Woman jailed for two years for an (alleged) illegal abortion. What the hell is going on.

[TheLoneRager]

I have long believed abortion is legal in the UK and did not understand the nuance that it does, in fact remain illegal, but is allowed under certain circumstances, up to 23 weeks 6 days, two doctors Garth at continuing the pregnancy would be harmful to the mother's physical or mental health and a few other limitations, explained in the article linked.

All of a sudden there seems to be a rash of stories about women being prosecuted for illegal abortions in various circumstances, which is not something I have ever heard of before. Just look at the graph in the article. These prosecutions have gone from 1 or 2 in 2018 to 30 in 2022.
Meanwhile abortion providers report police demanding patient files on "fishing expeditions".
And hospital staff are presumably reporting women who appear to have had a stillbirth for investigation Incase this was an illegal abortion.

I'm not generally a conspiracy theorist but this doesn't feel like a coincidence.

What the hell is going on?

Laura’s story: jailed for having an abortion in Britain.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/a6b76dfe-14f5-11ed-a669-519b582f91b7?shareToken=e3beac680aa389a8bef6cb9f2fd8bf533_

That’s a brilliant, both a rage-inducing and very reassuring response from Jess Phillips. Why is this training not being given, its so sexist in an issue that vastly affects women for service providers not to be prepared for it, it’s infuriating. We can expect domestic violence to get more widespread given the pandemic and now followed by this economic catastrophe facing the UK, we need professionals to be able to look after women affected. Rather than by omission contribute to women being criminalised.

In a country where abortion is legal, people have to be stopped from buying dangerous stuff online. She should have seeked medical help. There's plenty around, thankfully

She was coerced by an abusive boyfriend.

But nice bit of victim blaming there.

*sought

@Jalisco we only have her word that she didn't realise she was that far along. If she was only a few weeks why wouldn't she have had a legal abortion? Why would her boyfriend suggest a backstreet supplier?

Sorry to me this is isn't a straightforward case of she didn't know, anyway there's a reason that they didn't seek legal means. We only have her word that the boyfriend suggested it, she didn't have to go ahead.

I'm not saying she wasn't coerced, she may have been but there's no proof. This was probably a viable baby, so this was so wrong and needed punishment.

Wasn't this law from 1860 or something like that?
I maybe wrong, but if I'm right, why haven't our laws been updated to the 21st century.

And yes, her boyfriend should of been charged not her.

@gogohmm - I don’t think any sane woman would go through what Laura did if she’d had a choice. I don’t know any woman who would knowingly choose to have to give birth alone in a bathtub to a dead baby.

How do you know there is no proof of what Laura says happened? Maybe her boyfriend has a long history of DV, maybe neighbours/friends and family had witnessed his behaviour in the past? Coercive control is very hard to prove, but it very much exists and fortunately the courts are starting to recognise this. In this case it doesn’t sound like the police tried very hard to find out. A vulnerable woman is an easy target for abusive men and sadly the justice system. There are a lot of women in prison for the crimes of their partners.

The idea she needed to be punished makes my stomach turn. She needed to be protected.

The idea she needed to be punished makes my stomach turn. She needed to be protected
It makes my stomach turn too. She was clearly a very vulnerable woman to have done what she did. She needed support not punishment.

In a country where safe, free, legal abortion is widely available (acknowledging there are problems with access in some areas) I think any woman having a late, illegal abortion will be doing so for a reason - there will be a back story that needs investigating.
Reasons might include ignorance (lack of education/understanding), coercion or other abusive situation, obtaining pills over the internet without understanding the legal and health risks.

These are the issues that need addressing, not criminalising desperate women. Especially not sending them to prison, leaving their children to be cared for by relatives or the state and possibly at risk.
It serves no purpose to imprison these women.

I'm shocked at some of the victim blaming, both here and in the comments in the Times which are very depressing.

is there a question here of heritage leading into a lack of knowledge about legal issues we all take as 'understood and general knowledge'? Or a question about the right of a woman to make her own decisions. She is not 'property' of even a husband.
Certainly sad that baby was viable.
Hard cases don't make good law.

You can crack down on unregistered medical care without having abortion itself be illegal. The pill providers and other people who facilitated Laura’s abuse can all be “Cracked down on” using other legislation. Abortion being illegal only helps with persecuting women, not with poor or abusive medical care.

It wasn't 'the baby' that was 30 weeks old, it was the pregnancy occurring inside a woman's body.

Potential viability of the fetus does not alter the fact that the central issue is women's bodily autonomy.

Even if a woman isn't coerced or knows how far along a pregnancy is, her actions around her pregnancy shouldn't be criminalised.

As to how and why she was reported to the police - healthcare providers have a statutory duty to report eg disclosure about the abortion tablets purchased and taken outside of the mandated abortion pathway.

The other victims in this case are her three children, whose mother is now in jail for an act that shouldn't ever be criminalised.

drinkingwineoutofamug the 1967 Abortion Act essentially created loopholes in the Offences against the person Act of 1861 to make abortion legal in most circumstances ie before 24 weeks unless Ground E, two doctors in agreement etc.

It's limitation is that the circumstances in which abortion is still criminalised are those that invariably affect vulnerable, disempowered and traumatised women.

That's why abortion needs to be completely decriminalised.

Exactly, the news article states it like it was earlier, but she would have been pretty heavily pregnant at this point. Her actions killed a baby, not a featus. After about 28 weeks, these babies have a distinctive pattern of movement, so they're developing personalities.

I would agree if someone was having a pill abortion under 22 weeks or had maybe missed the deadline by a couple of weeks. But we're talking about 1.5 months later.

There is an increase in these stories because the progressives are trying to worry you OP.

I totally agree. She should have been getting support, and more should have been done for her. Before not after, she really does need support, and being convicted should be part of her getting that support. It is hard for anyone, let alone us, with third hand information to undertake exactly what happened.

But the boyfriend should have gotten a sentence, but maybe there was a lack of evidence, which if there was more support for women (and men) in toxic and abusive relationships. Then, hopefully, there would be witnesses and more evidence to convict him.

The whole situation seems fucked up. But let's remember that victims can also be perpetrators.

Again? The late abortion ( up to 24 weeks) law was there for the medical emergency outliers, it was never intended to be used just because a woman changed her mind about having a baby. 30 weeks is quite some over this. Whatever the circumstances ( and yes if laws don't already exist then they need updating to ensure that anyone piling pressure on to abort should absolutely be prosecuted). There does need to be protections in place for the child, which could easily have survived ( rather than bemoaning the fact that if someone hadn't reported then she would have got away with killing her child no questions asked). It's also worrying from that angle. But agree jail is not the answer.

No one can confuse 10 weeks pg with 30 weeks.

What she did was murder.

If she was vulnerable, needed help, bring abused, she should have sought help from the relevant bodies, gp, school etc.

She chose to do what she did at the end of the day has rightly been punished for it imo.

@flustercuckoo my post was last August about an abuse case that was shockingly mishandled. It is not so easy in an abusive relationship to just get help, the help has been cut to the bone and the victim is often terrified of the consequences.
But are you talking about the current case? If so then I agree that is a very different situation to the one I commented on last August not least because her search history proves she did know the gestation of the baby.

Suggesting that someone in a coercively controlling relationship, let alone a woman with three children, simply needs to contact the relevant authorities shows a complete absence of understanding of coercive control.

Fetus is the correct term, not baby. A fetus becomes a baby when it is birthed at which point it is entitled to all the legal protections that all babies have in the UK. Before that point, legally and biologically, it is a fetus.

Napmum nope, the law doesn't work like that. There isn't a day of leeway over 24 weeks let alone the somewhat arbitrary week and a half that you suggest.

She wasn't charged with murder, so you're wrong about that as well.

Fluatercuckoo yet every year in the UK there are hundreds of women who try to access abortion care either close to or after 24 weeks. Goodness knows how many more taking similar actions to this poor woman.

These women are invariably in coercively controlled relationships, in denial that they're pregnant usually due to trauma or have such chaotic lives that they haven't really engaged with the realities of a pregnancy.

Completely agree with those who say these women need support and understanding, not criminalisation and condemnation (the latter usually from people who have not a clue about the lives of these women).