(Phoenix) The Arizona Court of Appeals on Friday overturned a lower court ruling that allowed the immediate reinstatement of an old state law criminalizing virtually all pregnancy terminations.
Posted at 9:42 p.m.
With this decision, the appeals court is once again allowing abortions in Arizona under certain circumstances. In fact, for now, that is until the state Supreme Court rules.
The three-judge panel sided with the organization Planned Parenthood, which argued that the trial judge should not have lifted the injunction in place for several decades that prevents the application of this law.
In the decision written by Judge Peter J. Eckerstrom, we can read that Planned Parenthood and its Arizona division succeeded in demonstrating that the Tucson court judge should have taken into consideration that a series of laws governing the abortion were adopted long after the famous judgment of the United States Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade from 1973.
Of these subsequent laws, the most recent came into effect last month and prohibits abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy.
Last June, the US Supreme Court overturned the famous ruling that had granted women a constitutional right to abortion for almost 50 years. Arizona Attorney General, Republican Mark Brnovich, then jumped at the chance to ask a court to suspend the injunction preventing the application of the old law banning abortion. Judge Kellie Johnson agreed to intervene on her behalf on September 23 and lifted the injunction two weeks ago.
Specialty clinics stopped performing abortions in Arizona after the US Supreme Court ruling, but several had resumed operations over the summer. They had been reassured by a federal judge’s decision to suspend a law allowing criminal charges to be filed against medical personnel. However, following Judge Johnson’s decision, the clinics closed again.
In the case of the Court of Appeal, the judges found that the judge erred in limiting her analysis only to the prosecutor’s request to lift the injunction due to the invalidation of Roe v. Wade. According to them, it should have taken into consideration all the other laws governing abortion since 1973.
The Court of Appeals will hold a new hearing next week to determine whether it will put in place an expedited timeline to hear Planned Parenthood’s full appeal in this case.