Women imprisoned for Miscarrying

El Salvador: Where women may be jailed for miscarrying

El Salvador has one of the toughest anti-abortion laws in the world. A side-effect is that women who suffer miscarriages are sometimes suspected of inducing an abortion - and can even be jailed for murder.

Glenda Xiomara Cruz was crippled by abdominal pain and heavy bleeding in the early hours of 30 October 2012. The 19-year-old from Puerto El Triunfo, eastern El Salvador, went to the nearest public hospital where doctors said she had lost her baby.

It was the first she knew about the pregnancy as her menstrual cycle was unbroken, her weight practically unchanged, and a pregnancy test in May 2012 had been negative.

Four days later she was charged with aggravated murder - intentionally murdering the 38-to-42 week foetus - at a court hearing she was too sick to attend. The hospital had reported her to the police for a suspected abortion.

After two emergency operations and three weeks in hospital she was moved to Ilopango women's prison on the outskirts of the capital San Salvador. Then last month she was sentenced to 10 years in jail, the judge ruling that she should have saved the baby's life.

El Salvador is one of five countries with a total ban on abortion, along with Nicaragua, Chile, Honduras and Dominican Republic. Since 1998, the law has allowed no exceptions - even if a woman is raped, her life is at risk or the foetus is severely deformed.

More than 200 women were reported to the police between 2000 and 2011, of whom 129 were prosecuted and 49 convicted - 26 for murder (with sentences of 12 to 35 years) and 23 for abortion, according to research by Citizens' Group for the Decriminalization of Abortion. Seven more have been convicted since 2012.

bbc

Places where abusive husbands can help prosecute their victims. Women are presumed guilty also those countries are predominantly Catholic and for some reason prostitution is either excepted or legal. Women can be in fear of having a miscarriage because they may go to jail. This may explain some of the anchor babies in the US who knows.

I remember some of the legislation and statements from the far right and imagine they only wish they could adopt similar laws here. Imagine that they want the US to be more like El Salvador.

38-to-42 am I having a brain fart but isn't standard pregnancy 40 weeks?

And shes claiming she didn't know she was 9 months pregnant? Mayhaps there is some guilt here?

Not saying the laws are not barbaric, just even here at 9 months intentional abortion is a crime and Men have gone to jail for such things.

This is horrible. I've had two miscarriages and even though they usually can't tell you why it happened, many women carry a huge amount of guilt wondering if they've done something wrong, or if they could have done something different. I know I did.

Then to jail them on top of their loss and their guilt? That's horrible.

Something like 20% of known pregnancies ends in miscarriage, and with the amount of unknown pregnancies (not knowing and miscarrying) that figure is even higher.

These lawmakers should be ashamed of themselves.

Weird, i thought this would be about the shoplifter at Victoria's Secret who had a fetus in her bag...

I guess its how their law is.

Isn't it "murder" if husband or boyfriend "caused" the miscarriage? whats the difference?

I

reply to post by benrl


Standard is forty weeks but sometimes women can go as long as 42, which could be a miscalculation of their due date.

And I can't imagine not knowing for that long..

She's not alone though. There are stories like her's all the time. There's even a show called "I didn't know I was pregnant". Some of the women had pictures from a short time before delivery and it wasn't at all obvious. I do think many were in denial though.

Either way, no woman should be punished for (the average, IE not caused by heavy illicit drug use or intentional means) miscarrying a pregnancy.

daryllyn
reply to post by benrl

 

Standard is forty weeks but sometimes women can go as long as 42, which could be a miscalculation of their due date.

And I can't imagine not knowing for that long..

She's not alone though. There are stories like her's all the time. There's even a show called "I didn't know I was pregnant". Some of the women had pictures from a short time before delivery and it wasn't at all obvious. I do think many were in denial though.

Either way, no woman should be punished for (the average, IE not caused by heavy illicit drug use or intentional means) miscarrying a pregnancy.

Right, but you know in the US their are currently doctors in jail for performing late term abortions, I can think of one in Ohio recently serving life.

So the thing here is intent, even in OUR legal system someone intentionally aborting at such a late stage would raise questions.

And has led to jail for boyfriends who caused it, so the fact that shes facing charges is not so unusual than, even in the US she could if the doctors thought she harmed the baby on purpose (9months lets call it what it is) .

SO the question SHOULD be asked, and investigated, My only question is how hard are the convection rates, is she gonna get to fairly answer the court or is she going to be railroaded because of the law?

ITS Not as clear cut and dry as the op seems to present it as.

reply to post by benrl


You should read the linked article. There is a whole lot more to the stories but I have to stay within T&C and keep the OPs short. Maybe my last long thread was clipped and I got an infraction more because it wasn't kind to the tea party than actually quoting to much.

Anyway she didn't gain weight nor did her cycle change so she didn't even know she was pregnant. Also in the article her father says that she has endured years of abuse from her husband so he may have hit her causing a miscarriage and she is prosecuted for it.

Grimpachi
reply to post by benrl

 

You should read the linked article. There is a whole lot more to the stories but I have to stay within T&C and keep the OPs short. Maybe my last long thread was clipped and I got an infraction more because it wasn't kind to the tea party than actually quoting to much.

Anyway she didn't gain weight nor did her cycle change so she didn't even know she was pregnant.

And all I am saying that very well might be what someone Would say when their 8.5-9 month pregnancy aborts and shes faced with charges.

Hell thats probably the smart stance to take in a country with those laws , But we know from US statistics that unwanted pregnancy on average get far less prenatal care, if any at all.

Most when they find out don't go to doctors, which this case would fit that pattern.

It would seem that it is plausible that could of been the case, so with out knowing how slanted the legal system is we can't know the extent of the problem there based on this case.

reply to post by benrl



Abortion is illegal there but those women are being imprisoned for miscarriages.

Munoz has worked with 29 of the incarcerated women, helping secure the early release of eight. "Only one intentionally induced an abortion, the other 28 suffered natural obstetric complications but were jailed for murder without any direct evidence," he says.

Last year when Maria Teresa Rivera suffered a miscarriage, she was sentenced to 40 years in jail for aggravated murder.

Like Xiomara, Teresa, 28, had no pregnancy symptoms before sudden severe pain and bleeding, and was reported to police by the public hospital where she had sought emergency help.

The scientific evidence was flimsy, according to Munoz who will soon lodge an appeal, and the prosecution relied heavily on a colleague of hers, who testified that Rivera had said she "might be" pregnant a full 11 months before the miscarriage.

Good. I agree.

She's 19. I suspect something really bad is going on here.

Any laws that violate a person's sovereignity are crimes. This is a crime that just took place, and she is victim of government kidnapping, imprisonment and forced slave labor. That is how I view the legal system in our neck of the woods too, for most crimes. And anyone who allows them to target your family and gives up rights that should never be on the plate, is equally guilty of slavery, kidnapping and the whole rest of it.

Citizens should have stood up thousands of years ago together in outrage at their jailers and so called rulers, they should have been forced off planet...!!! Because they aint human!!!!! PERIOD!!!!

In any case, what I suspect is going on is they are not only kidnapping her but creating forced sex slaves and so the judge and all the corrupt officials in that chain of command need to be exposed for what they are, and groups should be getting PI's on the job. However it will have be grass roots by the very angry and protective parents, becaues most PI's would know their lives were at risk and thus would probably hide evidence to save their own lives. Because the evil dark side mafia system wouldn't let them get that proof.

People have to and they have to expose these evil creatures and all their wrong doings and RESCUE ALL THOSE VICTIMS IN JAIL AND IN THEIR BASES. PERIOD!

Its really time to wake up and love each other enought to stand up and do the right thing.

Its' out and out criminals running the government, courts and system, such evil criminal that no one on earth is capapble to the extent of what they do to people and the planet. You don't obey their crapola nor do you offer your children as sacrifices on altars to their rule. You expose and fire their buttsides, and nard them extremely hard, and cut them off from wealth. Ie, don't give them money, whether or not you can get them in jail is one thing, but solidarity in large numbers handles all of this, and you don't vote for any of them. If some party threw someone up to the lead, its because they're pscyho's and you do not vote for them. Only for your own human people. Average, school teacher, joe down the street, and groups of people, not winner take all politics, counsels of citizens.

Cut them off, dont' buy their products. People are unemployed, good thing, so start ethical small businesses and buy from each other, never buy from them again.

Its us or them and they aint human, they're demons in training.

reply to post by benrl


What if you are assuming she is guilty and she's not?

A friend of mine lost her son in utero at 32 weeks. She did everything right, never missed an appointment or test, ate right, took her prenatal vitamins, etc. She found out at a routine check up when the Doppler didnt pick up a heartbeat and then it was confirmed via ultrasound.

Sometimes these things happen and it's more common than one would think.

I get that you don't buy her story but, as ridiculous as it sounds to not know you are pregnant, it IS possible. I know several women that found out late. One found out at six months, she wasn't showing, she had not gained anything, no morning sickness, and was still having what she thought was her period.

I guess I'm inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt.

She could very well be telling the truth and if that's the case, my heart breaks for her situation.

In order to do this to a 19 year old beautiful wonderful young woman, my daughter, your daughter, we're all one, we're one family. They wanted her. Either as a sex slave, or maybe she miscarried because of RH- problem, and due to the pregnancy not being known and/or her lack of medical, she didn't get the proper treatment. If that's the case, then they may want her for a variety of reasons, the sex slave stuff AND their DNA harvesting because she has something they're looking for.

But its nothing is what you think it is.

And no, other countries do not have the right to create obscene unjust laws. There should be world wide laws, and human rights upheld in a wonderful advanced way, including full services and medical to all people, everyone housed, AND consequences, police action, setting unjust corrupt things straight. I don't mean wars and bombing. There is no scarsity, that is a chess game. It's a system of abundance and that we're standing by and betraying our family in our countries and our greater abroad family, by not insisting on what is right and good and higher mind, being done, is a crime in itself.

Those who are free carry the torch of freedom, they're supposed to be using it to free everyone, pass it one, because they're all your family, we know everyone here.

benrl

Grimpachi
reply to post by benrl

 

You should read the linked article. There is a whole lot more to the stories but I have to stay within T&C and keep the OPs short. Maybe my last long thread was clipped and I got an infraction more because it wasn't kind to the tea party than actually quoting to much.

Anyway she didn't gain weight nor did her cycle change so she didn't even know she was pregnant.

And all I am saying that very well might be what someone Would say when their 8.5-9 month pregnancy aborts and shes faced with charges.

Hell thats probably the smart stance to take in a country with those laws , But we know from US statistics that unwanted pregnancy on average get far less prenatal care, if any at all.

Most when they find out don't go to doctors, which this case would fit that pattern.

It would seem that it is plausible that could of been the case, so with out knowing how slanted the legal system is we can't know the extent of the problem there based on this case.

So the abuser becomes the witness and to top it off her daughter loses her mother. As you can see with one reply on this thread there seems to those here that wish that on all women.

Xiomara's father describes the conviction as a "terrible injustice".

He testified in court that his daughter had endured years of domestic violence at the hands of her partner. And yet the prosecution - which sought a 50-year jail term - relied heavily on this man's allegation that she had intentionally killed the foetus.

Xiomara has not seen her four-year-old daughter since the miscarriage.

reply to post by Unity_99Unity, I agree wholeheartedly with your heartfelt words and impassioned suggestions. And I do think that, based on only what I read in the OP and what else I could find online about this case, this girl is being railroaded.

Being in a 3rd-world (albeit developing) nation, El Salvador has an extremely low birthrate now. And -- outside of sex trafficking -- she could very well have been a very malnourished peasant girl who couldn't have possibly have carried a first pregnancy to term.

To any naysayers out there: The viability of a first term pregnancy into and even through its third trimester is around 30% to 50%... and the 30% viability is just the lower end of the average for 3rd world countries.

I have a very good friend in Ecuador who some years ago impregnated a woman on a trip whom to visit family in Ecuador. She was at that time a very sheltered, young villager. He did the right thing and brought her back to the US (he's a citizen); they married and have two young healthy children now in NY.
The point of that anecdote is: Imagine what would have happened to that young girl had she not realized early enough her condition (pregnant).
I can't help but wonder if this girl in El Salvador... and so many others like her... are not in that same state, but without the saviors -- such as my friend -- who did the right thing by her and their children.

And, yes, let's talk about pregnancies that result from child prostitution in these countries that forbid abortion and women's healthcare in general. Any country that bans contraception and as-needed abortion but still permits prostitution (or turns a blind eye to it) should be abhorrent to the UN and to the US. And especially to the US, they should be called out by name, sanctioned, and US corporations that do business with them be equitably sanctioned, if not by the government, then by our voices rising above the tyranny that we -- with our own freedoms -- oppose.

It's been happening in Mississippi:

On March 14, 2009, 31 weeks into her pregnancy, Nina Buckhalter gave birth to a stillborn baby girl. She named the child Hayley Jade. Two months later, a grand jury in Lamar County, Mississippi, indicted Buckhalter for manslaughter, claiming that the then-29-year-old woman "did willfully, unlawfully, feloniously, kill Hayley Jade Buckhalter, a human being, by culpable negligence."

Link

reply to post by links234


Thanks for posting that link. I sort of remember when that made the news but I didn't know about all of the other cases.

If our country took the money they spend on jailing substance a users and put it into treatment programs the entire country would be a better place. Those are some insane lawmakers though.

daryllyn
This is horrible. I've had two miscarriages and even though they usually can't tell you why it happened, many women carry a huge amount of guilt wondering if they've done something wrong, or if they could have done something different. I know I did.

Then to jail them on top of their loss and their guilt? That's horrible.

Something like 20% of known pregnancies ends in miscarriage, and with the amount of unknown pregnancies (not knowing and miscarrying) that figure is even higher.

These lawmakers should be ashamed of themselves.

You carry guilt? But I though the fetus isnt a living thing yiu can kill or murder. So why feel bad if misdcarried?