PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "There’s also a broader context here: The charges in Louisiana come at the same time that conservative state lawmakers are pushing and passing policies to prosecute anyone who helps a woman or girl get an abortion. This week, the Trump administration also gave anti-abortion extremists the green light to attack abortion providers without fear of consequence, and Republican lawmakers introduced legislation to repeal the FACE Act—the federal law prohibiting violence against clinics. In other words, Republicans are launching a full-scale assault on doctors, patients, and the community members who support them both."
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POST: "Louisiana Indicts New York Abortion Provider, Arrests Mother," by Jessica Valenti, published by Abortion, Every Day, on January 31, 2025. (Feminist writer, NYC native. 8 books, 1 kid & a lot of opinions. Her latest book, Abortion, is out now: prh.com/abortion)
SUB-HEADING: "These are the first post-Roe criminal charges brought against a doctor."
GIST: "I wish I had better news for you today. In what appears to be the first time an abortion provider has been criminally charged since Roe was overturned, a Louisiana grand jury has indicted a New York doctor for shipping abortion medication to a teen patient.
Dr. Maggie Carpenter was indicted today on charges of “criminal abortion by means of abortion-inducing drugs,” a felony punishable by up to 15 years in prison.
If Dr. Carpenter’s name sounds familiar, it’s because she was also recently targeted by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.
Carpenter’s organization, the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine (ACT), said in a statement, “It’s no secret the United States has a history of violence and harassment against abortion providers, and this state-sponsored effort to prosecute a doctor providing safe and effective care should alarm everyone.”
But Louisiana district attorney Tony Clayton didn’t just bring charges against Carpenter—he also arrested and indicted the patient’s mother, who obtained the pills.
Clayton claims the woman coerced her daughter into having an abortion, but as the Louisiana Illuminator points out, “coerced abortion” was not cited in the indictment.
While we don’t know the circumstances around the teen’s abortion, we do know that conservative prosecutors have a history of lying about these cases or misleading press and the public.
When Paxton sued Carpenter last month, for example, he claimed that a woman had “serious complications” after taking abortion medication—but his suit showed nothing of the sort.
It also turned out that it wasn’t the Texas abortion patient who brought the case to Paxton, but her aggrieved boyfriend, who was angry she ended her pregnancy without his permission.
All of which is to say: We should wait to find out more before assuming Clayton is telling the truth about coercion or anything else.1
There’s also a broader context here: The charges in Louisiana come at the same time that conservative state lawmakers are pushing and passing policies to prosecute anyone who helps a woman or girl get an abortion.
This week, the Trump administration also gave anti-abortion extremists the green light to attack abortion providers without fear of consequence, and Republican lawmakers introduced legislation to repeal the FACE Act—the federal law prohibiting violence against clinics.
In other words, Republicans are launching a full-scale assault on doctors, patients, and the community members who support them both.
More than that, they clearly want what’s happening in Louisiana to be a big, showy, public case. I mean, Clayton went on a talk show today to publicize the case!
Louisiana’s Attorney General Liz Murrill also highlighted the charges, tweeting earlier today:
“It is illegal to send abortion pills into this State and it’s illegal to coerce another into having an abortion. I have said it before and I will say it again: We will hold individuals accountable for breaking the law.”
Why make a big deal out of a criminal case that’s likely to be very, very unpopular? Because anti-abortion activists and big-money donors want to get this issue in front of the Supreme Court.
For example, the billionaire-backed Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA), has been leading the charge against mifepristone since Roe was overturned.
As researcher Ansev Demirhan pointed out last year, RAGA AGs were behind attacks on the FDA’s mifepristone regulations, they’ve threatened pharmacies against distributing the pills, and they filed an amicus brief to urge a Texas court to block the FDA’s approval of mailing mifepristone.
Now, with abortion medication allowing those in states with bans to get care, these extremist AGs, activists and donors want to make an example of a doctor—with SCOTUS’ help. It’s likely that Republican attorneys generals have been searching for the perfect case, and Louisiana AG Murrill was first to the finish line.
And boy is she pleased to have a talking point:
This case really does have precisely what conservatives have been looking for—and everything I’ve warned about since Roe was overturned.
I started raising the alarm over anti-abortion messaging around ‘coercion,’ for example, in 2023.
That’s when the Charlotte Lozier Institute started to suggest Republicans use ‘coercion’ in their policies and cases because “no one is openly in favor of coerced abortions.”
The tactic has only grown since.
Similarly, Republicans have been especially eager to restrict teenagers’ access to abortion: Both Tennessee and Idaho passed laws recently that made it a crime to help a teen obtain an abortion in any way.
And when three Republican AGs brought their most recent case against the FDA over mifepristone, they focused in on revoking access for teens, out of supposed fear for their “developing reproductive systems.”
Finally, Republican AGs have been on the lookout for a case with an unsympathetic defendant.
A mother who coerced her daughter into an abortion is a perfect victim for conservatives’ anti-abortion agenda. (Whether she actually coerced the teen or not.)
We also saw this tactic in Idaho, when the state brought its first ‘abortion trafficking’charges against a mother and son who had coerced the son’s girlfriend into an out-of-state abortion.
In short: The Louisiana AG clearly thinks she has found a winner of a case that she can bring to the Supreme Court to target out-of-state abortion providers.
And I think if we do a little bit of digging, we’ll find that it isn’t just Murrill behind this move—but a national anti-abortion strategy backed by extremist billionaire dollars.
In the meantime, this is why laws like the one that just passed in New York are so important: This bill would allow providers like Carpenter to remove their names from abortion medication prescription labels, protecting them from zealous out-of-state prosecutors.
Either way, New York has doctors’ back. From Attorney General Letitia James:
“This cowardly attempt out of Louisiana to weaponize the law against out-of-state providers is unjust and un-American. We will not allow bad actors to undermine our providers’ ability to deliver critical care.”
Damn straight. To support Dr. Carpenter, consider donating to her organization, the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine, here."
The entire post can be read at:
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog.
SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
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FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
