Texas Bill Could Send People to Jail for Driving a Woman to an Abortion, Lawmaker Says
Representative Joe Moody, a former prosecutor, was sure there’d been a mistake.
The sweeping anti-abortion bill that passed the Texas House May 19 could allow nearly anyone involved in the process of an unlawful abortion to be charged with a state jail felony, Moody said. That includes the doctor who performed the abortion, but also the person who drove the woman to the clinic, the receptionist who booked the appointment and even the bank teller who cashed the check that paid for the procedure.
“I’m not trying get into policy; I believe this is an unintended consequence of the law,” Moody said on the House floor Friday evening as he introduced an amendment to Senate Bill 8 that would limit who can be prosecuted. Three hours into the abortion debate, there were several calls to order as the El Paso Democrat pleaded with fellow lawmakers to pay attention.
“If the goal is to prosecute people who perform these acts, what’s written here goes way beyond that,” said Moody, one of the leading criminal justice experts in the House. He chairs the Criminal Jurisprudence Committee and worked as a prosecutor in the El Paso County District Attorney’s Office for four years.
Read more: https://www.texasobserver.org/texas-bill-could-send-people-to-jail-for-driving-a-woman-to-an-abortion/
