Vol. 81/No. 2 January 9, 2017
Suit by Sofia Vergara’s embryos targets women’s right to abortion
The lawsuit says it was filed on behalf of two embryos created by Vergara and her former fiancé Nick Loeb three years ago through in vitro fertilization. After they broke up in 2014, Vergara refused Loeb permission to have the embryos implanted in a surrogate; they remain frozen at a fertility clinic in California.
“Vergara has breached her duty to her offspring Emma and Isabella by preventing their birth,” the suit states, without saying where the two names came from. Further, “she has caused and continues to cause them financial harm,” because of an inheritance trust set up in Louisiana (it doesn’t say when or by whom) “providing for their health, education, maintenance, and support.” The embryos “are scheduled to be the sole beneficiaries of the Trust, at such time as they are born alive.”
The document states that Vergara had told Loeb she “believed that life began at fertilization. Vergara knew that Loeb would not otherwise consent” to create the embryos. It demands the court name Loeb “sole curator of Emma and Isabella,” with “full custody and authority to release them for transfer, continued development and birth.”
The lawsuit is based on a special law unique to Louisiana, adopted in 1986, which states, “An in vitro fertilized human ovum exists as a juridical person.” It explicitly gives embryos the right to sue or be sued, though New Orleans law professor Monica Hof Wallace told the Daily Beast she doesn’t know of a single previous case citing the statute.
One of the two attorneys who filed the suit is Catherine Glenn Foster, a lawyer in Virginia whose work is devoted to opposing abortion and promoting other “pro-life” issues.
A growing number of states have adopted laws expanding the definition of “personhood” to include a fetus. Women in Indiana and Tennessee have been prosecuted for attempted murder or feticide under such laws for allegedly attempting self-induced abortions.
Some opponents of women’s right to choose abortion are focusing on campaigning to pass state referenda granting “personhood” status to fertilized eggs — laying the ground for banning all abortions, and potentially some forms of birth control as well. These referenda have been rejected every time they’ve been on the ballot, including in Mississippi, North Dakota and Colorado.
Meanwhile, Ohio Gov. John Kasich vetoed a bill Dec. 13 that would have banned abortions after a fetal heartbeat was detected, as early as six weeks’ gestation, noting that such laws have already been declared unconstitutional in North Dakota and Arkansas. Proponents of the measure hoped to use it to challenge the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court ruling decriminalizing abortion before “viability” — a vague criteria that changes with advancements in medical practice.
Kasich signed a separate law banning all abortions after 20 weeks’ gestation, with the only exception being to save the life of a pregnant woman. More than a dozen states now have 20-week bans, earlier than any current definition of “viability,” part of the decades-long campaign by opponents of women’s rights to chip away at women’s access to abortion.
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