Freedom for Sonia Esther Tábora in El Salvador

Salvadorian feminists and women´s groups are demanding revision of a court sentence issued in 2005, that condemned then 20 year old Sonia Esther Tábora to 30 years of prison for “aggravated homicide” in a premature pregnancy case that had ended in the death of the fetus. The case will be revises in the Sonsonate court this coming Monday, July 16, 2012. Your signature and that of your organization is very important, as the case is political, since legal procedures were violated at the time of the original trial. This is one of their campaigns. You can join by here. The independent organization – Citizens for the Decriminalization of Abortion (Agrupación Ciudadana por la Despenalización del Aborto, Terapéutico, Ético y Eugenésico), a non governmental organization born in 2010 to promote of safe abortions, submitted a request for the revision of the case in the local courts in the country. Tábora was born in the town of Buena Vista in Sacacoyo, in La Libertad, 30 miles west of the capital City of San Salvador. In that town, 40% of the population live in extreme poverty according to FLACSO-FISDL (2005). On June 22 a group of about 25 poor female friends and neighbors gathered in front of the Court of Sonsonate, 65 kilometers west of San Salvador demanding that her case be heard. An international solidarity campaign is also being launched by PETATERAS, feminists from Meso América. Tábora has been in the Women´s Ilopango Jail in San Salvador during the past 7 years. The jail has a population 450% more than its real capacity. Almost 2,000 women for a space for 400 women. A number of 14 women sleep in a 2 meter space. The case needs to be revisited because the facts need to be revised. On February 16, 2005 during her pregnancy she underwent a complication due to very premature contractions that left her in a state of shock and hemorrhage. When her neighbors took her to the health clinic, she explained to the doctor about the complication and the death of the fetus. Immediately the doctor reported the case to the prosecution office of the police as if she had been a criminal act. Right there the police concluded that’s Sonia Esther deserved preventive prison with which she went from the bed in the clinic directly to jail. Days later she was condemned by court without any evidence but the word of the doctor, as not even an autopsy was performed to the corpse of the fetus. The organization is demanding the revision of the case, but also a revision of the law that criminalizes all abortions so that at least when the woman´s life is in danger, the removal of the fetus can save her life. In El Salvador, any kind of abortion is criminalized since 1997 when a new Penal Code prohibited abortion under all circumstances.