The Texan who sued his wife’s friends for murder over an abortion has likely failed. But his intentions were terrifying.

[essentialsaltes]

Not Every Man Will Be As Dumb As Marcus Silva​

This controlling behavior didn’t stop during the divorce proceedings. Before she moved out, Silva went digging through Brittni’s phone and purse, and discovered that she was pregnant and seeking an abortion. Her two best friends, Amy and Jackie, had allegedly offered to help her get abortion pills. Silva got in touch with Jonathan Mitchell, the architect of Texas’ bounty-hunter abortion ban, who helped Silva file a lawsuit. It made a rather extraordinary claim: He sued his ex-wife’s two friends for wrongful death, demanding $1 million from each, claiming that the terminated pregnancy was a child, his child, and that they had caused its “murder.”

Silva is not the first man to use the courts to further his alleged abuse of a woman who was trying to escape his control. Domestic violence experts have coined the term “litigation abuse” to describe the tactic of using protracted, frivolous, and repeated lawsuits, unnecessary motions, and invasive, harassing discovery demands as a means of prolonging contact with victims and inflicting further distress and expense on them. Frequently, abusive litigation is pursued in the aftermath of a victim’s successful attempt to leave the relationship. It has the effect of maintaining the abuser’s control, and of punishing the victim for trying to escape it. This is exactly the strategy Silva deployed.

Now, with abortion bans on the books, abusers have a powerful new ally in their quest to inflict suffering, isolation, and private control over women: the state.

It was only after Brittni’s abortion was complete that Silva revealed he knew about the plan and, according to the lawsuit, threatened to turn her in if she didn’t submit to his continued abuse.

What happens now to Silva? While nothing that Brittni, Jackie, or Amy did was illegal, his own alleged conduct most assuredly was. According to the counterclaim, he repeatedly accessed Brittni’s password-protected phone without her consent, reading messages between the women that were meant to be private. Under Texas law, that’s an actionable invasion of privacy. Silva’s alleged snooping also violates Texas’ Harmful Access by Computer Act, which prohibits unauthorized access of any computer (including a smartphone). By showing photographs of Brittni’s text messages to the police, Silva inadvertently “admitted that he committed a crime in violation of Texas Penal Code.”

(see also)

 

[zippy2006]

Suing those who murdered your child. What a terrible man. What terrifying intentions!

Slate seems fixated on petty crimes, like unauthorized access of a computer. I don't know why people would read such a strange, biased source.

 

[comana]

Suing those who murdered your child. What a terrible man. What terrifying intentions!

Slate seems fixated on petty crimes, like unauthorized access of a computer. I don't know why people would read such a strange, biased source.

From the OP link:

“Amy and Jackie have now turned the tables on Mitchell and Silva. In an explosive counterclaimfiled on Monday, the women allege that Silva not only knew about the abortion before it happened but in fact knowingly deceived his wife: He didn’t just find text messages when he was snooping. He found the abortion pill itself while searching her purse, then, according to the counterclaim, surreptitiously put it back—allowing her to have the abortion without realizing that he knew about it so he could to use the threat of liability to coerce her into staying with him. This revelation completely undermines the original lawsuit, absolving Amy and Jackie of wrongdoing. It opens up Silva to serious legal liability. And it confirms something that has been clear from the start: This case is not about avenging the “murder” of a “baby.” It is about transforming Texas’ draconian abortion laws into a tool of spousal abuse.”


This doesn’t sound like a father looking for justice over an abortion but rather a way to continue to control and harass is ex wife.

 

[rambot]

Republicans pass laws that endanger people?
Yaaaaaaaawn.
There is nothing surprising about this.

 

[The Barbarian]

Suing those who murdered your child. What a terrible man. What terrifying intentions!

By returning the pill where he found it, he became an accessory in that abortion. He cared nothing for the life of his child; he let the abortion go through, in a vain attempt to keep his wife in subjection.

Not exactly the guy you'd want living next door.

 

[Pommer]

By returning the pill where he found it, he became an accessory in that abortion. He cared nothing for the life of his child; he let the abortion go through, in a vain attempt to keep his wife in subjection.

Not exactly the guy you'd want living next door.

Nor be the child of, neither.

 

[essentialsaltes]

Texas man abandons suit against women he claimed helped ex-wife get abortion​

The lawsuit, filed in state court in Galveston County in March 2023, claimed that helping someone obtain an abortion qualifies as murder under the state’s homicide law and the abortion ban that took effect shortly after the Supreme Court ruling, allowing a Texas man to sue under the wrongful-death statute. The man, Marcus Silva, had been seeking at least $1 million in damages from each of the defendants.

Carpenter and Noyola filed a countersuit against Silva in May 2023, a few months after the original lawsuit was filed.

Both suits have been dropped with no monetary exchange.

 

[Tropical Wilds]

I’m glad he dropped it, but there are no winners here. He ended this suit, but not every abuser will. The standard has been set.

 

[RileyG]

Suing those who murdered your child. What a terrible man. What terrifying intentions!

Slate seems fixated on petty crimes, like unauthorized access of a computer. I don't know why people would read such a strange, biased source.

Edit: nevermind

 

[mindlight]

Not Every Man Will Be As Dumb As Marcus Silva​

This controlling behavior didn’t stop during the divorce proceedings. Before she moved out, Silva went digging through Brittni’s phone and purse, and discovered that she was pregnant and seeking an abortion. Her two best friends, Amy and Jackie, had allegedly offered to help her get abortion pills. Silva got in touch with Jonathan Mitchell, the architect of Texas’ bounty-hunter abortion ban, who helped Silva file a lawsuit. It made a rather extraordinary claim: He sued his ex-wife’s two friends for wrongful death, demanding $1 million from each, claiming that the terminated pregnancy was a child, his child, and that they had caused its “murder.”

Silva is not the first man to use the courts to further his alleged abuse of a woman who was trying to escape his control. Domestic violence experts have coined the term “litigation abuse” to describe the tactic of using protracted, frivolous, and repeated lawsuits, unnecessary motions, and invasive, harassing discovery demands as a means of prolonging contact with victims and inflicting further distress and expense on them. Frequently, abusive litigation is pursued in the aftermath of a victim’s successful attempt to leave the relationship. It has the effect of maintaining the abuser’s control, and of punishing the victim for trying to escape it. This is exactly the strategy Silva deployed.

Now, with abortion bans on the books, abusers have a powerful new ally in their quest to inflict suffering, isolation, and private control over women: the state.

It was only after Brittni’s abortion was complete that Silva revealed he knew about the plan and, according to the lawsuit, threatened to turn her in if she didn’t submit to his continued abuse.

What happens now to Silva? While nothing that Brittni, Jackie, or Amy did was illegal, his own alleged conduct most assuredly was. According to the counterclaim, he repeatedly accessed Brittni’s password-protected phone without her consent, reading messages between the women that were meant to be private. Under Texas law, that’s an actionable invasion of privacy. Silva’s alleged snooping also violates Texas’ Harmful Access by Computer Act, which prohibits unauthorized access of any computer (including a smartphone). By showing photographs of Brittni’s text messages to the police, Silva inadvertently “admitted that he committed a crime in violation of Texas Penal Code.”

(see also)

From the commentary in the thread, it seems Marcus Silva was a control freak trying to save a doomed marriage by force rather than love. So not a good example of a moral inquisition on the help provided by others for murders of the innocent.

Regarding the murder of the unborn and the complicity of those who endorse these behaviors, this is more akin to the Muslim community's tacit endorsement of terrorism, where they refuse to reveal the perpetrator's identity, or helped him short of committing the actual atrocities. My view is that there are exceptions when abortion is permissible e.g. rape, deformity and threats to the life of the mother. But generally, the principle of life first should be adopted, if the mother's life is completely ruined by the child then it is not clear that the birth is a good thing. How you define ruin is a sticky subject. You cannot stop a determined mother from killing her child so the law has to make provision for that eventuality but without condoning this. It should be clear what has been done even if she is allowed to get away with this.

The divisions in the USA are clear and a state-by-state law seems the best fit to me to keep the peace. Imposing a one-size-fits-all federal law is a recipe for civil war. But none of the states seem to be handling the issue as comprehensively as the current German law does. German law defines life as beginning at conception, but it tolerates abortion in the first 12 weeks with counseling. It provides for the welfare of the mother and child before, during and after birth regardless of ability to pay, gives adequate sex education to minors to prevent pregnancy in the first place, and it chases down responsible men to make them pay according to their responsibilities as fathers. The result is one of the lowest abortion rates in the developed world and no backstreet abortions