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- cross-posted to:
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Brittany Watts, 34, miscarried at nearly 22 weeks.
A grand jury decided Thursday not to indict an Ohio woman on allegations that she mishandled the remains of a fetus after miscarrying her pregnancy at home.
The case had alarmed reproductive rights groups and legal experts who said there is no clear guidance on how to handle an at-home miscarriage and that police and local prosecutors overreached by charging the woman, who is Black, with “abuse of a corpse.”
Brittany Watts, 34, of Warren, was arrested last October and pleaded not guilty to the charge. If convicted, she would have faced up to a year in prison. Because the grand jury decided not to indict, the case has been dropped.
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A subsequent autopsy showed that the baby had died before being born due to a spontaneous miscarriage and that no illicit drugs were present. Watts was arrested two weeks later on accusations of “abusing a corpse.”
If you ever get called up for the jury and get one of these cases… Remember that (in the US at least) there is a concept called “jury nullification” that you should not mention at the courthouse but can absolutely act upon.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification
For others bc I had to look it up. Good tip. I will be more enthusiastic about being called for jury duty in future.
Just remember not to let on that you know about the concept. In a lot of places indicating that you would not indict or convict on a law you believe to be unjust is a very fast way to get dismissed from jury duty.
Also worth noting that you can potentially spoil the entire jury pool by mentioning it during voir dire, forcing the courtroom to postpone jury selection entirely.