It finally happened. The arrest and prosecution of a teenage girl who had an illegal abortion was the result of private data provided by Facebook, according to court documents. It was a landmark moment, one which confirmed widespread fears and uncertainty as to what the modern criminalization of abortion really looks like.
The teen is being tried as an adult for removing, concealing, and/or abandoning of a dead human body and two other crimes. The girl's mother faces three charges, as well as two felony counts, one for performing or attempting to perform an abortion past 20 weeks of conception, and another for performing an abortion as a non-licensed doctor.
It seems unlikely that these charges could have been made without the data provided by Facebook.
Nebraska has strict abortion laws. Most cases of abortion are against the law after 20 weeks. It isn't a new law. 97 percent of Nebraska counties did not have an abortion clinic. It is not easy to get an abortion in the state.
The state hasn't changed its laws since the Supreme Court legalized abortion in June.
Celeste's private data was obtained after the case was thrown out.
It's not clear how police first became aware of the abortion. After the investigation of the family began, the cops served Facebook's parent company with a search warrant requesting the mother and daughter's private data. As a result of the information gleaned from these digital footprints, the Nebraska cops were given the go-ahead to seize and search all of the Burgess' electronic devices.
According to the affidavit,este Burgess talked about how she can't wait to get this thing out of her body and that they will burn the evidence after.
"I know from prior training and experience, and conversations with other seasoned criminal investigators, that people involved in criminal activity frequently have conversations about their criminal activities through various social networking sites... computer hardware, software, and data are instrumentalities and evidence in the commission of this crime."
The police were able to prove that Jessica Burgess helped her daughter get Pregnot, which led to her giving birth to a stillborn fetus. Third-trimester abortions are only allowed in rare and specific cases in most states.
The two tried to cover their tracks by burning and burying the corpse.
Hours after the report was published, Facebook put out a statement saying that they had no idea that the data was related to an illegal abortion.
Prior to the Supreme Court decision, there was no mention of abortion in the warrants we received. Police were investigating the case of a stillborn baby who was burned and buried, not a decision to have an abortion, according to the warrants.
Regardless of whether or not Facebook had to give incriminating abortion data to law enforcement, the fact that it happened, and that such data led directly to an arrest, marks the start of a grim new era in the investigation and prosecution of illegal abortion. As conservative states around the country have made swift moves to severely restrict or completely ban abortion, it's likely that similar investigations are to follow.
After giving the data in question to Nebraska police, the company refused to comment when asked if they would ever give cops abortion data. The same question was not answered by all of the aforementioned companies.
The #Delete Facebook began to trend after the news was broken. Even though Facebook has made it difficult to remove the app, it's still possible to prevent police from obtaining data related to abortion.
Given the Supreme Court's recent track record, there's no idea what law enforcement will do with that data.
The data Facebook gave police was used to prosecute a teenager for abortion.
A 10-year-old girl was forced to cross state lines because of the abortion ban.
The full statement from Meta.
The warrants we received from local law enforcement did not mention abortion. Police were investigating the case of a stillborn baby who was burned and buried, not a decision to have an abortion, according to the warrants.
Non-disclosure orders prevented us from sharing information about the warrants. The orders are no longer in effect.
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