A pregnant woman in Louisiana either has to carry a skullless fetus to term — so the baby is likely to die within hours — or travel to multiple states to get a Abortion has hired a prominent civil rights lawyer as she considers how to move forward.
Nancy Davis, 36, has retained attorney Ben Crump as she becomes the latest to embody the harrowing decisions some women are being forced to make after the US Supreme Court’s decision in June to strike down the right to abortion nationwide, according to A declaration from the prosecutor’s office.
Davis’ home state is among those that have banned abortion with very few exceptions. Davis, of Baton Rouge, has publicly stated that she attempted to abort her pregnancy after a 10-week ultrasound revealed that her fetus was missing the top of her skull – a condition known as acrania, which kills babies minutes or hours after birth.
But because acrania was not explicitly on Louisiana’s list of conditions warranting an exception to the state’s abortion ban, the hospital that treated Davis refused to terminate her pregnancy, which , Friday, was in its 13th week.
The medical center, Woman’s Hospital in Baton Rouge, referred her to an abortion clinic, saying her Medicaid insurance would not cover the procedure. But Louisiana abortion clinics have announced plans to leave the state amid legal battles over enforcement of the ban, according to the New Orleans news outlet. Gambit reported.
The state senator behind Louisiana’s abortion ban, Katrina Jackson, insisted to Baton Rouge TV WAFB that the hospital should have authorized the termination of Davis’ pregnancy, as the law contains exceptions for fetuses that are not viable outside the mother’s womb.
Nonetheless, in his office’s statement on working with Davis, Crump said the Louisiana abortion ban was clearly confusing to interpret and produced negative consequences, and he accused its authors of having “inflicted a profound emotional and physical trauma” to her client, as well as to other women in a similar situation. .
On Friday, Davis planned to possibly travel to Florida or North Carolina – which have abortion restrictions she can be exempted from – rather than give birth to what would be her second child, whom she would virtually lose. immediately.
“It’s hard to know that… I’m wearing it to bury it,” Davis told WAFB earlier this month.
The statement about Crump’s office working with Davis stopped short of saying what the legal plans are on their side, other than noting that she planned to raise money for her out-of-state abortion trip thanks to an online GoFundMe campaign.
But Davis told WAFB she hopes state lawmakers will consider additional medical conditions to serve as exceptions to the abortion ban, which threatens providers with criminal prosecution and confiscation of their medical licenses. .
“He’s the one who needs to be on this list [of exceptions]”Davis said of acrania.
The statement from Crump’s office added: ‘Ms. Nancy Davis has been placed in a horribly cruel position.
“Ms. Davis had to endure unthinkable emotional pain and increasing physical risk.”
A spokeswoman for the women’s hospital declined to comment when asked by CNN, citing medical confidentiality requirements. But the spokesperson said non-viable pregnancies were difficult to manage.
Other Crump clients include relatives of George Floyd, who was murdered by Minneapolis police; Trayvon Martin, an unarmed teenager who was shot by a neighborhood watch captain; and Breonna Taylor, who was killed by Kentucky police as they searched her home. Crump’s office helped the families of Floyd, Martin and Taylor secure tens of millions of dollars in settlement money.
Davis’ fate emerged almost at the same time as a Florida court blocked a pregnant 16-year-old girl to have an abortion. The court ruled that the girl was too immature to decide whether or not to have an abortion and therefore had to give birth to a child instead.
Meanwhile, in early summer, a 10-year-old girl from Ohio who was raped and pregnant had to travel to neighboring Indiana to terminate her pregnancy due to a ban on most abortions. by his state. Although some right-wing media and politicians have unfoundedly questioned whether the girl existed or was more of a liberal hoax to fuel support for abortion rights, authorities have since charged a man in connection with the girl’s rape, a crime he allegedly confessed to.