Apr 13, 2022
Robin Marty, Rewire News
This past weekend, the murder charge against Lizelle Herrera, a Texas woman accused of inducing her own abortion, made national headlines. According to local activists at Frontera Fund, an abortion fund based in South Texas, Herrera’s arrest allegedly happened after she visited a hospital where, while in the process of miscarrying, she may have provided medical staff with information that made them believe she had induced her own abortion. (The charge was dropped Sunday.)
Whether or not Herrera did something to provoke a miscarriage, the reality is that her arrest and murder charge prove exactly what we have always known: Abortion opponents lie when they claim they will not investigate miscarriages, or that pregnant people will not end up in jail because of their anti-abortion laws. Just like Rosie Jiménez, who died in 1977 because she could not afford a safe abortion, South Texans have become the bellwether of the true harm of abortion bans in the United States.