Court in El Salvador has sentenced a woman to 30 years in prison for abortion

Court in El Salvador has sentenced a woman to 30 years in prison for abortion. 

According to a humanitarian group aiding in her defense, a court in El Salvador sentenced a woman to 30 years in jail for aggravated murder after an obstetric emergency terminated her pregnancy.

In a statement released Tuesday, the Citizen Group for the Decriminalization of Abortion stated a woman named only “Esme” was convicted on Monday. 

However, when the lady sought medical attention in a public hospital, she had already been in pre-trial incarceration for two years after her arrest.

“The court behaved with prejudice, favoring the Attorney General’s Office’s version, which was laden with stigmas and gender stereotypes,” the organization said. They said that they planned to appeal.

Because the courts were closed, the sentence could not be verified right away.

El Salvador outright prohibits abortion, and some women have been prosecuted and sentenced to jail after reporting suspected miscarriages to authorities.

Nearly 180 women have been charged in the last two decades. The government has freed 64 of them since 2009. 

In addition, eight women serving hefty jail terms have had their sentences commuted since December.

Activists claim that at least 17 Salvadoran women have been wrongfully convicted and imprisoned due to obstetric crises. 

They have been the focus of a campaign against El Salvador’s strict anti-abortion legislation. Many women claim to have had miscarriages.

In the documentary “Jailed for Abortion in El Salvador,” CBS News revealed some of their tales.

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights concluded last year that the government of El Salvador had violated the rights of Manuela, a woman who was jailed in 2008 on allegations of inciting an abortion and died in detention in 2010, leaving two children.

Manuela’s mother said, “These poor ladies need assistance.” “I don’t want them to go through what my daughter went through. It is the young, particularly women, who must fight.”