As the repercussions of the leaked draft of the Supreme Court’s preliminary ruling on Roe v. Wade continue to shake U.S. politics, some experts are pointing out that the biggest impact will be felt in the African-American community.
We see very clearly that people [of color] are being surveilled, targeted, and accused of accessing abortion,” Dr. Jamila Perritt, an abortion provider and president of Physicians for Reproductive Health, told VICE News.
A 2013 study that examined 413 civil and criminal cases brought forward after Roe found that Black women were “significantly more likely to be arrested, reported to state authorities by hospital staff, and subjected to felony charges,” according to VICE News.
With that, recent data in 2017 from the Guttmacher Institute uncovered that between 2008 and 2014, women of color were more likely to get abortions, while also living below the poverty line.
“Poor people, Black and brown people will have larger barriers to get access to abortion… Then they’ll get driven back into the shadows,” St. Louis Mayor Tishura Jones said, adding that ending Roe will have “long-term consequences” on health and the justice system.
States Aim to Stop Prosecutions
“Once federal protection of abortion is gone,” said Drexel University law Professor David Cohen, in speaking with Pew Trusts. “we can expect to see more overzealous local prosecutors taking aggressive actions against people for self-managed abortions and other pregnancy outcomes.”
A collateral consequence of these anti-choice perspectives against abortion is the prosecution of individuals for self-managed abortion or other pregnancy loss. In Texas, for example, prosecutors have attempted to charge individuals with murder over self-induced abortions, Pew Trusts details.
26-year-old Lizelle Herrera was recently arrested and charged with murder when a hospital reported that she had a self-induced abortion to law enforcement, but it was an unfortunate miscarriage, VICE News details.
The charges have since been dropped, but health advocates warn that more people who manage their own healthcare using U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved medications, herbal remedies, or other non-medical methods “will be falsely arrested on charges of violating abortion bans, homicide laws, and other criminal statutes.
With this in mind, lawmakers and criminal justice officials in a handful of states are trying to prevent “rogue” prosecutions,” Pew Stateline reports.
In 2019, Illinois and New York enacted provisions excluding a pregnant person from fetal homicide laws, and Rhode Island repealed its fetal homicide law.
In March of this year, Washington state enacted a law that protects people seeking an abortion and those who aid them from legal action from the state.
In April of this year, Colorado enacted “a broad reproductive health law” which ensured someone could not be prosecuted for pregnancy-related death or harm to a fetus.
Still to come in 2022, lawmakers in California and Maryland have recently considered similar bills, clarifying that a person may not be punished for the death of a fetus due to any acts or omissions during their pregnancy or shortly thereafter.
Roberts: ‘Breach of Trust’
Chief Justice John Roberts on Wednesday announced that an investigation into Supreme Court leak will be headed by Colonel Gail A. Curley, the Marshal of the U.S. Supreme Court, reports Bloomberg News.
In a statement earlier, Roberts called the leak a “breach of trust” and an effort to “undermine the integrity of our operations,” the New York Times reported.
Curley, a career army lawyer who became the 11th marshal in the court’s history in June following the retirement of Pamela Talkin, has experience with security and the law and has the authority to make arrests for violations of state or federal law and any regulations. A decision on a prosecution would likely come from the Justice Department.
“To the extent this betrayal of the confidences of the Court was intended to undermine the integrity of our operations, it will not succeed,” Roberts said in his statement.
“We at the Court are blessed to have a workforce — permanent employees and law clerks alike — intensely loyal to the institution and dedicated to the rule of law. Court employees have an exemplary and important tradition of respecting the confidentiality of the judicial process and upholding the trust of the Court.
“This was a singular and egregious breach of that trust that is an affront to the Court and the community of public servants who work here.”
Responding to the content of the leak, President Joe Biden Tuesday said he hoped it wasn’t the final decision, arguing that reflects a “fundamental shift in American jurisprudence” that threatens “other basic rights” like privacy and marriage, the Chicago Tribune reported.
“If this decision holds, it’s really quite a radical decision.”
See also: Illinois Plans for Influx of 30,000 Patients if Roe Falls, Chicago Tribune, May 4, 2022
Additional Reading: Abortion, Prison and the Death Penalty, The Crime Report, May 4, 2022