El Salvador court absolves woman accused of killing her stillborn child
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
CIUDAD DELGADO, El Salvador (Reuters) - A Salvadoran court absolved a woman previously convicted of aggravated homicide after she gave birth to a stillborn child, the woman's lawyer Bertha DeLeon said on Monday, in a closely watched retrial that overturns a 30-year prison sentence.
Defendant Evelyn Hernandez, 21, has already served three years of the sentence handed down after prosecutors said she had induced an abortion.
The case had attracted international attention.
"Thank God, justice was done," Hernandez, in tears, told a cheering crowd outside the court building.
Any intentional termination of a pregnancy in El Salvador can be prosecuted as a crime, including stillbirths due to home delivery or abortions induced because of medical emergencies, with some women receiving up to 40 years in prison.
"We believe the judge was very just in the ruling. The judge said there was no way to prove a crime was committed and that is why (Hernandez) was acquitted," said DeLeon.
Some 147 Salvadoran women were sentenced to up to 40 years in prison in such cases between 2000 and 2014, according to the Citizen Group for the Decriminalization of Abortion, a local rights group.
"There are many women who are still locked up and I call for them to be freed soon, too," said Hernandez.
In February, the Supreme Court ordered Hernandez released and retried, saying that the original judge's decision was based on prejudice and insufficient evidence.
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I've actually been watching this case for a couple of years and am glad that finally saner minds have prevailed in this case.
Anyone crafting anti-abortion laws should pay attention to the examples seen in El Salvador and other countries when doing so
Anyone crafting anti-abortion laws probably uses or wants the El Salvadorian system. It boggles the mind that such laws exist in the world in this day and age. Even more so that some politicians want enact similar kind of laws here. It's like some people prefer an irrational draconian way of thinking.
No offence meant to El Salvador but that any 1st world country/people would consider emulating the draconian laws/punishments of essentially a 3rd world country is puzzling to say the least
Even 3rd world countries having such laws is puzzling. We're talking medieval level mentality.
Not much different in concept than the idea of familial responsibility for a alleged crime so prevalent in history up until the middle of the last century and still practiced in some parts of the world today.
The idea that a woman should be charged with a crime because of a miscarriage, abortion, stillbirth, etc., is not just reprehensible, it is misogynistic at it's core. The fact that some people support criminalizing such things, not to mention some countries already have such laws, only proves that.