For immediate release
Contact: media@pregnancyjusticeus.org
NEW YORK – A judge vacated the conviction of our client, Brooke Shoemaker, who served five years of an 18-year sentence for experiencing a stillbirth. In vacating her conviction last week, the judge found that new evidence we presented on an infection causing the stillbirth was credible. Immediately after the ruling, the state filed a notice of appeal and demanded that Ms. Shoemaker remain incarcerated, away from her family, while the state pursues its groundless case.
“While we are thrilled with the judge’s decision, we are outraged that Ms. Shoemaker is still behind bars when she should have been home for Christmas,” said former Pregnancy Justice Senior Staff Attorney Emma Roth. “She was convicted based on feelings, not facts. Pregnancy Justice will continue to fight on appeal and prove that pregnancies end tragically for reasons far beyond a mother’s control. Women like Ms. Shoemaker should be allowed to grieve their loss without fearing arrest.”
In 2017, Ms. Shoemaker delivered a stillborn at home before being taken to a hospital by paramedics, where she disclosed to medical staff that she used methamphetamine during her pregnancy. Instead of being met with the health care she needed, a detective interrogated her at her bedside. Although a medical examiner could not determine the cause of the stillbirth and her placenta showed clear signs of infection, police arrested Ms. Shoemaker and charged her with Class A chemical endangerment of a minor; a conviction carries a potential life sentence.
Ms. Shoemaker was convicted in 2020 of chemical endangerment resulting in a death and was sentenced to 18 years in prison, one of the longest known sentences for a pregnancy-related prosecution. The Alabama Criminal Court of Appeals affirmed Ms. Shoemaker’s conviction, and the Alabama Supreme Court declined to hear her case, leaving her conviction intact.
After becoming Ms. Shoemaker’s counsel in 2024, Pregnancy Justice filed a petition alongside Andrew Stanley of the Samford Law Office requesting a hearing based on new evidence about the infection that led to the demise of Ms. Shoemaker’s pregnancy, leading the judge to agree with Pregnancy Justice’s medical witness and to vacate the conviction.
“After years of fighting, I’m thankful that I’m finally being heard, and I pray that my next Christmas will be spent at home with my children and parents,” said Ms. Shoemaker. “I’m hopeful that my new trial will end with me being freed, because I simply lost my pregnancy at home because of an infection. I loved and wanted my baby, and I never deserved this.”
Alabama leads the nation in pregnancy-related prosecutions, with Pregnancy Justice documenting 192 cases in the state in the first two years after the loss of Roe. Alabama also has some of the worse maternal and infant health outcomes in the U.S. Every major medical and public health association in the country, including Alabama’s own maternal mortality review committee, has called for the end of punitive responses to pregnancy like what Ms. Shoemaker endured.
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Pregnancy Justice advances and defends the rights of pregnant people, no matter if they give birth, experience a pregnancy loss, or have an abortion. No one should lose their rights because of pregnancy.