cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/1874605

A 17-year-old from Nebraska and her mother are facing criminal charges including performing an illegal abortion and concealing a dead body after police obtained the pair’s private chat history from Facebook, court documents published by Motherboard show.

  • Chippyr@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    She was 7 months pregnant. That baby is viable outside the womb in many scenarios. It’s disgusting to abort a child at that point. The local law allows abortions up to 5 months into the pregnancy (20 weeks). That’s plenty of time to make a decision, and a pretty liberal allowance. Prosecution of this mother and daughter is justified and there is nothing wrong with Meta complying with the info request.

    • Dioxy@programming.dev
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      1 year ago

      The article:

      Court and police records show that police began investigating 17-year-old Celeste Burgess and her mother Jessica Burgess after receiving a tip-off that the pair had illegally buried a stillborn child given birth to prematurely by Celeste. The two women told detective Ben McBride of the Norfolk, Nebraska Police Division that they’d discussed the matter on Facebook Messenger, which prompted the state to issue Meta with a search warrant for their chat history and data including log-in timestamps and photos.

      From Motherboard (where you also can read court documents):

      The state’s case relies on evidence from the teenager’s private Facebook messages, obtained directly from Facebook by court order, which show the mother and daughter allegedly bought medication to induce abortion online, and then disposed of the body of the fetus.

      According to court records, Celeste Burgess, 17, and her mother, Jessica Burgess, bought medication called Pregnot designed to end pregnancy. Pregnot is a kit of mifepristone and misoprostol, which is often used to safely end pregnancy in the first trimester. In this case, Burgess was 28-weeks pregnant, which is later in pregnancy than mifepristone and misoprostol are recommended for use. It’s also later than Nebraska’s 20-week post-fertilization abortion ban, which makes allowances only if the pregnant person is at risk of death or “serious risk of substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function.” (Nebraska’s abortion laws have not changed since Roe v Wade was overturned).

        • Dioxy@programming.dev
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          1 year ago

          Yes, I’m not arguing or anything, I forgot to mention I appreciated the added context you provided. Just wanted to further expand on it for those wanting to get more context, as it seems to be a lot of people in the thread that didn’t read the article

    • TopRamenBinLaden@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Thanks for adding some nuance that people might miss if they just read the headline. This girl broke some long established abortion laws by aborting at 7 months like you said. She is definitely in the wrong here.

      At the same time, I don’t like meta for violating people’s privacy and working with law enforcement. Make law enforcement do their own jobs.

      Still, I don’t feel sorry for them. These women definitely dug their own hole. You think it would be obvious to people by now to not talk about illegal things on any social media, especially meta.

      • ParsnipWitch@feddit.de
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        1 year ago

        You would want to force a 17 year old (or any person) to go through pregnancy and childbirth because you personally feel that’s the right thing to do? What about her rights? Does she lose them by getting impregnated? Because that’s what you are wanting to enforce.

        • TopRamenBinLaden@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          No not at all. Just don’t get an abortion at 7 months. Literally doctors won’t do it because it’s unethical at that point. Did you even read the article? Like she took a bunch of drugs illegally to abort a fetus that could just about live outside the womb.

          I am extremely pro choice, but we have a cutoff point for it that science has established to prevent cruelty.

          • ParsnipWitch@feddit.de
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            1 year ago

            But why is that a choice society makes for her body? I have asked that elsewhere but never get an answer from people who feel women should be forced to childbirth at a certain point: do you think people should be forced to donate organs?

            • TopRamenBinLaden@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              I don’t know why you are bringing up forced childbirth. I already said I was pro choice, and I am even antinatalist.

              She made the choice to not abort until 7 months. Thats the problem here. At a certain point the fetus is considered a human and you cross the line into murder. Medical science has determined that point to be around 5- 6 months. I believe women should have every right to abort before the point the fetus is considered conscious.

              When someone is pregnant, at a certain point they have made a human, and you cant just get rid of it like that. There are other options like adoption at that point. I don’t know why you can’t see the nuance here.

              • ParsnipWitch@feddit.de
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                1 year ago

                It is still forced childbirth, obviously, because what else are you suggesting? You think after a certain point in pregnancy a woman should have to birth the child so others can adopt it. After a certain point you think the woman loses the right to chose for her own and now society has the right to dictate that she has to continue being pregnant and birth the child. I think it is important to fully realize that this is the consequence of your reasoning.

                • TopRamenBinLaden@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  Okay well once you have created a human it is no longer a choice to kill it. Yes you are forced to give birth to a child at that point due to not getting an abortion before you created a human. Why don’t we allow abortions up to 2 years? There’s not a big difference between a 7month old fetus and a 2 year old.

                • TopRamenBinLaden@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  Okay well once you have created a human it is no longer a choice to kill it. Yes you are forced to give birth to a child at that point due to not getting an abortion before you created a human. Why don’t we allow parents to kill their kids up to 2 years? There’s not a big difference between a 7month old fetus and a 2 year old.

                  Maybe you feel like because the mother made the human it’s her property and she can do whatever she wants with it? Big old atheist me, and the rest of the old don’t see it that way. Once a human is fully formed, that human has its own right to life. The mother doesn’t own it like property, it’s a human being at that point with its own rights like you and me.

        • Technomancer@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          1 year ago

          The baby was nearly fully formed with a face, hands, feet, and a heartbeat that could have survived outside the womb. I implore you to go look up some photos of a 28 week fetus and I guarantee you’ll be surprised how much it looks like a normal baby.

      • Chippyr@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        I’m trying, but it seems that unfortunately Lemmy is yet another platform chock full of people so hard left that they downvote an opinion that 7 months pregnant is a bit too far along to have an abortion… it’s insane to me that 7 months is even a debate. I’m pro-abortion up to a point. That point starts to become concerning after the first trimester. This baby was in the third trimester…

    • SheeEttin@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Why should we continue birthing children when we already have so many that are insufficiently cared for?

      If you, personally, would assume responsibility for this child, great, but otherwise leave it up to the individual.

      • wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        1 year ago

        The morality of having children at all is a separate point entirely. There are countless ways this could have ended or been prevented long before the fetus was viable outside the womb.

        • ParsnipWitch@feddit.de
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          1 year ago

          Pregnancy can never be 100 % prevented. Unless you sterilise someone. And you do not know the reasons for why this girl didn’t go through abortion earlier.

    • ParsnipWitch@feddit.de
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      1 year ago

      It’s disgusting to wish on women that they should lose the rights to their own bodies that easily.

      • Technomancer@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        1 year ago

        She carried the baby to nearly full term. It had a face, hands, feet, and a heartbeat. It was a living being that could have survived outside the womb. Then she took abortion medication that wasn’t meant for pregnancies that far along. I’m not even religious and have always been pro-abortion, but there needs to be a reasonable cut-off point. In 2 and half more months she could have given it up for adoption.