Today, the Center for Reproductive Rights filed an appeal with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in a case involving a Louisiana woman who was forced to carry a pregnancy to term as a result of a prison policy that prevented her from obtaining an abortion. The Center maintains that the prison policy violated the woman’s Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment protections.
"A woman’s constitutional right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy does not end when she is placed behind bars," said Linda Rosenthal, a staff attorney for the Center for Reproductive Rights and lead counsel on the case. "The jail created insurmountable obstacles that actually prevented her from obtaining an abortion and deprived her of her constitutional right to an abortion," added Rosenthal.
The Center for Reproductive Rights is arguing that prison officials failed to attend to the serious medical needs of the plaintiff and, by requiring her to hire an attorney and obtain a court order, actually made it impossible for her to access abortion services. The Center is seeking damages for plaintiff Victoria W. under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.
Victoria W. first entered the Terrebonne Parish jail on July 28, 1999 and as a result of a routine physical, for the first time learned she was pregnant. Victoria W. immediately informed prison personnel that she wished to terminate the pregnancy. Eventually, she was informed in writing that she could not be released for an abortion unless she hired an attorney and received a court order authorizing the procedure. Though she attempted to comply with the jail’s policy, she was unable to obtain the court order. Victoria W. was released from prison on October 13, 1999, 25 weeks pregnant and no longer able to have an abortion in Louisiana.
Last April, a District Court Judge dismissed the plaintiff’s claims. The decision was the first in the country; previously, every federal court to address the constitutionality of a court-order policy for inmates had held that those policies violated both the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. Today’s appeal follows several court battles over this case, filed in New Orleans on July 5, 2000.
Representing Victoria W. in the case Victoria W. v. Larpenter are Linda Rosenthal, Staff Attorney, and Tori Jueds, Fellowship Attorney, of the Center for Reproductive Rights, and William Rittenberg, an attorney with the firm of Rittenberg and Samuel in New Orleans.
