2026年3月20日 / 美国东部时间上午9:20 / 美联社
一名31岁的佐治亚州女子已被警方指控犯有谋杀罪。警方表示，她服用药物以终止妊娠，违反了该州一项在妊娠早期禁止堕胎的法律。
如果州检察官决定推进当地警方对亚历克西亚·摩尔提起的谋杀指控，她的案件将成为自2019年佐治亚州通过禁止大多数堕胎的法律以来，首个因终止妊娠而被指控的女性案例。
指控摩尔谋杀的逮捕令使用了与该法律呼应的措辞，称警方认定摩尔怀孕已超过六周，”依据医务人员的知识，婴儿有心跳且在挣扎呼吸”。
倡导组织”怀孕正义”的高级副总裁达娜·苏斯曼在一份声明中表示：”任何人都不应因堕胎而被定罪。”她称摩尔的案件是”针对所谓堕胎的前所未有的谋杀指控”。
法庭记录显示，摩尔于12月30日抵达医院，抱怨腹痛。根据金斯兰警方（位于萨凡纳以南约100英里处）获取的逮捕令，她告诉医护人员自己服用了米索前列醇（一种用于药物流产的药物）和阿片类止痛药羟考酮。
逮捕令称，胎儿在医院分娩后存活了约一个小时。获取逮捕令的警方调查人员写道，摩尔告诉护理人员：”我知道我的婴儿在受苦，因为是我做的堕胎。我希望她死。”
佐治亚州禁止在胚胎出现心跳后堕胎，这通常发生在怀孕约六周时——此时许多女性甚至不知道自己怀孕。
根据在线监狱记录，摩尔自3月4日起因谋杀和非法持有毒品罪名被关押在沿海卡姆登县监狱。
“怀孕正义”组织2024年的一项研究发现，在美国最高法院2022年推翻”罗伊诉韦德案”裁决后允许各州执行堕胎禁令的12个月内，至少有210名美国女性因与怀孕相关的犯罪被指控。
这一数字超过了该组织在其他任何12个月期间发现的案件数量。大多数案件涉及怀孕期间物质使用的指控。
摩尔的母亲周四在电话中表示暂无即时评论。佐治亚州公设辩护人委员会的一名发言人证实，该委员会的一名律师正在代表摩尔，但未作进一步评论。
法庭记录显示，摩尔的律师已提交寻求保释和快速审判的法律动议。听证会定于周一举行。
最终，是否对摩尔提起谋杀指控将由不伦瑞克司法巡回区的地方检察官基思·希金斯决定，他首先必须获得大陪审团的起诉书。希金斯未立即回复电话和电子邮件。
逮捕令称，医疗记录估计摩尔怀孕22至24周，胎儿处于存活临界点。文件将摩尔的胎儿称为”一名活产并存活了一小时的人类”，并指出”根据佐治亚州法律，受害者在活产的那一刻成为法律意义上的人”。
佐治亚州堕胎法规定，一旦检测到心跳，胚胎在法律上即被视为一个人。未参与摩尔案件的佐治亚州辩护律师安德鲁·弗莱施曼表示，这意味着当局可能对在胚胎出现心跳后故意终止妊娠的女性寻求谋杀指控。
“谋杀是故意导致他人死亡，”他补充说，他和其他人在该法律通过前就警告过，母亲可能会在类似案件中被指控。
“我不确定检察官是否急于跨越这一障碍，”弗莱施曼说，”我认为这在法律上完全是允许的，他们可能会这么做。如果他们坚持，我会感到惊讶。”
佐治亚州所谓的”心跳法”是自”罗伊诉韦德案”被推翻以来，许多保守倾向州实施的限制性堕胎法规之一。
反堕胎组织”佐治亚生命联盟”执行董事伊丽莎白·埃德蒙兹表示，任何声称指控源于2019年堕胎法的说法”歪曲事实，试图再次制造佐治亚州起诉女性妊娠结局的恐慌”。
埃德蒙兹称，她认为谋杀指控是适当的，部分原因是摩尔被指控在胎儿死亡前非法获取和服用羟考酮。
逮捕令称，毒理学检测在胎儿血液中发现了羟考酮，但警方被告知该检测无法检测米索前列醇。摩尔告诉警方，她从网上购买了堕胎药，并从亲戚那里获得了阿片类药物。
卡姆登县验尸官M.韦恩·皮普尔斯周四表示，他被传唤至东南佐治亚医疗系统医院接收遗体。他说佐治亚州调查局拒绝进行尸检，理由是胎儿是在医院分娩的。
验尸官称，他未将死亡裁定为凶杀，而是认定死亡原因和方式均不确定。
摩尔还面临持有羟考酮（一种未开具给她的受控药物）以及持有用于堕胎的米索前列醇（一种危险药物）的指控。
米索前列醇和米非司酮联合使用经美国食品药品监督管理局批准，用于终止妊娠前10周的妊娠。如果无法获得米非司酮，米索前列醇也可单独使用。它还被超说明书用于妊娠中期堕胎。
2024年，最高法院驳回了针对米非司酮可及性的挑战。反对者曾在得克萨斯州提起诉讼，称FDA不应在2000年批准该药物。2024年，路易斯安那州将米非司酮和米索前列醇归类为受控危险物质。其他一些州和联邦国会也提出了类似立法，但尚未在其他地方通过。
Georgia woman charged with murder after police say she took abortion pills to end pregnancy
March 20, 2026 / 9:20 AM EDT / AP
A 31-year-old Georgia woman has been charged with murder by police who say she took pills to induce an abortion in violation of a state law that bans it after the earliest weeks of pregnancy.
If state prosecutors decide to move forward with the murder charge brought by local police against Alexia Moore, her case would be one of the first instances of a woman being charged for terminating a pregnancy in Georgia since it passed a 2019 law banning most abortions.
The arrest warrant charging Moore with murder uses language that echoes the law, saying police determined Moore had been pregnant beyond six weeks “based on the medical staff’s knowledge that the baby had a beating heart and was struggling to breathe.”
“No one should be criminalized for having an abortion,” Dana Sussman, senior vice president of the advocacy group Pregnancy Justice said in a statement, calling Moore’s case “an unprecedented murder charge for an alleged abortion.”
Court records say Moore arrived at a hospital Dec. 30 complaining of abdominal pain. She told medical workers that she had taken misoprostol, a drug used in medication abortions, and the opioid painkiller oxycodone, according to an arrest warrant obtained by police in Kingsland, about 100 miles south of Savannah.
The fetus survived for about an hour after being delivered at the hospital, the warrant says. The police investigator obtaining the warrant wrote that Moore told the nursing staff: “I know my infant is suffering, because I am the one who did the abortion. I want her to die.”
Georgia bans abortion after embryonic cardiac activity can be detected. That’s generally at about six weeks’ gestation — before many women know they’re pregnant.
Moore has been jailed in coastal Camden County since March 4 on charges of murder and illegal drug possession, according to online jail records.
A 2024 study by the advocacy group Pregnancy Justice found that at least 210 women across the U.S. were charged with crimes related to their pregnancies in the 12 months after the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade and allowed states to enforce abortion bans.
That tally was more than the group found in any other 12 month period. Most of the cases involved allegations of substance use during pregnancy.
Moore’s mother said she had no immediate comment when reached by phone Thursday. A spokesperson for the Georgia Public Defender Council confirmed one of its attorneys is representing Moore but made no further comment.
Court records show Moore’s attorney has filed legal motions seeking a bond and a speedy trial. A court hearing was scheduled for Monday.
Ultimately, the decision on whether to prosecute Moore for murder will be left to District Attorney Keith Higgins of the Brunswick Judicial Circuit, who would first have to obtain an indictment from a grand jury. Higgins did not immediately return phone and email messages.
The warrant said medical records estimated Moore had been pregnant for 22 to 24 weeks, placing her fetus at the threshold of viability. It refers to Moore’s fetus as “a human being who was born alive and survived for one hour. Under Georgia law, the victim became a person at the moment of live birth.”
Georgia’s abortion law states that an embryo is legally a person once cardiac activity can be detected. Andrew Fleischman, a Georgia defense attorney who is not involved in Moore’s case, said that means authorities could seek murder charges against a woman who intentionally terminates her pregnancy after there’s cardiac activity.
“Murder is intentionally causing the death of a person,” he said, adding that he and others warned before the law passed that a mother could be charged in a case like this.
“I’m not sure prosecutors are eager to be the first one to jump this hurdle,” Fleishman said. “I think it’s a totally legally permissible case. I think they could do it. I’d be surprised if they go through with it.”
Georgia’s so-called “heartbeat law”is among the restrictive abortion statutes that have been put in place in many conservative-leaning states since Roe v. Wade was overturned.
Elizabeth Edmonds, executive director of the anti-abortion Georgia Life Alliance, said any claim that the charges stem from the 2019 abortion law is “misrepresenting the facts and trying to again make it a fear-mongering thing that Georgia is prosecuting women on pregnancy outcomes.”
Edmonds said she believed the murder charge was appropriate in part because Moore is accused of illegally obtaining and taking oxycodone before her fetus died.
The warrant says a toxicology screening detected oxycodone in the fetus’ blood, but police were told the test would not be able to detect misoprostol. It says Moore told police she obtained the abortion pills online and got the opioid from a relative.
Camden County Coroner M. Wayne Peeples said Thursday that he was called to Southeast Georgia Health System’s hospital to take custody of the remains. He said the Georgia Bureau of Investigation declined to perform an autopsy, noting the fetus was delivered in a hospital.
The coroner said he didn’t rule the death as a homicide, instead finding both the cause and manner of death were undetermined.
Moore also faces charges for possessing oxycodone, a controlled drug that wasn’t prescribed to her, as well as possession of a dangerous drug for the abortion-inducing misoprostol.
The drugs misoprostol and mifepristone together are approved for terminating pregnancies during the first 10 weeks of gestation by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Misoprostol can also be used alone if mifepristone is not available. It’s also used off-label for abortion in the second trimester.
The Supreme Court in 2024 rejected a challenge targeting the availability ofmifepristone. Opponents had filed a lawsuit in Texas claiming the FDA shouldn’t have approved the drug back in 2000. In 2024, Louisiana classified mifepristone and misoprostol as controlled dangerous substances. Similar legislation has been introduced in some other states and in Congress, but has not been adopted elsewhere.
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