Police could search women's homes and phones after pregnancy loss

[IwantToRetire]

Police have been issued guidance on how to search women’s homes for abortion drugs and check their phones for menstrual cycle tracking apps after unexpected pregnancy loss.

New guidance from the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) on “child death investigation” advises officers to search for “drugs that can terminate pregnancy” in cases involving stillbirths. The NPCC, which sets strategic direction for policing across the country UK, also suggests a woman’s digital devices could be seized to help investigators “establish a woman’s knowledge and intention in relation to the pregnancy”. That could include checking a woman’s internet searches, messages to friends and famil y, and health apps, “such as menstrual cycle and fertility trackers”, it states.

Details are also provided for how police could bypass legal requirements for a court order to obtain medical records about a woman’s abortion from NHS providers.

Abortion law in the UK is based on the Offences Against the Person Act from 1861. In recent years, an increasing number of women have been investigated and prosecuted under this law. The Abortion Act of 1967 allows women to end their pregnancies under medical supervision up to 24 weeks, or beyond in certain circumstances, such as if the life of the mother is at risk or if the foetus has a serious abnormality.

The guidance replace s a 2014 document that did not mention investigating stillbirths, but had one mention of investigating women who may have had an illegal abortion. The new guidance, published in January and developed by a sub-group of the NPCC’s Homicide Working Group alongside the College of Policing, National Crime Agency and Metropolitan Police, covers the scenario over several pages.

The lead authors were Ch Sup t Liz Hughes of Avon and Somerset police force; Det Sup t Jon Holmes of Lancashire; DCS David Ashton of Durham; Ch Sup t Fiona Bitters of Hampshire and Isle of Wight; Sonya Baylis, of the National Crime Agency; and D S Robert Simmons of Suffolk.

Article continues at https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/police-could-search-homes-and-seize-phones-after-sudden-pregnancy-loss

The idea of this somehow helping trafficked or abused women doesn't make sense to me. Finding an illegal abortion doesn't help to prove that a woman was trafficked or abused. Instead even if the police do manage to prove she was trafficked, she still has to prove that she didn't consent to the termination otherwise she's a criminal just as much as the traffickers. And we already know how hard it is to prove lack of consent. This kind of investigation will just makes it that much harder for a pregnant abused or trafficked woman to seek help and escape. Sure, it may occasionally lead the police to a convict a trafficker if all goes well and they're very lucky but the possibility of investigation works against women and in favour of trafickers and abusers.

I've recommended it before and am doing so again, but Unborn by Rachel McLean is a "dystopian" novel which seems more and more like a prediction.

The guidelines pretty clearly focus suspicion primarily on the mother or HCPs (depending on the type of loss they're referring to). The possibility of third parties exerting control is only mentioned in passing. This is not a document aimed at protecting vulnerable women.

The headline does not misrepresent the facts except in that it says "could" instead of "can". These aren't new police powers the guidelines suggest using. It's just a change in emphasis that threatens increased risk of a criminal investigation for innocent women who have gone through a harrowing time. All for no social benefit, because we already know that criminal penalties for abortion do not effectively reduce the number that happen.

Women won't, though. Increasing the use of criminal prosecution will make women in difficult situations less likely to go and see a doctor as doing so will make her more vulnerable to police involvement down the line.

Studies show that criminal sanctions for abortion don't reduce numbers and do increase negative health outcomes. This is the case whether she ends up aborting or not. So it puts the fetuses of women who are unsure but don't abort at risk as well as the women and their families who are investigated when they did not break the law.

And it is an easy law for bad actors to abuse.

It just sounds sinister. Even if it was intended to protect women which I find dubious, the result will be to harass and victimise them.

But that’s an argument to decriminalise everything?

There isn’t much evidence that criminalising anything stops it from happening…… you can argue that about drugs, stealing etc so should we just make nothing illegal because it doesn’t actually stop or deter anything, so we should just as accept it as a society then and never impose a moral code that says no you should not do that

The argument isn't that it being a crime doesn't stop it happening - it doesn't, but you're right that that's true of all crime.

The argument is two fold - that it doesn't lower rates and that it causes harm (by making pregnant women fearful of seeking medical intervention in pregnancy and creating a route for abuse).

With most crime, criminalising it doesn't stop it happening but it does lower rates. And most criminal law doesn't create significant negative affects by deterring actions we want people to take. Nor does it throw a shadow of criminality over all to common tragedies, a shadow that would be easy for VAWG perpetrators to exploit (or misogynists in law enforcement) given it is uniquely about women's fertility.

(To be fair, the rates argument is contested - there difficulties in measuring. But from a public good perspective, even if it is effective in forcing women to continue with unwanted pregnancies, there are arguments about the impact on society of the unwanted children that result that also don't apply to the criminalization of most crime.)

Well I guess we have a choice here, the guidelines haven’t changed so either nothing will happen, they will be used to investigate late term illegal abortions amongst vulnerable women, or the police are in fact colluding to enforce a Netflix inspired dystopian nightmare scenario.

I grew up as a teen in the 90s thinking abortion was legal, but it’s only in the past ten years that I’ve learned it’s only decriminalised. There’s a strict difference. What’s needed is a complete overhaul of the law on the basis that abortion is healthcare.

That is precisely why she ended up in the news. If she had been poor, and trafficked from Congo, or Laos, or Lithuania, noone would have known or cared. Because she was "normal", it illustrates the full horror of the situation.

It's a bit like how noone cared about the victims of the Yorkshire Ripper until that poor kid who worked in the supermarket was murdered.

The police guidelines HAVE changed. That’s what prompted the thread.

And they come on the back of increased investigation of women who have suffered pregnancy loss over the last few years.

We don’t have to go full Gilead for it to be bad for women.

Abortion hasn’t been decriminalized in the UK. Where did you hear that?

Abortion is a crime, except when it is performed in accordance with the abortion act 1967, under which circumstances it is legal. (Different Act for N.I., it was a crime in virtually all circumstances there until a few years ago).

The difference is that legally a fetus is not a person and has no rights until it is born. So the ‘crime’ being committed is by a woman against who? Her own body?

And different in Scotland.

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/46/notes/division/5/5/11/4/15

'In Scotland the law relating to abortion, both civil and criminal, is mostly common law, with the exception of the Abortion Act 1967 (as amended). At common law in Scotland it is a crime to procure or attempt to procure an abortion. Certain exceptions or defences were provided by the common law but these are now superseded by the 1967 Act which sets out the circumstances in which it is lawful, for the purposes of the law relating to abortion, to carry out an abortion. The 1967 Act introduces in effect a similar regime for the whole of Great Britain.

The 1967 Act also makes provision for the approval of places where terminations of pregnancies may lawfully be carried out and for the making of regulations to require certification and notification of doctors opinions before a termination is carried out.

Attempts have been made to seek civil law remedies in Scotland to prevent abortions being carried out under the 1967 Act but these were unsuccessful.'

https://www.gov.scot/groups/abortion-law-review-expert-group/

'This group was established in 2024 to review the current law on abortion and provide Scottish ministers with recommendations on whether or not aspects of the existing law should be changed. If so, they will advise on potential legislative changes and any other changes needed to support that.'

No. The Abortion Act 1967 gives the criteria for legal abortion in Scotland as well as England and Wales. It’s the underlying law that criminalizes abortion that is different between England & Wales and Scotland.

Police forces are very prone to mission creep i.e. they are given the power to do something so they will find reasons to use that power, if only to reach targets set by commanding officers. Police forces are also historically sexist and unsupportive of women in vulnerable situations.

These are the same police forces making free with the various communications laws in the UK in order to investigate people for stating lawful political thoughts on social media, so I can’t imagine they’ll be any more sensible or sensitive if they are given the right to investigate women for pregnancy loss.

That ship sailed a long time ago. Don't try and use logic to engage with jurisprudence. They don't play nicely together.

Yes. That's what I meant.

The BMJ has criticised the new guidelines but cant acess the full article.

https://www.bmj.com/content/389/bmj.r1036.full

I came across this legal podcast discussing the recent changes in practice from Police and CPS with regards to women in this tragic situation:

https://overcast.fm/+AA60W8poF5Y

I just posted this on a thread where ppl are discussing the fact that police dont have time to investigate complaints about shoplifting. So thought id copy and paste it here.

Police have been given new guidelines suggesting they can search womens homes for abortion drugs and even their mobile phones for internet searches, messages to family and friends and health apps if a pregnancy loss is unexpected.
Between 1861 when abortion was made illegal and November 2022 with updates to the law in between just three women were prosecuted for procuring an illegal abortion in Great Britain. Yet the number of women subjected to the trauma of these investigations has risen sharply. Around 100 women have faced investigations since 2020. A breach of privacy which is enshrined in Article 8 of the Human Rights Act 1998.

For every woman who ends up in court at least 10 more are subjected to prolonged police investigations according to abortion providers.
Ive copied this out from the paper copy but here is the whole thing for anyone with a Readly account.
https://gb.readly.com/magazines/woman/2025-06-03/6836d0c7eeb04ebdc0894d0d?srsltid=AfmBOoov8OFys60YBElhNn6YaB4TPD3s82vP1N3WdNQqImYJe6xf8qe0

I lost 6 to miscarriage, usually between weeks 9 & 16. If I’d then been arrested & had the house, computer etc examined, there is absolutely no way I would be here typing this. I was suicidal after at least one of those miscarriages and police involvement would have been the straw that broke the camel’s back. If the police do this, more women will either not seek medical help - which could be fatal- or end up committing suicide.

We need to have proper, set in law rights to abortion & medical care after miscarriages. I fear for all women of childbearing age in the UK with this new guidance.

Im so sorry to hear what you have been through @MedievalNun