Georgia woman charged with murder after police say she took pills to induce an abortion

SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — A 31-year-old Georgia woman has been charged with murder by police who say she took pills, including oxycodone, to induce an illegal abortion.

The arrest warrant charging Alexia Moore with murder says police determined Moore had been pregnant beyond six weeks “based on the medical staff’s knowledge that the baby had a beating heart and was struggling to breathe.”

Court records say Moore arrived at a hospital Dec. 30, complaining of abdominal pain. She told medical workers that she had taken misoprostol, a drug used for chemical abortions, and the opioid painkiller oxycodone, according to an arrest warrant obtained by police in Kingsland, about 100 miles south of Savannah.

The fetus survived for about an hour after being delivered at the hospital, the warrant says. The police investigator obtaining the warrant wrote that Moore told the nursing staff: “I know my infant is suffering, because I am the one who did the abortion. I want her to die.”

Georgia bans abortion after embryonic cardiac activity can be detected, which is generally at about six weeks’ gestation.

Moore has been jailed in coastal Camden County since March 4 on charges of murder and illegal drug possession, according to online jail records.

The warrant said medical records estimated Moore had been pregnant for 22 to 24 weeks, placing her fetus at the threshold of viability. It refers to Moore's fetus as “a human being who was born alive and survived for one hour. Under Georgia law, the victim became a person at the moment of live birth.”

Georgia’s abortion law states that an embryo is legally a person once cardiac activity can be detected. Andrew Fleischman, a Georgia defense attorney who is not involved in Moore's case, said that means authorities could seek murder charges against a woman who intentionally terminates her pregnancy after there's cardiac activity.

“Murder is intentionally causing the death of a person,” he said. “I’m not sure prosecutors are eager to be the first one to jump this hurdle. I think it’s a totally legally permissible case. I think they could do it. I’d be surprised if they go through with it.”

Elizabeth Edmonds, executive director of the pro-life Georgia Life Alliance, said any claim that the charges stem from the 2019 abortion law is “misrepresenting the facts and trying to again make it a fear-mongering thing that Georgia is prosecuting women on pregnancy outcomes.”

Edmonds said she believed the murder charge was appropriate in part because Moore is accused of illegally obtaining and taking oxycodone before her fetus died.

The warrant says a toxicology screening detected oxycodone in the fetus's blood, but police were told the test would not be able to detect misoprostol. It says Moore told police she obtained the abortion pills online and got the opioid from a relative.

Moore also faces charges for possessing oxycodone, a controlled drug that wasn't prescribed to her, as well as possession of a dangerous drug for the abortion-inducing misoprostol.

In 2024, Louisiana classified mifepristone and misoprostol as controlled dangerous substances. Similar legislation has been introduced in some other states and in Congress, but has not been adopted elsewhere.