TOLEDO, Ohio (WOWO) — Pro-life advocates and Republican lawmakers are calling for additional charges and tighter regulation of mail-order abortion pills following the conviction of a former Toledo doctor accused of secretly giving abortion medication to his girlfriend.
Hassan-James Abbas pleaded no contest to four felony charges in the case. According to investigators, Abbas used his former wife’s identity to obtain mifepristone and misoprostol, crushed the medication and forced it into his girlfriend’s mouth while she was sleeping.
Abbas was sentenced in June by Lucas County Judge Joseph McNamara to two years of community control and six months in jail. The judge warned that violating the terms of probation could result in a prison sentence of up to 18 months.
The case has renewed debate over how abortion medications can be obtained and shipped.
Advocates gathered Tuesday outside the Lucas County Courthouse to call for additional regulation of mail-order abortion pills.
Savannah Marten, president of the Ohio Coalition of Pregnancy Centers, said the circumstances of the case should prompt people on both sides of the abortion debate to consider the rights and safety of women.
“Get out of the rhetoric, and we come back down to the community level, there is a lot more that we agree on,” Marten said.
She said advocates agree that women should have the ability to carry and raise their children while having access to resources such as housing, health care and child care.
The case has also drawn attention in Washington.
U.S. Sen. Bernie Moreno, an Ohio Republican, criticized Abbas’ sentence and called for additional action involving abortion medication.
“It is hard for me to imagine a wickedness more significant than this,” Moreno said in a statement. He also questioned why Abbas received six months in jail along with two years of probation.
The medications involved in the case are mifepristone and misoprostol. The drugs are commonly used together for medication abortion. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved mifepristone for use with misoprostol for terminating an early pregnancy, and federal regulators have allowed the medications to be prescribed through telehealth and dispensed by mail under federal rules.
The Toledo case involved an alleged use of the medications without the woman’s knowledge or consent, which is distinct from a patient voluntarily obtaining and using abortion medication through the legal medical process.
Pro-life organizations and some Republican lawmakers are using the case to argue that additional safeguards are needed for abortion medications obtained through the mail.
The case also illustrates the broader dispute over how medication abortion should be regulated, with supporters of greater access and opponents of abortion taking different positions on the appropriate role of government and medical providers.
Abbas’ criminal case has concluded with his sentence, but calls for changes to abortion-pill regulations are continuing.
The allegations against Abbas were addressed through his no-contest plea and conviction. The additional policy proposals being discussed by advocates and lawmakers would require action through the appropriate legislative or regulatory process.
