After Outcry, Texas Prosecutor Drops Murder Charges Against Woman Arrested for "Self-Induced Abortion"
In Texas, the Starr County district attorney said he will drop murder charges against Lizelle Herrera, a 26-year-old Latina woman who was arrested Thursday and accused of causing the death of an individual through a self-induced abortion." Herrera was detained on a $500,000 bond and released from jail Saturday evening, hours after activists with the Rio Grande Valley-based La Frontera Fund held a protest outside the Starr County Jail. We speak with La Frontera Fund's founder, Rockie Gonzalez, who says Herrera requested care from medical professionals who then turned her in to law enforcement. Gonzalez says that while details of the case are sketchy, the highly publicized arrest of Herrera will further intimidate pregnant people from accessing medical care in the age of anti-abortion laws like S.B. 8. People are going to be afraid to share potentially lifesaving information with medical professionals for fear of arrest," says Gonzalez.