Women Face Criminal Charges Over Pregnancy For Medical Cannabis Use, Record Number Of Prosecutions In Year After Dobbs
Over two hundred pregnant women faced criminal charges for conduct related to pregnancy, abortion, pregnancy loss or birth during the first year following the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision. Some women faced prosecution for using medical marijuana, despite being registered patients under state law, as highlighted by Marijuana Moment’s Ben Adlin.
That’s according to a report from Pregnancy Justice, a reproductive rights organization, titled “Pregnancy as a Crime: A Preliminary Report on the First Year After Dobbs.”
Following the landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court to overrule Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, eliminating the constitutional right to abortion 2022, dated June 24, 2022, a sharp increase in pregnancy-related prosecutions is evident.
The report found that “in the one year from June 24, 2022, to June 23, 2023, there was the highest number of pregnancy-related prosecutions documented in a single year.”
Nearly 97% of 210 criminal cases filed cited substance use during pregnancy.
In 133 of those cases, drug use was …