English woman who had illegal lockdown abortion jailed for 28 months in 'tragic' case

A woman in England has been jailed today for 28 months after being convicted of illegally aborting her pregnancy during the Covid lockdown. 

The woman, who we are choosing not to name, pleaded guilty earlier this year to procuring an illegal abortion under the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act. She had initially been charged with ‘intentional destruction of a viable unborn child’, an offence under the 1929 Infant Life (Preservation) Act, when she appeared before North Staffordshire Magistrates Court in July 2022, but prosecutors later accepted a guilty plea to what they today described as a “more palatable” alternative. Both carry a maximum penalty of life in prison. 

She wept in the dock as she appeared at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court on Monday (12 June) for sentencing. Robert Price, prosecuting, told the court that she had lied to the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) – a legitimate abortion provider – to obtain abortive medicine in May 2020, during the first coronavirus lockdown. BPAS believed her to be under eight weeks pregnant, he said. 

An emergency law was passed during the first coronavirus lockdown to allow abortion care to be provided remotely for women during their first 10 weeks of pregnancy. Following a remote consultation, abortion pills could be provided for the patient to take at home.

Mr Price told the court that the woman, who already has other children, had lied to BPAS about how far along her pregnancy was, and that internet searches about how to induce a miscarriage demonstrated she knew she was past the 24-week legal limit for abortions and had been trying to conceal her pregnancy.

Paramedics were called to the woman’s home after she delivered a stillborn foetus later estimated to have been between 32 and 34 weeks gestation. She told paramedics she believed she had had a miscarriage late in 2019, and was no longer pregnant, but that her “tummy had continued to grow”. Unsuccessful resuscitation attempts were made on the foetus by the woman’s then partner, and later paramedics, but a pathologist later ruled there was no evidence it had ever taken a natural breath, and had died “at or around the time of delivery”. 

The woman later described “pushing the possibility of pregnancy to the back of her mind”, Price said, and was not certain she was pregnant when she took the abortive medicine, nor “that she was that far gone”. 

Mitigating, Barry White, described how the woman had been struggling considerably as she tried to decide what to do, and that medical practitioners who had had contact with her since the abortion “were concerned for her fitness and wellbeing”. 

Mr White also spoke of the “unprecedented struggle that developed in this case”, with the normal in-person services that may have been available to help a woman in her position unavailable. Her relationship with the baby’s father had ended and she had returned home to a “failed relationship” so that her existing children could have contact with both their parents during the coronavirus lockdown. She did not want this partner to know that she was pregnant by another man. 

We cannot know what “turmoil” she was experiencing at the time, White said, adding that she had been in a “dark and difficult place”. Her remorse and guilt has been evident since, he said, adding: “It will haunt her forever.” 

The woman – who still requires support from mental health services three years on from the abortion – had written letters to her existing children explaining what she had done in case she did not return from court today, White told the judge, as he asked him to consider imposing a suspended sentence rather than immediate custody to avoid a detrimental impact on the family. 

Sentencing, Mr Justice Pepperall described the case as “tragic”, but said the balance struck "between a woman’s reproductive rights and the rights of her unborn foetus” was an “emotive” issue, but that it was a matter for Parliament and not the courts to determine.

Despite pleading guilty, he said he could not impose a suspended sentence because she had not done so at the earliest opportunity, during an early court appearance. The fact she had not done so was one of “the many tragedies in this case”, he told the woman.

The judge accepted that the woman felt “deep and genuine remorse” and had been in “emotional turmoil” at the time of the termination. He also accepted that she was plagued by nightmares of her dead baby’s face, and felt a deep emotional attachment to the child.

Dr Jonathan Lord, an NHS consultant gynaecologist, was present in court to represent the main medical authorities and Royal Colleges responsible for reproductive healthcare in the NHS. The group had written to the court, outlining serious concerns that a custodial sentence would impact their ability to deliver NHS services and would deter patients from being open and honest with medical staff. A representative from BPAS was also present in court, and has been supporting the woman and her legal team. 

Judge Pepperall described receiving the letter from the “eminent professionals” as unusual, before criticising its contents, describing it as having been “just as inappropriate” as if an anti-abortion group had written to the court. If the medical profession considers it wrong to imprison women who have late-term abortions then they should lobby Parliament, not the courts, he said.

“I consider that it would have been better if the letter had not been written at all,” he added. “I do not accept that imprisonment in this case is likely to deter women and girls from lawfully seeking abortion care within the 24-weeks limit.”

In a joint statement issued before the sentencing, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (of which Dr Lord is co-chair of their abortion taskforce) and the Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare called on the UK government to decriminalise abortion across the UK, saying: “It is our belief that prosecuting a woman for ending their pregnancy will never be in the public interest.”

“[The law] criminalises women, who are often already vulnerable and in desperate situations, over a healthcare issue and can deter them from seeking aftercare for fear of repercussions,” the statement said. “The current punitive approach hampers the ability of doctors to provide supportive care and removes women’s autonomy to make their own decisions about their bodies”.

The statement went on to outline the success of telemedicine (at-home abortions), saying that it had “significantly” reduced the number of women seeking access to abortion outside of the existing law. Women seeking to buy abortion pills online can include those who live in rural areas or significant distances from clinics, women with disabilities, those who fear detection by a controlling partner or family member, or those who are scared of facing protestors outside clinics.

The authorities stated that in the very rare scenarios where women seek an abortion at a later gestation, they are invariably victims. “Many of these women are extremely vulnerable, for example victims of domestic abuse and women with a history of mental health problems, and the operation of the current law means that rather than being provided with the care, compassion, safeguarding and support they need, they are being criminalised.”

Late last year a second illegal abortion case was dropped by prosecutors in Oxford, after a judge had said he was “flabbergasted” the prosecution had been brought. The woman in that case was accused of ‘administering poison with intent to procure an abortion’ under the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act. The drug in question was misoprostol, a commonly used abortion medicine. 

When prosecutors dropped the case, the judge told them they had been “misconceived” in their pursuit of the woman and that the trial would have been a waste of court time, according to the Times. 

There are two laws that criminalise abortions in England and Wales. The first is the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act, passed during the American Civil War and almost 70 years before women won full voting rights in the UK, and which made abortions illegal in all circumstances. The second is the 1929 Infant Life (Preservation) Act, which makes it an offence to end a pregnancy after 28 weeks, the point at which 1920s lawmakers considered a foetus capable of being born alive. 

The maximum sentence under both laws is life in prison. Neither law was repealed by the 1967 Abortion Act, which created strict criteria in which two doctors can sign off on an abortion before 24 weeks if they are satisfied the woman’s mental or physical health is at risk by continuing the pregnancy. 

In law, no distinction is made between women trying to abort their own pregnancies or other people – male or female – who assist them, either by performing an abortion or selling or acquiring drugs to be used in one. Those who assault or even kill pregnant women resulting in pregnancy loss can also be prosecuted with the same legislation.