The 33-year-old Watts, who had not shared the news of her pregnancy even with her family, made her first prenatal visit to a doctor’s office behind Mercy Health-St. Joseph’s Hospital in Warren, a working-class city about 60 miles (100 kilometers) southeast of Cleveland.
The doctor said that, while a fetal heartbeat was still present, Watts’ water had broken prematurely and the fetus she was carrying would not survive. He advised heading to the hospital to have her labor induced, so she could have what amounted to an abortion to deliver the nonviable fetus. Otherwise, she would face “significant risk” of death, according to records of her case.
That was a Tuesday in September. What followed was a harrowing three days entailing: multiple trips to the hospital; Watts miscarrying into, and then flushing and plunging, a toilet at her home; a police investigation of those actions; and Watts, who is Black, being charged with abuse of a corpse. That’s a fifth-degree felony punishable by up to a year in prison and a $2,500 fine.
This is obviously a dumb question, but what the fuck are the legal requirements of a miscarriage? I can imagine her thinking she was glad she didn’t have any more appointments or have to pay a huge hospital bill. What else was she supposed to do, and would she have known?
I once passed a kidney stone and they didn’t say to do anything special with it so I threw it away. Same thing, right?
Yeah that’s the crux of the argument the lawyer is making:
She’d already been in and out of the hospital, and so when she got home I’m sure she was so traumatized and confused that she probably thought she just had to release whatever was left and move on. Kinda like what happens in a period. The blood comes out, you flush it and clean up, end of story.
I would imagine the “proper” protocol would be for the doctor to “perform” the procedure in a hospital and dispose of it the same way they do of all biological waste. There is absolutely no way she would have an intimate knowledge of Ohio’s corpse desecration laws. I buried my cat in the back yard and that was that. She should be afforded the same dignity here, since the fetus died in utero.
If it cost but a penny, republicans wouldn’t afford dignity for their own mothers.
And they couldn’t afford it without a bailout from California.
The legal requirement seems to be not to have one.
Stuff like that if people who have not a single clue about pregnancy make laws regarding pregnancy.
This has nothing to do with the case above, but it’s a really bad idea to just throw away a kidney stone. It needs to be analyzed so you can come up with a treatment plan with your doctor to help you avoid future problems.
Oh man and that’s free?
Not in America. But we have insurance, so our medical bills are only… nearing $10,000?
Only $10,000? Why such a discount???
We have “good” insurance and I haven’t had my latest surgery yet (it’s next week), which will bring it up to about $12,000.
I’ve had several. I guess they figured they’d analyzed enough of them.
I missed the part where you said they didn’t say to do anything special with it. Sorry.
In fairness they asked every other time. They might’ve just forgotten, but in any event I had nothing to do with it. No little bottle or anything. Which I’d guess they didn’t give her one either since she wasn’t sent home to pass it. So anyway it went down the toilet in both cases. Maybe I left too much originally unsaid in that parallel.
I just hope you haven’t had to deal with them too often. I had one kidney stone last year, not even a huge one, and they gave me fentanyl in the hospital to deal with the pain, so I definitely sympathize.
Four times confirmed, I think with a fifth that passed without needing to go to the hospital (had leftover Vicodin at home thankfully from back in the days they weren’t quite as stingy with it - for good reasons I understand but I always used my meds responsibly and stopped taking them as soon as I could to save the leftovers for when they were really needed). Thankfully none have needed surgery but they were all nearly that size. I appreciate the empathy and send some of my own. It’s the worst and they just send you home with pain meds and well wishes.