Missouri Prison Officials Transport Inmate for Abortion
BY Liz Townsend

Under court order, Missouri prison guards took a female inmate from a prison in Vandalia to a St. Louis abortion clinic October 20 where she aborted her 16- to 17-week-old unborn baby, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.

The unidentified inmate returned to the prison later that same day. Although she paid for the abortion herself with money borrowed from friends and family, the state paid for fuel costs and for two guards to accompany her, the Associated Press reported.

Pro-lifers strongly protested the court orders that required the state to spend taxpayer dollars to abet an abortion. "Missourians have spoken loudly, that they do not want to have a hand in abortion in any way, shape or form," said Pam Manning, Missouri Right to Life director at large. "And they are being forced to have a hand in it."

The woman has been in the Missouri prison since August 22 for parole violations after she traveled to California despite the probation she received after a conviction for possession of methamphetamine, according to the Post-Dispatch. She discovered she was pregnant while in jail in California.

Missouri established new regulations July 19 that prohibit taxpayer money to be used to transport prisoners to get an abortion, according to the Washington Post. State legislators had criticized the Department of Corrections for taking inmates for abortions in several previous cases. The legislators cited a 1986 Missouri law establishing that no state money, public employees in the course of their employment, or public facilities are to be used for abortions except abortions performed to save a woman's life.

The lawsuit filed by the inmate after Missouri officials refused to transport her for the abortion did not claim that the abortion was necessary to save her life. According to the lawsuit, the Post-Dispatch reported, she needed the abortion because she has "serious medical needs" and that she "suffered anxiety and depression because of the prison's obstruction of her efforts to terminate her pregnancy. She feels that continuation of the pregnancy would be unbearable."

U.S. District Judge Dean Whipple ruled in the inmate's favor October 13. "The law is now well established that federal courts have declared that a woman has a constitutional right to choose to terminate a pregnancy rather than carry the pregnancy to term," Whipple wrote, according to the Post-Dispatch. "It is also clearly established that these rights of the woman survive incarceration."

The state brought the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, and Justice Clarence Thomas issued a stay on Whipple's ruling October 14 so the entire court could consider the case. Missouri asked the justices to give "heavy consideration" to the state's policy of "discourag[ing] abortions and encourag[ing] childbirth," the Washington Post reported.

However, the full Court issued an unsigned, two-sentence order October 17 denying the temporary stay and allowing Whipple's original decision to stand. That night, Whipple ordered officials to take the inmate for an abortion before Friday, October 21, according to the Post-Dispatch.