Pregnant prison guard says she wasn’t allowed to leave work. Her baby died, suit says

After clocking into work at a Texas prison on a November night, Salia Issa began feeling contraction-like pains.

Issa, a corrections officer, was seven months pregnant.

Rather than rush her to a hospital, her supervisor kept her at her post for hours despite her repeated requests to leave, according to a lawsuit filed against Abilene prison officials and the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

“You’re just lying,” her supervisor is accused of telling her over the phone, according to the lawsuit.

Issa said she called him several times, pleading to leave. And each time she was told to stay put, the lawsuit says.

Issa said she was finally given permission to leave two-and-a-half hours later. In intense pain, she made her way to her car and drove to a local medical center, the lawsuit says.

Once there, she was wheeled into an exam room, where she began bleeding.

Hospital staff searched for her baby’s heartbeat but could not find one, she said, according to the lawsuit. She was hurried into surgery, and despite attempts to save the child, it was delivered stillborn.

Hospital staff told Issa, according to the lawsuit, “if she had arrived sooner, they could have saved the child.”

Now, Issa, in her lawsuit, is arguing the state caused the death of her child, who had been healthy and without complication before being born stillborn, she said. She is requesting an unspecified amount of money to cover medical costs, mental anguish and other reported damages.

In a preliminary ruling this month, a U.S. Magistrate Judge recommended letting the case, which was initially filed in October, go forward, according to the Texas Tribune.

Texas outlawed abortion after six weeks of pregnancy in 2021, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

“Protecting the lives of unborn children” is a “major priority,” according to a 2018 news release from Attorney General Ken Paxton.

“In seeking dismissal, Texas has relied on Roe v. Wade in an attempt to shield its employees from liability, despite the Attorney General’s public pronouncement that Roe was wrongly decided at the time it was overruled, and despite numerous laws in Texas purporting to protect the rights of unborn children,” Ross Brennan, an attorney for Issa, told McClatchy News.

“My clients were devastated by losing their child at seven months in the womb,” Brennan said, “and they look forward to continuing their pursuit of justice.”

Paxton’s spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment from McClatchy News.

Abilene is about 200 miles southwest of Dallas.

This story was originally published August 11, 2023 at 1:20 PM.