According to Omaha World-Herald, a mother who took her 12-year-old daughter to get an abortion and then returned home with the child to the man who continued to rape her for years, has been convicted of child abuse.
Douglas County District Judge Olon Engleman sentenced Shawna Fernando, 32, to 10 to 14 years in prison for two counts of child abuse and one count of accessory to a felony for her part in her daughter’s repeated sexual abuse. She will be eligible for parole in five years, and if denied, she will serve no more than seven years due to a state law that reduces most sentences to half, according to Omaha World-Herald.
Her daughter’s abuser, Pedro Fernando-Flores, 33, was sentenced earlier this year to 60 to 80 years in prison for two counts of sexually assaulting a child.
Pedro Fernando-Flores (Photo: Nebraska Sex Offender Registry)
Fernando-Flores, who was Fernando’s husband and the daughter’s stepfather, raped the girl for at least three years, from the time she was 11 until she was 14 years old. When Fernando’s daughter became pregnant at 12, Fernando knew her husband was the baby’s father, so she took the girl for an abortion and then brought her back home to her abuser, who continued to rape her for two more years.
The girl was not rescued until she told a friend from church about the abuse, and that friend told the pastor, who in turn called the police.
During the trial, prosecutors presented evidence proving that the mother knew her husband was raping her daughter and that he was the one who got the girl pregnant. The girl herself testified that she told her mother repeatedly that Fernando-Flores was assaulting her and was the one who got her pregnant.
The girl, now 16, also testified that she was about six weeks pregnant when her mother took her for the abortion. She was given the abortion pill and antibiotics to protect against infection, which is a common risk of the abortion pill. She was left home alone as she went through the abortion, an experience that many women have called “terrifying” and the “worst thing I’ve ever felt.”
Fernando has given up parental rights to all seven of her children, and the abuse survivor now lives with her soon-to-be adoptive parents. She doesn’t get to see her siblings as often as she wants to, but her adoptive parents do plan to adopt some of her younger siblings as well.
“Now I have to start over with another family — and they are amazing — but sometimes I wish I would have had a good family to begin with,” the teen wrote. “She has made it harder for me to be a real or normal teenager. I’m going to have to learn … how to have a good relationship with a parent.”
Also at fault for the girl’s continued abuse is the abortion facility, which failed to report the suspected abuse of a child as is required when girls below a certain age are found to be pregnant. If the staff had reported the suspected abuse, authorities could have rescued the girl and arrested Fernando-Flores, preventing years of abuse to the child and perhaps other potential victims.
It’s a common tactic of child sexual abusers and traffickers to access abortion as a means to cover up their crimes and continue the abuse. Live Action’s Aiding Abusers investigation exposed how abortion giant Planned Parenthood has carried out abortions on girls as young as 12 and then returned them to their abusers, who paid for the abortions.
Instances include a 15-year-old rape victim who was taken to Planned Parenthood, where staff said it wasn’t worth the “hassle” to report the rape, and a 13-year-old girl in California, who was taken to Planned Parenthood by her abusive father for two abortions. On neither occasion did the abortion giant report the suspected abuse as required by law.
In Washington, a young teen was taken to Planned Parenthood by her abusive father for abortions when she was 14, 16, and 17. No one at Planned Parenthood did anything to help the girl.
In Arizona, a 23-year-old man took his 12-year-old foster sister for an abortion at Planned Parenthood, then returned home with her where he continued to rape her. She became pregnant again six months later and he took her to Planned Parenthood for a second abortion.
In Ohio, a 16-year-old sexual assault victim told Planned Parenthood that her father was raping her, but staff ignored her pleas for help as well as the mandatory reporting laws — and sent her home to her abuser. She later filed a lawsuit, claiming that Planned Parenthood’s “don’t ask/don’t tell” practices led to her further suffering.
And in Alabama, the Department of Public Health cited Planned Parenthood for failing to report suspected child abuse and discovered that Planned Parenthood in Birmingham had failed to report the suspected sexual abuse of a 13-year-old who had two abortions within four months. These are just a few of the cases that show Planned Parenthood is complicit in child sexual abuse and is a go-to place for abusers to receive assistance in covering up their crimes.
But it isn’t just Planned Parenthood. The entire abortion industry aids abusers. Just this year, Brian Crowder, the former dean at Greater Lawndale High School for Social Justice, was charged with raping one of his students and then forcing the girl to get at least two abortions, posing as her stepfather and signing consent forms for the abortions. It was years before Crowder was reported — and in that time he continued to rape the girl and work at the school.
Sex traffickers also utilize abortion to force their victims to continue having sex with their buyers. One study found that 55% of sex trafficking victims were forced into abortions, with 30% having had more than one. One survivor told researchers, “I was under serious pressure from my pimps to abort the babies.” These young victims were often taken to Planned Parenthood — the nation’s number one abortion business — because, as one victim explained, “Planned Parenthood didn’t ask any questions.”
“Survivors [of human trafficking] also had significant contact with clinical treatment facilities, most commonly Planned Parenthood clinics, which more than a quarter of survivors (29.6%) visited,” reported study author Laura J. Lederer, former senior advisor for trafficking in person for the U.S. Department of State. “… Since pimps and traffickers generally exercise nearly complete control of their victims, these points of contact with healthcare represent rare opportunities for victim identification and intervention.”
The connection between the abortion industry and sexual abusers runs deep. Despite clear signs of abuse, abortion facilities often fail to file a report with authorities as required — and abusers know it. Instead, abortion facilities take the money from the abusers for the abortions and hand the victims back over to them. As Nita Belles, a national expert in the anti-human trafficking movement explained, “The abortion industry is profiting tremendously [from sex trafficking] …financially.”
