Jun
16
Teen who fought for 2005 abortion pregnant again
Filed Under abortion, social services | Comments Off
By KATHLEEN CHAPMAN
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
The foster child who made national news last year when the state of Florida went to court to prevent her from having an abortion is pregnant again.
“L.G.,” who turned 15 this month, is due to deliver a baby boy Nov. 1, her mother said.
The teenager first got pregnant at 13 after running away from a state group home. Attorneys with the Florida Department of Children and Families petitioned a juvenile court judge to stop her from terminating her pregnancy, saying the state could not consent to an abortion.
But the foster teen’s attorneys successfully argued that the decision was L.G.’s to make. She ended her pregnancy May 3, 2005.
Her story, which came just months after the government’s interference in the Terri Schiavo case, grabbed headlines across the country.
But not much changed for L.G.
The teen has been in foster care since her ninth birthday, when she was removed from her mother’s house amid allegations of abuse. The state terminated her mother’s parental rights but failed to find L.G. a permanent home.
By the time she was 13, L.G. was a chronic runaway, often returning to her mother’s house.
After L.G. had her abortion, leaders at Palm Beach County’s foster care agency privately considered whether to take the unusual step of returning the teen to the mother who had lost all legal rights to her.
But that plan fell through. L.G. ended up in a local runaway shelter where, according to her mother, she got in a confrontation with a worker and was charged with a felony after allegedly damaging the woman’s car.
She ran from state custody again in September and was gone for eight months. While missing, her mother said, she had unprotected sex with an 18-year-old man in Miami.
L.G. went to doctors for prenatal care, her mother said, but didn’t use Medicaid so the state couldn’t find her. She asked doctors to send the medical bills to her mother’s house. Her mother said she told L.G. she had no way to pay them.
In May, L.G. turned herself in. She is now in the custody of the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice and could be sent to a locked program for young offenders.
At 13, she told Palm Beach County Juvenile Court Judge Ronald Alvarez that she wanted an abortion because she didn’t want the baby to grow up in foster care.
This time, her mother said, L.G. wants to keep her baby. The mother does not think her daughter’s second pregnancy was an accident.
Some teenagers who get pregnant while in foster care succeed in keeping their children, with help from local programs for young mothers. Others lose them to the same foster care system that raised them. The decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, Department of Children and Families spokeswoman Marilyn Munoz said.
L.G.’s mother said she would like to hire an attorney to fight for her daughter but doesn’t have the money. She said the state does not allow her to contact L.G.
The two of them are a lot alike, she said:
“She’s smart. She’s a survivor. And she’s had to fight her whole life, just like me.”
Copyright 2006 The Palm Beach Newspapers, Inc.
Palm Beach Post (Florida)
June 16, 2006 Friday
FINAL EDITION
SECTION: LOCAL; Pg. 1B
LENGTH: 502 words