Dear Friends and Allies,
Thank you for your commitment to National Advocates for Pregnant Women (NAPW). Whether we met you a few weeks ago or you've been with us for years, you are helping us free women from incarceration, keep families together, and stop forced medical interventions.
The long and twisted prosecution of Anne Bynum has finally been resolved without a new trial and without a conviction for any crime.
In 2015, Arkansas law enforcement officials apparently believed that Anne Bynum had taken steps to have an abortion at home.
On September 20, 2018, feticide and involuntary manslaughter charges were dismissed against Kelli Driskel. In December of 2017, Ms. Driskel went to the emergency room after experiencing a stillbirth at home. An autopsy was later performed on the fetal remains and the cause of death was determined to be placental abruption with "acute methamphetamine intoxication" listed as a contributing factor.
On September, 13, 2018, prosecutors in Chesterfield County, Virginia finally dropped the criminal charge of "producing an abortion," a class 4 felony, filed against Michelle Roberts. Almost three years ago Ms. Roberts had experienced a stillbirth at home and placed the fetal remains in the ground behind her house.
NAPW, along with 11 other organizations and 27 individual experts, submitted an Open Letter to the Madison County, Indiana prosecutor, asking him to drop felony charges against a woman who experienced a stillbirth at home. An Indiana woman who experienced a pregnancy loss is being prosecuted for feticide and involuntary manslaughter, based on her alleged drug use while pregnant.
The last few weeks have been horrendous. The Muslim ban (too often misnamed a travel ban), the decision allowing fake clinics to deny pregnant women truthful information (making a mockery of free speech principles), and the attack on workers (overturning long-standing precedent and striking down public sector union fees).
And then there was the announcement of Justice Kennedy's resignation.
March 14, 2018
The Arkansas Court of Appeals has issued a unanimous ruling reversing Anne Bynum’s conviction for “concealing a birth” that resulted in a sentence of six years in prison. The criminal charge and conviction stemmed from the state’s claims about Ms. Bynum’s actions after she experienced a stillbirth at home in 2015. The three-judge panel found that the trial court in Drew County had abused its discretion by allowing the jury to consider evidence about Ms. Bynum’s past pregnancies and outcomes including abortion, that “clearly prejudiced” the verdict in the case.
Join us for the 8th annual Take Root: Red State Perspective on Reproductive Justice conference, February 23rd-24th, 2018 in Norman, Oklahoma!
The activist potential of people in the red states has not been effectively encouraged, nurtured, or sustained.
On January 24, 2018, NAPW consulting attorney Dan Arshack argued before the Arkansas Court of Appeals on behalf of Anne Bynum, a woman who experienced a stillbirth at home and was convicted for "concealing a birth" and sentenced to six years in prison after she was alleged to have waited several hours to bring the fetal remains to the hospital and did not tell her mother about her pregnancy.
