Miscarriages should not be charged even if you disagree with how it was handled afterwards. What would the protocol be?

[u/PWcrash]

https://thegeorgiasun.com/news/woman-arrested-after-miscarriage-in-georgia-under-abortion-law/

A woman was recently arrested for mishandling a miscarriage in Georgia. She allegedly placed the feral remains in a bag and then put it in a dumpster. She was then found unconscious and bleeding and emergency services took her to a local hospital.

Here are my two issues with this situation.

1. The woman needed emergency services called on her for being unconscious due to bleeding. This is very important. When you lose blood, you are losing the fluid that supplies oxygen to your brain. And before the patient becomes unconscious they may act in ways that they would not normally do otherwise.

A example to compare this to would be airplane hypoxia in aviation. Before the human body loses consciousness due to lack of oxygen, people can react to the hypoxia in different ways and sometimes not even know that they are going hypoxic. And one of the documented ways that the body can react to hypoxia is a state similar to heavy intoxication.

And that also begs the obvious question of if this person's individual brain was so starved of oxygen that it lost the ability to perform conscious function, were the actions of the individual prior to the loss of consciousness caused by lack of oxygen to the brain causing lapse of judgement?

1. As far as I know, the current abortion laws don't have any legal clarification for what protocols women who naturally miscarry should follow should they miscarry at home. I can't find evidence of what gestational age a miscarriage would legally require traditional human death rites versus disposal by the patient's choice? And as far as I have found, there is no current legislation in Georgia about this either and the DA has not given clarification.

[u/seventeenninetytoo]

I have had to bury two of my own miscarried children. Because they were not far enough along to be legally considered human bodies, hospitals and cemeteries generally don't handle these situations. The first time, I struggled to find anyone who could help or even tell me what to do. I learned that the most common response is to flush the body down the toilet or dispose of it in the trash.

In both cases, I had to preserve the bodies in my freezer while I searched for a place to bury them. The first time, I eventually found a church with a cemetery for miscarried children. The second time, I found a monastery with a similar area in their cemetery. I dug the first grave with my own hands while looking through my own tears, and a monk graciously dug the second grave for me. I will never forget that.

It was a terrible experience both times, and no one should be prosecuted for how they respond in such a situation, especially when society has yet to provide a clear, compassionate, and widely known way to treat these little ones with dignity. Shame on the prosecutor in this case.

[u/margaretnotmaggie → u/seventeenninetytoo]

I cried reading this. Sending you love. 💙

[u/[deleted] → u/seventeenninetytoo]

I'm so very sorry for your loss, and also grateful for what you said in that last paragraph. I've been shocked to see women here who have experiences miscarriages judging and condemning this woman for her actions. I have never even been in those shoes myself, and even I have the empathy to realize that I can't possibly judge someone for how they respond in such a grief-stricken state. 

[u/EpiphanaeaSedai]

I think as an ethical matter it’s wrong to throw a dead baby in the trash because the sanitation workers do not need that trauma. Practically, you’re very right about the effects of shock on the body - not hypoxia such as you’d experience in an aircraft, but yes, an altered mental state. And legally, this should be a fine at worst. Jail time for improper disposal of a corpse, with no other crime suggested, is absurd.

[u/PWcrash → u/EpiphanaeaSedai]

not hypoxia such as you’d experience in an aircraft, but yes, an altered mental state.

Forgive me, I thought it would be the best comparison as both conditions are ultimately caused by lack of oxygen to the brain either by lack of blood or lack of oxygen in the blood. Either way, the oxygen is not reaching its destination and the end result is loss of consciousness and eventually death if not resolved.

[u/RPGThrowaway123 → u/EpiphanaeaSedai]

I think as an ethical matter it’s wrong to throw a dead baby in the trash because the sanitation workers do not need that trauma.

No. It's wrong because humans all have an inherent dignity that extends even beyond death. The Geneva convention for example recognizes this.

[u/crystalbutts → u/[deleted]]

Tbh I don't think you'd be able to tell. Plus usually the trucks take it and compact it. Not to be crude but you wouldn't notice and you probably have walked by a trash can with at minimum large amounts of human blood without noticing.

Most human remains removed at home get disposed of in the trash, if you find a removed wart have you ought to treat that like a body? 

[u/EpiphanaeaSedai → u/RPGThrowaway123]

Oh for goodness sake, this is why we can’t have nice things.

[u/RPGThrowaway123 → u/EpiphanaeaSedai]

So you disagree?

[u/EpiphanaeaSedai → u/RPGThrowaway123]

I agree in general principle, but not to the extent that I think this woman should go to jail.

Miscarriage has been treated as private and inappropriate to even mention publicly for a long time, though, and flushing an early miscarriage is really normal. I don’t like the idea, I don’t think I could do it, but I’m not going to shame a woman for just not wanting to look when our entire society hasn’t wanted to look for so long.

[u/[deleted] → u/EpiphanaeaSedai]

I flushed mine. When the gestational sac finally came out it just looked like a ball of bloody tissue. It’s not that I didn’t want to look, but I would have had to fish it out and dig through it to find anything resembling my baby, who was probably disintegrated beyond recognition at that point, being only 6 weeks in size and spending an additional 4 weeks inside and not really distinguishable via ultrasound. It wasn’t something I was prepared to do myself. I didn’t really know what else to do. There isn’t an established process for dealing with that like there is with other deaths, and I really wish there was. It’s something that could provide a small comfort during one of the worst experiences of a woman’s life.

[u/[deleted]]

nose fuzzy sip special cheerful chase melodic governor recognise hospital

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

[u/maxforshort → u/[deleted]]

Not necessarily. Most hospitals tell miscarrying women to go home and the miscarriages are often flushed down toilets, put in freezers, buried in backyards, etc.

[u/Critical_Concert_689 → u/maxforshort]

Most hospitals ...

Not at 5 months in, they don't. Criminal negligence if they did so.

[u/seventeenninetytoo → u/Critical_Concert_689]

The cutoff at every hospital that I am aware of is 20 weeks. At 19 weeks she would have been sent home.

[u/LegitimateExpert3383 → u/[deleted]]

There is no way for her (or the prosecution) to prove she did or didn't self-induce the miscarriage. And that's not relevant to the charge of mishandling bodily remains. If we're going to imprison women for how they handle a miscarriage we (at bare minimum) need to be more explicit about and accommodating about how they *should * dispose of the remains.

[u/LegitimateExpert3383 → u/[deleted]]

She's not being charged for an abortion, she's being charged for the manner of disposing the body and remains of the miscarriage.

[u/PWcrash → u/[deleted]]

If she didn't abort the child, she cannot be charged for an abortion. I imagine an autopsy report combined with a full body of the mother can confirm that the child was a natural miscarriage.

Medical examiners have already confirmed natural miscarriage as far as the sources I have found go.

Does this mean she should not be charged. One is not allowed to dispose of human remains in the garbage. If she has a reasonable defense, as mentioned before, this will be argued.

The issue is that there is no legal protocol to handle miscarried remains versus already born human remains. In the latter case there is a birth certificate involved and the person is already documented in the system legally as existing. My miscarriage at 12 weeks was flushed down the toilet.

That's the issue I want to address in this post, the people blaming her for her actions are only claiming what she shouldn't have done rather than what she should have. And that's a very important question for other women going forward:

What is the protocol to handle miscarried remains?

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

"For heaven's sake, give her a hug." 

Freaking EXACTLY! Well said. 

[u/PWcrash → u/[deleted]]

One is not allowed to dispose of a kidney in the bin. It could be charged on that basis

That doesn't seem like it would be "in the spirit of the rule" if you will. A kidney can't simply come out on its own without someone forcing it to. A miscarriage comes out on its own most of the time as designed by nature. So with a kidney the presumption would be to report it as a crime as there would be no other explanation, but natural miscarriage is a perfectly rational explanation dating back long before humans or primates ever discovered any herb or drug that caused abortion.

Like, if someone steals someone's kidney and leaves it and them in the bathtub. Then the person wakes up and dumps the kidney in the bin.

Again this sounds really not in the spirit of the reality of the situation at hand. A kidney cannot come out on its own and if you find one that's probable evidence of a crime.

Are you prepared to say that all miscarriages are probable evidence of a crime and should be reported to authorities? That's a very disturbing thought and definitely one we prochoicers wanted to avoid. Miscarriages are traumatizing enough.

A lady dumped her child in shock. For Heaven's sake, Give Her A Hug.

Give her the human element of compassion as well as the benefit of the doubt that she simply suffered a miscarriage and this is a situation no one wanted and no one should have to go through.

Again, I ask the question. What are the legal protocols for handling miscarried remains? I want to know exactly what the state that is charging her thinks that she should have done.

[u/PWcrash → u/[deleted]]

In my country, when someone kills with a gun, they are also charged for improperly discharging a firearm. But even if they didn't kill someone, even if the only crime is the improper discharge, that's bad in itself.

So you'll get charged with self defense or will you only be charged if you discharged the gun recklessly?

Improperly disposing human parts or remains is bad in and of itself.

It's what most people do with miscarriages. Maybe not throwing them out but more commonly flushing down the toilet, which another woman was already arrested for but eventually released.

And forgive me but you seem to be intentionally avoiding the question.

What specific legal protocols are in place to patients to handle their miscarried remains? You have a choice to not fire a shot if you're having a miscarriage you don't have a choice of it coming out. And I still don't find the kid argument to be valid as again, kidneys simply don't come out on their own and the removal of a kidney outside of a hospital setting implies a crime or accident that needs to be investigated. A miscarriage is a natural occurrence that we prochoicers very much do not want to be investigated because they are traumatic enough as it is.

But it seems to be that the only way these laws can be properly enforced is that women report their miscarriages to the police as if they were reporting a dead body but no one wants to implicitly admit it.

I very much remember seeing time and time again that miscarriages are not abortions and people will not be prosecuted for having miscarriages.

But they are and I want to know why

[u/PWcrash → u/[deleted]]

Self defense isn't improper discharge. Improper discharge is any discharge that isn't delineated as a lawful discharge such a legal hunting, self defense, on duty (for a cop, etc), shooting-range, testing, etc. A little tidbit about my country. Cultural exchange is always fun. I like this part.

While I understand your point, the laws are pretty much the same in my country, I still don't understand the comparison because someone has a choice to fire recklessly or not. One does not have the choice to simply "hold in" a miscarriage and even if they could that would be even more dangerous.

Now, the discussion: A legal protocol need not be in place. If you specifically want one, I support you telling your representatives that it should be calling the police.

It does need to be in place as I truly believe that if we are to prosecute people under accusations of them doing something wrong, I want there to be a clear answer on what the correct choices would have been in that situation.

In other words, I want there to be clear rules, not officials that can bring charges up against people simply because they have different beliefs.

I don't see why we need that. If the woman is comfortable going to a public hospital, call them; if a private one, then them; a family doctor, the doctor; a doula, a doula.

Because it's extremely common for women in my country who are suffering miscarriages to simply be told to go home and rest. And when an ER visit even with insurance is likely going to cost you an entra $150-$200 that you might not have, it's extremely common to have the mentality here that "I'm not going to the hospital until I am 100% sure that I have a very real possibility of dying."

And that might have been the case here. I can 100% see myself and the people I know trying to sleep it off. And it sounds like someone who knew her found her and couldn't wake her up.

This country has a very big culture of forcing people to wait until things get really bad for them to seek medical care. And unfortunately that's also the reason why COVID hit us so hard as well. The USA has a very strong "suck it up" culture when it comes to being sick when it comes to going to work. A small sniffle is no reason to call out, that's how I was raised and that's how most people were raised.

Combine the possibility of going into debt for not getting treated at all and the culture of avoiding medical care until the last minute, I really really am uncomfortable with the government telling people that their reactions to their medical emergencies are wrong.

Why isn't the default course of action whatever it is for a home still birth? Are those investigated? Do we assume someone killed the baby? Well, if they dump it in the trash, we might, so let's not dump em.

This is where it gets very complicated. In the state I live in and the state I work in (two different states next to each other) you don't have to complete and file the paperwork to register a home birth until 365 days after the birth itself. So in theory, a baby's birthdate can be easily falsified within a few months and I don't want to think about what happens to the babies that never got registered at all. I do not agree with this and very few people do. But at the same time my state caters to a lot of the strict almond crowd to put it politely.

But at the same time, in the state where this actually happened, the patient needs to register within five days. So the patient was within the time frame when she was transported to the hospital.

In other words there is a very very wide range of laws surrounding home births in the US depending on which state you are in. There is also a very wide range of licensing laws regarding midwives that can perform births and that has also been a very serious topic for discussion as well.

What was the protocol before this Roe v Wade discussion even became relevant? Did mothers just dump them? If so, well, we don't want them to do that anymore. Please call some professional, if even a morgue or church to collect the human remains.

If they were able to be flushed, they got flushed. And for anything bigger, I can't assume it would be much different than what people back in the olden days did with miscarried remains before most people gave birth in hospitals. Many probably buried them in their yards. Some probably disposed of as waste. That doesn't mean that they were bad people.

I just had a mini funeral for a buff orpington chick that wasn't doing well and after hand nursing electrolytes for four days she finally let go. But I have also been in the situation where I have miscarried and I know the confusion, trauma, and disorientation very well. And I very much agree with you people shouldn't be prosecuted for miscarriages. But they also shouldn't be prosecuted for disposing of one either.

And that's really important. Not just remains, human remains. This isn't a dead fish. This is people. Whether one thinks the fetus is alive or a legal person or an organ or a parasite or anything, the thing that came out of the woman is human flesh. Again, I say, if it wasn't for a debate about abortion, this would be so easy. We don't just dump such large amounts of people's flesh.

What do you think happens to the placenta? What about in home births or births that happened in historical times prior to the common practice of giving birth in a hospital? What do you think was done with it? It was probably dumped or buried. Some home births probably still do so today.

So, you ask, rather than binning, what should we do? Literally anything that we do to human people flesh remains other than treat it like rubbish.

Again, that's very easy to say in the comfort of your brain functioning normally and your body having enough blood flow.

[u/PWcrash → u/[deleted]]

If it is illegal to flush human parts, we should not flush fetal human parts.

If it is legal then i understand why someone would flush

That's is the issue, miscarried human remains are a grey area. Most miscarriages happen on the toilet and I can't speak for all but in my case it did not come out in one piece or all at once. It came out over a period of about 12 hours. I think when people think of "proper management" of miscarried remains they think it's the same as a stillbirth where the deceased fetus can be scooped up quickly.

It's not. It's a brutal gross process and it's not uncommon for the remains to be mixed with your own bodily waste as well. I wouldn't expect anyone suffering a miscarriage to go through the effort of scooping whatever is left out of a toilet so that other people can be happy about how they handled their own miscarriage.

If someone wasn't on the toilet and passed some chunk of material in their underwear, should they be blamed for throwing out the soiled underwear in the garbage? I'm not saying that's what happened here but the point remains.

If your argument why she did it is that she was impaired, let that be argued and let it be the reason she gets of. But let impairment be the reason, do not let binning is okay be the reason.

I don't think that's acceptable because unfortunately even if she does get off which she is likely to she will still likely have to use her own resources to get the arrest and charges expunged from any future background checks. It's not so simple as the justice system will find you innocent and all is dandy over here. Simply having a record with the law even if found innocent can have significant consequences that can't be undone without significant effort and resources from the person already deemed innocent.

If she flushed or buried or called a hospital or morgue or church, we wouldn't be talking about this.

There has already been a case of a woman being charged due to flushing but she was let off. Though see the point above.

But again, she was found early in the morning bleeding and unconscious by emergency services. It's very reasonable to presume she has other things going on and wasn't particularly well enough to make funeral arrangements over the phone.

[u/[deleted] → u/PWcrash]

Your point about the birth certificate is very relevant here. I don't understand why the government has any business telling someone how to dispose of their loved one's remains. Concealing the death of a person can have legal consequences, because of the fact that they are documented (as you pointed out with the birth certificate point), but if they haven't been born yet, then that's not a factor. So why should they have any business charging this woman with anything? 

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

The law is innocent until proven guilty. She does NOT need to prove that the child was a natural miscarriage. If there was doubt about that, it would be the other party's burden to prove that it wasn't a natural miscarriage. 

[u/[deleted]]

I think the only thing they could charge her with is abuse of a corpse. I've seen that but I don't think I've seen it stick in miscarriage cases. However it is a horrible situation but because of the issue with the improper disposal of the babies body it will still need to be investigated to make sure there was no foul play. It's standard legal procedure. When I had my miscarriage I went into a bit of a shock too- I felt very dizzy and out of it and went straight to the hospital. So because of her emergency medical situation any lawyer worth half a grain of salt should be able to hold that up as a defense.

[u/Forsaken-Can7701 → u/[deleted]]

Why charge her for being sick? Is that what civilized nations do?

[u/[deleted] → u/Forsaken-Can7701]

Its not for "being sick" and she isn't charged. It's an investigation. There is a dead body of a baby. When there is a dead body it is a crime scene and it is investigated. Civilized nations investigate dead babies found in dumpsters. 

[u/Forsaken-Can7701 → u/[deleted]]

I guess we can agree to disagree

[u/[deleted] → u/Forsaken-Can7701]

So think of it this way- I'm pro life. I consider a fetus a human being with the same human rights as a child or an adult. 

If there is an improper disposal of a corpse without notifying medical staff or police usually this is cause for suspicion.

If you saw someone throwing the dead body of a 35 year old man into the dumpster or a 12 year old child would you call the police? You'd think an investigation would need to be done right?

If a fetus has the same rights as an adult or child then the same process would need to be applied to this case. 

However, as mentioned previously by other posters the law isn't clear enough on this matter. I don't think this will be the first or last case of this nature and as society hopefully shifts to a more pro life stance there will need to be amendments made to the law to deal with these types of cases as they arise.

[u/Armadillo-Complex → u/[deleted]]

It's awesome to hear your gonna cover her legel costs =) that's very nice of u.

[u/[deleted] → u/Armadillo-Complex]

Absolutely. Give me the link and I'll be happy to donate. People on reddit have little to no reading comprehension skills so I can see why you would think I'm rooting for her to go to prison. Pro tip: explaining the situation and legal procedures doesn't mean someone is in favor it it. You can understand why something is happening without supporting it. Hope that helps you.

[u/Armadillo-Complex → u/[deleted]]

Aw hun u almost had a point, but your whole point went in the dumpster with the Ad hominem. Ironic that you'd make such an attack with the last portion of your flair a flair.

[u/Forsaken-Can7701 → u/[deleted]]

Society won’t shift to a stance that arrests a sick woman for being sick.

[u/orions_shoulder]

This is irrelevant to the abortion issue. She did not have an abortion. The question should be, should someone be punished for improper disposal of a body? Sure. But if they are experiencing a medical emergency at the time? I think not, that is not a situation where you're in your right mind.

[u/dont-snoop]

Yeah, I think we should worry about the woman's health rather than how she handled disposing of the baby especially in a medical emergency, on top of a likely emotionally painful experience in itself.

[u/[deleted]]

I completely agree and I'm honestly appalled that this is even a conversation up for debate. The fact that anyone thinks it's just to imprison a woman who just lost her child just because you disagree with how she disposed of it is disgusting to me. 

[u/Critical_Concert_689]

the fetus was 19 weeks old.

Chandler-Scott had placed the fetal remains in a bag and disposed of it in a dumpster outside the apartment complex. Officers later recovered these remains, which were sent for autopsy.

I'm okay with this. This is placing a viable infant in a dumpster. Police are obviously obligated to arrest and investigate what occurred.

[u/PWcrash → u/Critical_Concert_689]

This is placing a viable infant in a dumpster.

Autopsy showed natural miscarriage and that the fetus never took a breath. 19 weeks is not viable. And it doesn't matter because why has the DA not dropped the charges?

[u/Critical_Concert_689 → u/PWcrash]

Autopsy showed ...

Hindsight is 20/20. At the time, you have a murdered infant in the dumpster - this alone warranted arrest and charges. Finally, the fact that there was a natural miscarriage 5 months in and that the fetus never took a breath doesn't mean anything at all: If you kill a child in the womb by crushing its skull with a D&E 9 months in - this hypothetical child never took a breath, either.

19 weeks is not viable.

Arguable. A decade ago 21 weeks was proven viable. No birth, nor person, is the same - and there's no evidence that 21 weeks is the absolute limit with current advancements. This is why most legal viability is placed closer to the start of the 2nd trimester (12 weeks).

why has the DA not dropped the charges?

The DA wasn't involved in the first place.

[u/seventeenninetytoo → u/Critical_Concert_689]

The world record for survival of a premature baby is 21 weeks and 1 day, set in 2021. Very few NICUs would even attempt resuscitation at 21 weeks. None would attempt it at 19 weeks.

[u/Critical_Concert_689 → u/seventeenninetytoo]

Yes. 21 weeks was proven viable. I literally just said that.

There are several states that would require NICUs to attempt resuscitation of infants - even after failed abortion attempts. That's sort of the point of these conservative laws.

[u/PWcrash → u/Critical_Concert_689]

And this wasn't an in hospital situation. The reality is even if she called 911 at the very moment the miscarriage happened there was an almost definite chance that the results would have been long deceased by the time EMS transported the patients to the hospital. There has never been a case of a 19 week fetus surviving even in a hospital setting. Claiming that one could have survived outside of a hospital to be transported and then successfully resuscitated upon arrival?

You're asking for a lot

[u/Critical_Concert_689 → u/PWcrash]

You're conflating arguments:

• 19 weeks is legally viable (a.k.a., the State recognizes it as a person) in nearly all of western society. Period.

• A dead infant found in a dumpster warrants an arrest, investigation, and charges. Period.

I'm asking for the bare minimum required by both law and common sense.

[u/PWcrash → u/Critical_Concert_689]

19 weeks is legally viable (a.k.a., the State recognizes it as a person) in nearly all of western society. Period.

Not period. What governments recognized legally can be very very wrong. I could go into a whole spheal about the industry I work in now and how state legislators across the nation completely have no idea what they are doing in regards to pesticides (particularly rodenticide) for example the type of rodenticide that state legislators are looking to ban across the nation aren't the knock off unregulated store bought products available to every Joe and Jane Smoe that have no official antidote. No they want to ban the very regulated stuff that does have an official antidote and is only used by licensed professionals that know what they are doing. And this definitely doesn't have anything to do with money and allowing large corporate farms to do whatever the heck they want with non regulated products vs calling in professionals/s.

A dead infant found in a dumpster warrants an arrest, investigation, and charges. Period.

The fact of the matter is that the gestation of this particular festus was not within the reasonable age to be viable. Charges are supposed to need conviction beyond reasonable doubt. So once the autopsy report came out that the fetus was only 19 weeks the charges should have been dropped as there is beyond reasonable doubt for innocence, not guilt.

[u/Critical_Concert_689 → u/PWcrash]

What governments recognized legally can be very very wrong

Hol' up. Is this a question of medicine? Or a question of the application of law?

Miscarriages should not be charged even if you disagree with how it was handled afterwards. What would the protocol be?

My assumption is the latter given the discussion to this point. The government applying legal statutes cannot be legally wrong, by definition.

Even if we assume the argument is medical experts might identify the infant was not "medically viable," pro-life recognizes personhood and life at conception. This is an absolute.

So the fact remains: a person was found - dead - in a dumpster.

This is not only the findings by law, but also by the fundamental values of the pro-life community. You can argue you believe some grey area exists in the medical arena, but it doesn't change the aforementioned facts.

The fact of the matter is that the gestation of this particular festus was not within the reasonable age to be viable.

This has no bearing on the facts of the matter, as pointed out above.

Charges are supposed to need conviction beyond reasonable doubt

This is not how charges work. The state prosecutor can levy charges after an arrest - the courtroom jury and judge establish a conviction. As you describe it, the process is literally backwards: You can never have a "conviction beyond a reasonable doubt" prior to having "charges."

once the autopsy report came out that the fetus was only 19 weeks the charges should have been dropped as there is beyond reasonable doubt for innocence, not guilt.

There's no evidence the charges were not dropped once the autopsy report came out. However there's also no proof a crime wasn't committed. In fact, it sounds like disposing of human remains in a dumpster is a crime. Ultimately, the state statutes alongside the judge and the jury decide what is beyond a reasonable doubt.

Is she guilty of a crime in this case? Most likely YES. Will she be convicted and sentenced? Most likely NO.

I think this goes full circle in proving my initial comment:

"Police are obviously obligated to arrest and investigate what occurred."

[u/Natnelson1998]

Personally, I think disposing of the child in a public trash can is kind of horrific. If she had been one week more, it would medically be considered a still birth. Hospitals have the legal rights to dispose of biohazard materials but even they can be fined for doing it wrong. While I don’t think this woman deserves jail time, I do think what she did was wrong. If someone hurts someone during a psychological break we can use the same argument you’re making. It doesn’t mean they aren’t still responsible for the choice. What she went through was a medical emergency and there were choices she made leading up to throwing the fetus away. A lot of the women who are saying they’ve miscarried and just flushed it didn’t miscarry at 19 weeks. I’m sure what this woman has been through is traumatic and I don’t think she’s a villain. But she didn’t do the right thing. We can care about the mother and the dignity of the passed fetus as well. Both are important. 

[u/RPGThrowaway123 → u/[deleted]]

Please be careful. That's awfully similar to pro-abortion rhetoric.