Prosecuted for homicide for having given birth to a baby who died shortly after birth, a Salvadoran woman obtained the abandonment of the legal action by a judge. El Salvador has an extremely repressive anti-abortion law, backed by the powerful Catholic Church.
The media call her Katia to protect her identity. She risked, in accordance with Salvadoran law, a sentence of thirty years in prison after being prosecuted for homicide with aggravating circumstances for having given birth at home to a baby who only survived a few hours. A judge from the city of Ahuachapan, located 100 km east of the capital, “declared the final dismissal of the criminal action against Katia”, according to a press release from the Citizen Group for the Decriminalization of abortion (Acdatee).
#LibertadParaLasMujeres| Celebramos la libertad de Katia, una joven que a sus 22 años enfrentó un parto extrahospitalario y al buscar ayuda médica fue denounced. The @FGR_SV the acusó por homicidio agravado y solicitaba 30 años de cárcel.
? pic.twitter.com/D8pkOXllAJ— Agrupación Ciudadana #ManuelaJusticiaYEsperanza (@AbortoPORlaVIDA) October 21, 2022
In 2019, at the time of the events, the young woman was only 22 years old when she gave birth to a little girl in her bathroom. Her relatives immediately transport her, with her baby, to a hospital center to receive emergency medical care. The girl dies in hospital. In the process, the nursing staff denounces Katia to the police. She is detained on remand, and later accused of having killed her baby.
The prosecutor’s decision to drop the procedure on October 19 was welcomed by feminist activists. ” Once again, we have succeeded in confronting and reversing the criminalization efforts which baselessly and without evidence (…) persecute, accuse and seek to convict women said Morena Herrera, from Acdatee’s board of directors, in the statement.
Since 1998, El Salvador’s penal code has prohibited abortion, even in cases of rape or danger to the mother, and provides for penalties of up to eight years in prison. However, prosecutors and judges are requalifying cases of abortions, even involuntary ones, as “homicide with aggravating circumstances”, which was done for Katia, punishable by a sentence of up to 50 years in prison.
Last year, in October, Congress rejected any change to the law on abortion. The reform proposal came from associations for the defense of women’s rights and called for decriminalization in three cases: to save the life of the mother, when the fetus is not viable, or in the case of rape of children, to adolescent girls and women. Evelyn Hernandez Cruzpregnant after a rape, thirty years in prison after a miscarriage (lawyers), Lesly Ramirezwhose baby dies shortly after birth, thirty years in prison… Beatriz whose baby was non-viable and forbidden to abort… cases – around forty women are in prison – which offend international public opinion and human rights organisations.
The Inter-American Court of Human Rights and the United Nations Human Rights Committee called for the sentences of these women to be reviewed and the law corrected, without success so far.
