After the 1973 Roe decision, anti-abortion groups responded with a strategic plan to reverse the decision and recriminalize abortion through laws that seek to codify the belief that life begins at conception. Some of these criminal statutes create a new crime for causing a pregnancy loss by injuring a pregnant person, and others expand the definitions of "person" or "another" to include zygotes, embryos, and fetuses under existing criminal codes for murder, manslaughter, or related charges.
When Fetuses Gain Personhood: Understanding the Impact on IVF, Contraception, Medical Treatment, Criminal Law, Child Support, and Beyond
After suffering setbacks, the fetal personhood movement has gained support. The theory of a fetus as a legal person has become the framework of anti-abortion states and was highlighted in Justice Alito's majority opinion in Dobbs, creating a path for a fetal right to life argument under the Due Process Clause of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments.
Pregnancy Justice Submits Testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee on the Impact of the Dobbs Decision
We submitted written testimony at the request of the Senate Judiciary Committee as part of their July, 2022 hearing, "A Post-Roe America: The Legal Consequences of the Dobbs Decision." Our testimony covers the devastating impact of the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade.
Confronting Pregnancy Criminalization: A Practical Guide for Healthcare Providers, Lawyers, Medical Examiners, Child Welfare Workers, and Policymakers
For decades, pregnant people across America have been subjected to criminalization and deprivations of liberty on the basis of pregnancy or pregnancy outcomes. Women have been targeted by police and prosecutors, healthcare providers, child welfare workers, and judges who have sought to deprive them of their constitutional rights in the name of "fetal personhood.
With Roe in the Balance, Pregnancy Justice Launches Multidisciplinary Confronting Pregnancy Criminalization Guide for Medical, Legal, Child Welfare, and Policy Professionals
June 23, 2022
As we await the anticipated fall of Roe and the subsequent loss of the constitutionally protected right to abortion, Pregnancy Justice today launched a first-of-its-kind, multidisciplinary guide to arm professionals with the tools and resources to reject the criminalization of pregnant people and their pregnancy outcomes — Confronting Pregnancy Criminalization: A Practical Guide for Healthcare Providers, Lawyers, Medical Examiners, Child Welfare Workers, and Policymakers.
Speak Out Against Obstetric Violence: Justice for Rinat Dray Toolkit
Contact Northwell Health and ask them to resolve Rinat Dray’s case and to take steps to ensure pregnant patients are never again forced to undergo medical procedures without consent.
Background:
Rinat Dray was pregnant with her third child in 2011, and after two cesarean surgeries, she was committed to finding a provider who would be open to the possibility of, and respect her desire for, a Vaginal Birth After Cesarean (VBAC). She chose Northwell Health’s Staten Island University Hospital (SIUH). Despite advertising itself as a VBAC-friendly hospital, Ms. Dray’s birth experience at SIUH was even worse than her previous ones.
Murder Charge Against Chelsea Becker for Experiencing a Stillbirth Is Dismissed
For Immediate Release: May 20, 2021
Today, Kings County Superior Court Judge Robert Shane Burns dismissed the murder charge against our client, Chelsea Becker. This outcome is a major victory in her 19-month legal battle challenging the legitimacy of a murder charge for experiencing a stillbirth.
Webinar Recording Available! When Pregnancy is Used to Deny Pregnant Patients Their Civil and Human Rights
Experts Address the Rights of Pregnant Patients to Informed Consent, Bodily Integrity, and Medical Decision Making
What happens when a pregnant patient exercises their right to medical decision making? Is there any justification to override a pregnant patient’s consent? Join Pregnancy Justice for a discussion featuring leaders in bioethics, medicine, law and birth justice about pregnant patients' rights to informed consent, bodily integrity, and medical decision making and the trauma that forced medical interventions can inflict on pregnant people.
Webinar Recording: Anti-Abortion and Pro-Insurrection: How White Supremacists, Male Supremacists, and Anti-Abortionists Converged at the Capitol
Webinar Recording: Anti-Abortion and Pro-Insurrection: How White Supremacists, Male Supremacists, and Anti-Abortionists Converged at the Capitol
Dr. Carol Mason and Professor Loretta J. Ross explain connections between the insurrectionary right and anti-abortion ideology, both of which are fueled by racism, anti-Semitism, and misogyny.
Pregnancy Justice Submits Amicus Brief in Manuela et al. v. El Salvador
On March 10 and 11, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights heard oral arguments in the case of Manuela et al. v. El Salvador. El Salvador has an absolute abortion ban. Under that law, women who have abortions go to jail along with women like Manuela who, in 2008, was sentenced to 30 years in prison after suffering a miscarriage.