Court rules on immigrant seeking abortion
SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge in San Francisco said Wednesday that the government cannot prevent a pregnant 17-year-old at a Texas facility for unaccompanied immigrant children from getting an abortion, but declined to issue an order that would bar federal officials from interfering in the girl’s access to the procedure.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler said the legal challenge on behalf of the girl by the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California was not filed in the right court, because the girl — identified only as Jane Doe — was in Texas, not in Northern California.
The ruling allows the girl’s attorneys to file a new lawsuit seeking the same order in another federal court district. A lawyer for the U.S. Department of Justice, Peter Phipps, said at a hearing Wednesday that the government might propose having Jane Doe’s case heard in Texas or Washington, D.C.
