Woman Charged With Attempted Murder for Failed Abortion With Coat Hanger
A 31-year-old Tennessee woman who attempted to self-abort her 24-week-old pregnancy with a coat hanger has been charged with first-degree attempted murder after doctors managed to save her baby boy from the botched attempt to kill him.
Citing a report from the Murfreesboro Police Department, the Daily News Journal said the woman, Anna Yocca of Swindon Circle, was indicted by a grand jury last week and is being held in the Rutherford County Adult Detention Center on $200,000 bond for the grisly incident.
Detective Tommy Roberts told the Journal that Yocca filled a bathtub with water, then "took a coat hanger and attempted to self-abort her pregnancy." She, however, "became concerned about her safety" after seeing the amount of blood and her boyfriend took her to Saint Thomas Rutherford Hospital.
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She was later transported to Saint Thomas Midtown in Nashville, where medical professionals managed to save her baby, who weighed 1.5 pounds at birth.
Doctors and nurses told Detective Roberts that Yocca said she wanted to kill the baby.
Although the baby did not die, doctors said Yocca did a lot of damage to him. The boy suffered injuries to his eyes, lungs and heart because of his mother's actions.
"Those injuries will affect this child for the rest of his life, all caused at the hands of his own mother," Sgt. Kyle Evans told News Channel 5.
"The whole time she was concerned for her health, her safety and never gave any attention to the health and safety to the unborn child," he said.
The investigation into Yocca began in September, and last week, a grand jury indicted her on the attempted first-degree murder charge.
Yocca's Facebook page indicates that she moved to Murfreesboro, Tennessee, in October 2014 when she started a new job at Amazon.com and began a relationship with Matt Kluge.
The Christian Post requested an interview with Yocca at the Rutherford County Adult Detention Center on Monday, but public information officer Lisa Marchesoni said Yocca told her she wanted to have a lawyer present during any interviews and noted that she was still in the process of securing one.
Abortions with coat hangers, explains the Dailey Law Firm, are among the most grisly ways a woman can attempt to end a pregnancy. They're usually considered a relic of the time before Roe v. Wade and are held up by abortion rights advocates as a symbol of what life without abortion access looked like.
And in reaction to Yocca's case, that is the direction Tiffany Tai, member support coordinator at the National Network of Abortion Funds, pointed her finger at in a tweet on Monday.
"It has happened. We are back to the coat hanger days. Thinking of Anna Yocca and the circumstances that brought her to this moment," she wrote.
