Posted on 07/19/2007 3:47:30 PM PDT by Coleus
An 18-year-old Dominican immigrant charged two months ago with illegally inducing an abortion by taking anti-ulcer pills will not face homicide charges, prosecutors said yesterday. Prosecutors had been considering the more serious charge after Amber Abreu prematurely delivered a 1-pound girl named Ashley at Lawrence General Hospital on Jan. 6. She died four days later. Abreu, a Lawrence resident, allegedly admitted that she had taken three Cytotec pills before giving birth, an abortion method that is common in some Latin American communities, authorities said.
Abortion is illegal in Massachusetts after 24 weeks of pregnancy, and any action to cause a miscarriage after that threshold could lead to homicide charges. The state medical examiner determined that Abreu's fetus had been 25 weeks old at death, according to the Essex district attorney's office. Prosecutors, however, decided that they would probably not be able to convince a jury that Ashley was a viable human being who had been killed. "The baby was 25 weeks, and you can't prove viability beyond a reasonable doubt at 25 weeks," said Steve O'Connell , a spokesman for the office.
Yesterday, an Essex County grand jury indicted Abreu on the lesser charge of illegally procuring an abortion, a felony that carries up to seven years in prison if convicted. Abreu has been released on $15,000 bail. O'Connell said she will be arraigned in Salem Superior Court within the next two weeks.
The decision by prosecutors ends speculation on an unusual case at the complex intersection of law, medicine, and culture. Authorities said that Abreu showed up at Lawrence General complaining of stomach pains, gave birth, then disappeared. Doctors rushed Ashley to Tufts-New England Medical Center, but physicians there were unable to keep her alive. Prosecutors said that Abreu told police, "I killed my baby."
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
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She admitted it. Charge her with murder.
“Cytotec (misoprostol) is contraindicated, because of its abortifacient property, in women who are pregnant. ( See PRECAUTIONS.)”
This is from the rxlist.com site.
This is from the FDA.gov site:
“Misoprostol (marketed as Cytotec) Information
FDA ALERT – Risks of Use in Labor and Delivery
This Patient Information Sheet is for pregnant women who may receive misoprostol to soften their cervix or induce contractions to begin labor. Misoprostol is sometimes used to decrease blood loss after delivery of a baby. These uses are not approved by the FDA. No company has sent the FDA scientific proof that misoprostol is safe and effective for these uses.
There can be serious side effects, including a torn uterus (womb), when misoprostol is used for labor and delivery. A torn uterus may result in severe bleeding, having the uterus removed (hysterectomy), and death of the mother or baby. These side effects are more likely in women who have had previous uterine surgery, a previous Cesarean delivery (C-section), or several previous births.”
This information reflects FDA’s preliminary analysis of data concerning this drug. FDA is considering, but has not reached a final conclusion about, this information. FDA intends to update this sheet when additional information or analyses become available.
"Misoprostol and declining abortion-related morbidity in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic: a temporal association.
Miller S, Lehman T, Campbell M, Hemmerling A, Anderson SB, Rodriguez H, Gonzalez WV, Cordero M, Calderon V.
Women's Global Health Imperative, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of California, San Francisco, California 94105-3444, USA.
OBJECTIVE: To validate anecdotal reports that abortion-related complications decreased in the Dominican Republic after the introduction of misoprostol into the country.
DESIGN: Retrospective records reviews and cross-sectional surveys, interviews and focus groups.
SETTING: Family planning clinics, pharmacies, door-to-door canvassing and a tertiary care maternity hospital in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.
POPULATION: Women of reproductive age in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.
METHODS: Qualitative and quantitative methods were used. Individual interviews and focus groups of reproductive health professionals, non-governmental organisation leaders and women's group leaders (n= 50) were conducted to discover the role of misoprostol in the Dominican Republic. Local women (n= 157) were surveyed to determine their knowledge of misoprostol as an abortifacient and mystery client visits were made to 80 pharmacies in order to purchase misoprostol without a prescription.
Sales data were obtained that documented when misoprostol was introduced to the Dominican Republic pharmacies. Hospital admissions for abortions from the prior eight years were reviewed and hospital emergency room consultation ledgers of 31,190 visits for the period 1994-2001 were reviewed for abortion complications.
MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Frequencies of maternal morbidities and knowledge of misoprostol.
RESULTS: Mystery clients purchased misoprostol without a prescription in nearly 64% of pharmacies; staff provided little additional information or counselling. Reliable sales data documented the introduction of misoprostol in 1986.
Abortion complications decreased from 11.7% of abortions in 1986 to 1.7% in 2001. The majority of professionals interviewed felt that knowledge of these findings should be made public.
CONCLUSIONS: The data were of too poor quality to validate the verbal reports reliably, but misoprostol appears to have been widely used over a period when abortion-related morbidity fell. It remains plausible that the use of misoprostol contributed to the reduction.
Publication Types:
Validation Studies
PMID: 16101610 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
If nothing else, what I was able to pull up here in just a few minutes ought to give credence to her story about where she got the idea and should also show the level to which our “health” agencies are involved in protecting everybody, almost everybody.
“I felt bad because I knew she was suffering,” Abreu told the Eagle Tribune about her daughter’s death. “I felt guilty for what I had done. At that moment, I’d have done anything to let her live.” “I was hysterical when she died. I hugged her and kissed her,” she indicated.”
This poor girl fell for the “it’s not a child” lie from the leftist culture of death. When she held her dying baby in her arms, then she realizes what she has done and how she has been decieved.
I’ve met women like this. They become true abortion haters. They figure out, after their child is dead, that they have been scammed by the abortion industry.
They end up outside of clinics, desperate to keep others from making their mistakes.
Okay, when does she get deported?
If this were a doctor at a clinic they would be pressing charges of murder...unless it was Kansas' Tiller.... What an odd country we live in.
Sad post.
So, she wanted to abort her child, but then named her Ashley? What kind of psycho freak is the mother? BTW I thought abortion is legal everywhere in the US until the second before birth (Doe v. Bolton) all the mother has to say is that she has a “health condition”.
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