Mother Arrested Trying to Stop Teen Daughter From Having Abortion

State   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Apr 15, 2005   |   9:00AM   |   WASHINGTON, DC

Mother Arrested Trying to Stop Teen Daughter From Having Abortion Email this article
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by Maria Vitale Gallagher
LifeNews.com Editor
April 15, 2005

Granite City, IL (LifeNews.com) — A Southern Illinois woman was arrested after trying to stop her 14-year-old daughter from having an abortion. The woman came to Hope Abortion Clinic in Granite City to try to find her daughter, who she found out was not at school.

"My husband and I rushed to the abortion clinic where we saw our daughter’s name on the roster and the time she had checked in," the mother told the Illinois Leader.

She then took a seat near the main desk, but "was told I could not prove my daughter was there so I began calling her name. A medical tech at the clinic told me, ‘It’s your daughter’s rights, it’s her body. You have no rights.’"

Authorities were called in, according to the Leader, and the mother was arrested after she continued to call out her daughter’s name and cried out, "Don’t do it."

The girl told her mother she could hear her but when she asked workers to give her mother a message, they came back to the room and told her that her mother had left.

The girl was reportedly taken to the abortion facility by the mother of the man who allegedly impregnated the 14-year-old, the Leader reported. The woman, posing as the girl’s grandmother, had the girl called off from school.

When the girl left the abortion facility after having an abortion, employees told her, "No one will ever know you were here, we’ll bury your records."

Meanwhile, the woman who had taken the girl for the abortion was slipped out the back door of the clinic, the Leader report indicated.

Police apparently told the girl’s mom that they couldn’t intervene despite the fact the girl was a victim of statutory rape. That’s because the allegation of rape took place seven weeks after the incident. Police told the girl’s mother that, while she had no right to stop the abortion, she did have the right to go to the abortion facility and speak to her daughter.

Illinois has no law requiring parental permission or notification before an abortion is performed on a minor girl.