Portuguese Appeals Court Charges Doctor, Assistant, Three Women In Abortion Case, Overrules Acquittal Of Lower Court

A Portuguese court of appeals in Coimbra, Portugal, on Tuesday sentenced an alleged abortion provider, his assistant and three women accused of having illegal abortions to prison, overruling a 2004 lower court ruling that acquitted them of the charges, AFP/Today Online reports (AFP/Today Online, 7/4). Abortion is illegal in Portugal except when necessary to protect the life or health of a woman or if a woman becomes pregnant as a result of rape. In the trial, which began in December 2003, public prosecutors also had charged a physician with performing illegal abortions and had charged his two employees and seven other individuals as accomplices, including those who allegedly accompanied the women to the clinic, such as a parent, husband or boyfriend. A lower court in February 2004 dropped the charges against the alleged abortion provider, seven women who were accused of undergoing the illegal procedure and several others accused of being involved with illegal abortions. Presiding Judge Paulo Brandao said that although public prosecutors had proven that the doctor performed abortions at his clinic, they had not proven that the seven women charged had obtained abortions. Brandao said that despite being acquitted, the physician would be penalized by having his car, medical instruments and some money obtained through providing abortions seized by the state (Kaiser Daily Women's Health Policy Report, 2/19/04).

Appeals Court Ruling
In overruling the lower court, the appeals court sentenced the physician to three years and eight months in prison, AFP/Today Online reports. The court also sentenced the woman who worked in the clinic and allegedly assisted the physician in performing abortions to 16 months in prison, suspended for three years, and sentenced the three women who were accused of undergoing the procedure to six months in jail, suspended for two years, according to AFP/Today Online. The appeals court based its decision in part on gynecological exams, which the lower court had not allowed to be submitted as evidence. Defense lawyers have 15 days to appeal the court's decision. Prime Minister Jose Socrates has vowed to hold another referendum on the nation's abortion laws, AFP/Today Online reports (AFP/Today Online, 7/5). The public in a 1998 referendum voted 51% to 49% to reject a measure that would have allowed abortion in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy. Former Prime Minister Jose Manuel Durao Barroso in January 2004 barred another referendum from taking place during his administration's term (Kaiser Daily Women's Health Policy Report, 2/19/04). Officials say that about 10,000 women annually in Portugal are treated at hospitals for complications caused by illegal abortions (Associated Press, 7/4).

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