Northern Ireland

Judgement reserved in challenge to woman's prosecution for buying schoolgirl daughter abortion pills

The high court in Belfast
The high court in Belfast The high court in Belfast

JUDGMENT has been reserved in a legal challenge to a woman being prosecuted for buying her schoolgirl daughter abortion pills.

Lawyers for the pair, who have been granted anonymity, claim the decision to pursue charges breaches their human rights.

Following a two-day hearing at the High Court in Belfast it was confirmed that a ruling will be delivered at a later stage.

Terminations are only legal in Northern Ireland to protect the pregnant female’s life or if there is a risk of serious damage to her well-being.

The mother is facing a trial and could be jailed for up to five years if convicted.

In 2013 her daughter, then aged 15, became pregnant during an allegedly physically and verbally abusive relationship. Feeling vulnerable and unable to travel to England for a termination, the mother purchased abortion pills online.

The family’s legal team claim compelling the girl to continue with a crisis pregnancy would have breached rights to protection from inhuman and degrading treatment.

They said prosecuting her mother for enabling her to access medication to obtain an abortion also violated those entitlements and rights to privacy and family life, it was contended.

Further issues have been raised about the disclosure of information from a GP and child and adolescent mental health services as part of the police investigation and subsequence decision to bring charges.

According to counsel for the Public Prosecution Service, however, the doctor’s notes contain disputed “hints” of feeling pressured over taking the medication.

Tony McGleenan QC said a key question centred on whether the girl was beyond the 10-week mark in her pregnancy when the pills were sought.

“In this case the critical questions are – is the medication appropriate, and is your pregnancy under 10 weeks? The information here is very sketchy about that, we don’t have definitive dates,” he said.

Attorney General John Larkin QC told the court an attempt to change Northern Ireland’s abortion regime had been “comprehensively rejected” by the Stormont assembly in February 2016.