Court Opinion

ID: 9596866
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:53:49.038991+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:01:36.203950
License: Public Domain

SUTIN, Judge (dissenting in part and concurring in part). I concur with the majority opinion that this case be reversed and Dr. Strance be discharged. I dissent because the entire criminal abortion statute is unconstitutional, including that part which is not underlined in the majority opinion. (A) The Entire Statute is Unconstitutional. This statute was deemed unconstitutional in 1970. New Mexico’s 1969 Criminal Abortion .Law; 10 Natural Resources Journal, p. 591 (1970). It should be repealed. The reasons set forth are strong and compelling. The Legislature and society • should peruse the many studies made in the field of abortion. It would convince them, as it does me, the sociological value of the consensual physician-patient relationship in arriving at a decision. As Justice Douglas pointed out in Roe v. Wade, supra; Many studies show it is safer for a woman to have a medically induced abortion than to bear a child. Legislation which seeks protection of prenatal life should not be adopted unless some strong compelling state interest demands it. No such compelling interest exists in New Mexico. See, New Mexico’s 1969 Criminal Abortion Law, supra. It establishes beyond a doubt that the statute serves no state welfare or safety interest. Anti-abortion statutes have had the same effect on the health and welfare of women that prohibition had for citizens generally under the XVIII Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, repealed December 5, 1933; that anti-drug statutes have today on the young men and women of our country. “The estimates, at least as of 1967, of illegal abortions obtained annually in the United States vary from 200,000 to 1,200,000.” In New Mexico, women are “forced to hospital shop, first in town, and if unsuccessful throughout New Mexico, or other states, (then) perhaps even to Juarez or Nogales, Mexico.” Criminal abortions are probably the most common single crime of maternal deaths. Every pregnant woman should have the freedom openly to seek the services of a licensed physician, the use of clean offices or hospitals. This is her right to privacy and the right to be left alone. In the event of harm, she is protected by the laws of medical malpractice. (B) The Portion of the Statute Not Italicised is Unconstitutional. The pertinent portions of the statute remaining are: 40A-5-1. Definitions. A. ‘pregnancy’ means the implantation of an embryo in the uterus; * * * t- 4* * 40A-5-3. Criminal Abortion. Criminal abortion consists of administering to any pregnant woman any medicine, drug, or other substance, or using any method or means whereby an untimely termination of her pregnancy is produced, or attempted to be produced, with the intent to destroy the fetus, and the termination is not a justified medical termination. (Emphasis added). I quote from p". 610 of'the law review article, supra: The 1969 abortion law appears to cover all unjustified terminations of pregnancy from the time the fertilized ovum starts to be implanted in the uterus until childbirth. But does it really? The law forbids producing an “untimely termination of . pregnancy.” Pregnancy is defined as “the implantation of an embryo in the uterus.” The law forbids, therefore, producing an untimely termination of the implantation of an embryo in the uterus. A strict reading of this language is that all that is unlawful is an abortion during those few days within which the embryo becomes implanted in the uterus. The law no where defines the words “embryo” or “fetus.” “Embryo” appears in the definition of “pregnancy” and “fetus” appears in the definition of criminal abortion as an ingredient of the element “with intent to destroy the fetus.” The embryo and the fetus are not the same. The embryo exists about 12 weeks, and then becomes a fetus. Again, a strict reading of the law would be that it is not a crime to terminate pregnancy if the intent is to destroy the embryo, rather than the fetus. Strictly construed, only the untimely termination of pregnancy from approximately the 13th week of pregnancy to childbirth, when the fetus exists, would be unlawful. Penal statutes are strictly construed, but they must be of such sufficient certainty that a person will know his act is criminal when he does it. We will not change or limit the wording in a criminal statute in order to construe it against the accused. State v. Collins, 80 N.M. 499, 458 P.2d 225 (1969); dissenting opinion, State v. Sanchez, 82 N.M. 585, 484 P.2d 1295 (Ct.App.1971). The criminal abortion statute is not limited to physicians administering to a pregnant woman. It applies to any person who administers any medicine, drug or other substance or uses any method or means of untimely termination of pregnancy. The language is not sufficiently certain to alert a person that his act is criminal. I close with the quotation from the law review article, supra: The direct, immediate, and intimate effect of embryonic and fetal existence and the termination thereof is upon the family. It is not upon society. When desired, agreed to, and understood by the woman seeking it, termination of pregnancy possess no element of evil which detrimentally affects the public as a whole or endangers the health, welfare, or safety of society. There is no collective judgment of the people of this country that the embryo or fetus is morally entitled to survive. Termination of pregnancy under medically safe conditions should not be a crime. It is arbitrary and unreasonable to punish conduct such as this based on a consensual patient-physician relationship wherein a decision to terminate pregnancy is usually always formed from serious consideration of the consequences.