Nebraska Mom Gets 2 Years in Prison After Buying Abortion Pills for Her Teen Daughter

“Here's the audacity: Self-managed abortion is not even a crime in fucking Nebraska,” an advocate told Jezebel. The case is a harbinger of more criminalization.

By Susan Rinkunas
Sep 22, 2023

On Friday, a Nebraska judge sentenced Jessica Burgess to two years in prison after she bought abortion pills for her teen daughter and helped bury the fetal remains in early 2022, according to reporters from Norfolk Daily News and Courthouse News. The sentencing went forward without a court-ordered psychological evaluation that the judge canceled for lack of funding last week. Burgess had faced up to five years in prison after she accepted a plea deal. With good behavior, she could be released in a year.

Burgess pled guilty in July to three charges (tampering with human remains, false reporting, and abortion after 20 weeks’ gestation) in exchange for prosecutors dropping two others (concealing the death of another person and abortion by someone other than a licensed physician). States have criminalized people for their pregnancy outcomes for decades—even, as in this case, while Roe v. Wade stood—but advocates worry these types of charges, against people seeking abortion and those who help them, will only become more frequent as millions of people live under state abortion bans.

Continued: https://jezebel.com/nebraska-abortion-case-mom-sentenced-1850864511

USA – Abortion Snitching Is Already Sending People to Jail

In places where abortion is banned, women must rely even more on social and familial networks. But with greater reliance, comes greater risk.

8/19/2023
by MORGAN CARMEN

Last month, Celeste Burgess was sentenced to 90 days in prison because she took abortion pills when she was 17 years old. Celeste was charged with removing, concealing or abandoning a human body; concealing the death of another; and false reporting, after burying her miscarriage with the help of her mother, Jessica.

The story of Celeste and her mother—who helped her get the pills and will be sentenced next month—went national. Most media attention centered on the local police’s access to Facebook messages between the two, and for good reason: Companies like Meta amass intimate information—including but not limited to messages, location data, browsing patterns, phone numbers and online searches—that may be accessed easily by law enforcement. This case was seen as a harbinger of intimate privacy violations to come.

Continued: https://msmagazine.com/2023/08/19/celeste-burgess-abortion-snitching-privacy-police-illegal/

Nebraska mom pleads guilty to giving daughter pills for an abortion and helping bury the fetus

July 7, 2023
By The Associated Press

MADISON, Neb. (AP) — A Nebraska mother pleaded guilty Friday to giving her 17-year-old daughter pills for an illegal abortion last year and helping to burn and bury the fetus.

Under a plea agreement, Jessica Burgess, 42, of Norfolk, admitted to providing an abortion after 20 weeks of gestation, false reporting and tampering with human skeletal remains. Charges of concealing the death of another person and abortion by someone other than a licensed physician were dismissed.

Continued: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/nebraska-mom-pleads-guilty-to-giving-daughter-pills-for-an-abortion-and-helping-bury-the-fetus/

07.07.2023

prosecuting women for abortion

prosecutions of women having abortions

COPS AND REPUBLICANS ARE CRIMINALIZING PREGNANT PEOPLE WITHOUT ROE

by Meg O’Connor
Jun 21, 2023

Abortion opponents have long claimed they only want to criminalize providers, not pregnant people. In a 2023 statement entitled, “Why women are not, and should not be, prosecuted for abortion,” anti-abortion group Americans United for Life said that prosecuting women “for the crime of abortion is unwise and contrary to the goals of the movement.”

This is untrue: even while Roe v. Wade was in place, thousands of people were criminalized for having miscarriages, stillbirths, or abortions. And, in the year since the Supreme Court overturned Roe, abortion opponents have prosecuted more women for their pregnancy outcomes and introduced laws allowing criminal charges against people who get abortions.

Continued: https://theappeal.org/police-republicans-criminalize-pregnant-people-roe-abortion/

21.06.2023

Commentary

Celeste Burgess

Chelsey Redmon-Zellers

jailing women for abortion

Jessica Burgess

Meg O'Connor

prosecuting women for abortion

punishing women for abortion

Facebook and Google are handing over user data to help police prosecute abortion seekers

KATHERINE TANGALAKIS-LIPPERT
MAR 5, 2023

As abortion bans across the nation are implemented and enforced, law enforcement is turning to social media platforms to build cases to prosecute women seeking abortions or abortion-inducing medication – and online platforms like Google and Facebook are helping.

This spring, a woman named Jessica Burgess and her daughter will stand trial in Nebraska for performing an illegal abortion — with a key piece of evidence provided by Meta, the parent company of Facebook. Burgess allegedly helped her daughter find and take pills that would induce an abortion. The teenage Burgess also faces charges for allegedly illegally disposing of the fetus' remains.

Continued: https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/news/facebook-and-google-are-handing-over-user-data-to-help-police-prosecute-abortion-seekers/articleshow/98423158.cms

05.03.2023

News

digital surveillance and abortion

Eric Goldman

Facebook and abortion

Nebraska – Facebook gave police their private data. Now, this duo face abortion charges

Experts say it underscores the importance of encryption and minimizing the amount of user data tech companies can store
Johana Bhuiyan
Wed 10 Aug 2022

In the wake of the supreme court’s upheaval of Roe v Wade, tech workers and privacy advocates expressed concerns about how the user data tech companies stored could be used against people seeking abortions.

When a Facebook staffer posed the dilemma to the chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, asking how the platform would protect the user data of individuals seeking abortion care, Zuckerberg said the company’s ongoing push to encrypt messaging would help protect people from “bad behavior or over-broad requests for information”.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/aug/10/facebook-user-data-abortion-nebraska-police

Nebraska woman charged with helping daughter have abortion

Investigators uncovered Facebook messages in which the two allegedly discussed using medication to induce an abortion.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Aug 9, 2022

OMAHA, Nebraska — A Nebraska woman has been charged with helping her teenage daughter end her pregnancy at about 24 weeks after investigators uncovered Facebook messages in which the two discussed using medication to induce an abortion and plans to burn the fetus afterward.

The prosecutor handling the case said it’s the first time he has charged anyone for illegally performing an abortion after 20 weeks, a restriction that was passed in 2010. Before the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June, states weren’t allowed to enforce abortion bans until the point at which a fetus is considered viable outside the womb, at roughly 24 weeks.

Continued: https://www.politico.com/news/2022/08/09/nebraska-woman-charged-with-helping-daughter-have-abortion-00050763

09.08.2022