Meta Hands Over Teen's Messages in Landmark Nebraska Abortion Prosecution
Meta provides a Nebraska teenager's private Facebook messages to police, leading to felony charges for allegedly using abortion pills. The tech giant hands over the data without challenging the legal order despite the questionable grounds of the investigation.
Meta provides private Facebook messages to Nebraska police that lead directly to the felony prosecution of a 17-year-old girl for alleged abortion-related crimes. The company hands over the teenager's direct messages without challenging the legal order, allowing detectives to build a case after the girl reportedly uses mail-order abortion pills and buries the miscarried fetus.
Court documents show that a detective investigates the burial under the official pretense of "Prohibited Acts with Skeletal Remains" but actively seeks evidence of an abortion. The investigator requests the Facebook data based on a debunked theory that the fetus died from asphyxiation, even though an autopsy confirms the girl's story that the fetus was stillborn and never took a breath.
Before receiving the messages from Facebook, police possess no evidence of a crime beyond the improper disposal of a miscarried fetus. Armed with the social media data, officers raid the family's home to seize multiple devices, and the teenager now faces serious charges, including performing an abortion after week 20 and concealing a dead body.