Man sues over girlfriend's abortion in a first-of-its-kind lawsuit
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Orchestrating the effort is Jonathan Mitchell, a conservative attorney who helped construct Texas's 'heartbeat' law, the most restrictive abortion measure passed before Roe's fall. The lawsuit Mitchell set in motion alleges that the doctor violated the Comstock Act, a 19th century federal law that bans the mailing of 'obscene' materials, including abortion-related materials. Now in a post-Roe era, Democratic lawmakers and abortion advocates have worried that the government would invoke Comstock to ban medication abortion, which accounts for most abortions in the United States.
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The case is a new approach alleging state and federal law violations - filed in federal, rather than state court - though it's too early to tell how viable that strategy will be.
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'This very much has the feeling of taking matters into your own hands,' said Mary Ziegler, a professor of law at the University of California at Davis.
The plaintiff, Jerry Rodriguez, is suing California-based physician Remy Coeytaux for more than $75,000. Rodriguez, who stated that he is suing on behalf of 'all current and future fathers of unborn children,' is asking the court for an order blocking Coeytaux from mailing abortion pills. His complaint adds that he plans to sue the manufacturers and distributors of the abortion pills if they are identified during discovery.
Coeytaux did not respond to a request for comment from The Washington Post, and it was unclear whether he had retained an attorney as of Thursday.
In Texas, women who get an abortion cannot be prosecuted. But antiabortion activists in the state have publicly sought out men who are willing to bring cases against people who helped their partners have an abortion. Mitchell, who declined to comment Wednesday, has represented men in at least two similar cases out of Texas, both filed in state court.
In a 2023 lawsuit, a man alleged that three women helped his ex-wife get abortion pills to end her pregnancy. That case was later dropped. In May 2024, Mitchell helped a man file a petition to investigate an ex-partner's out-of-state abortion, setting up for a wrongful-death lawsuit.
In the new federal court complaint, filed Sunday, Rodriguez alleges that Coeytaux mailed abortion pills to his girlfriend's estranged husband in September 2024. The pair were not divorced when Rodriguez and the woman began dating but were already legally separated, according to the lawsuit. Rodriguez's girlfriend, whom The Post is not naming because she is not a plaintiff and to protect her privacy, took abortion pills on two occasions, once in September and another in January, to end two pregnancies after her estranged husband and mother 'pressured her,' according to the complaint. On Monday, Rodriguez filed a separate wrongful-death lawsuit in state court against the estranged husband and mother; Mitchell is also representing him in that case. Few details of the relationships between Rodriguez, his girlfriend, her mother and her estranged husband are included in the lawsuit. According to Rodriguez's complaints, his girlfriend is now pregnant again.
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Since the Supreme Court in 2022 struck down the constitutional right to the procedure, the number of abortions has increased, bolstered by medication abortions enabled by telehealth, data shows. In an attempt to thwart that access, officials in red states are launching attacks on the shield laws in blue states that keep the pills flowing across the country.
Texas and Louisiana are pursuing legal action against a New York doctor accused of prescribing abortion pills to patients in those states, which both ban nearly all abortions. To the frustration of prosecutors, New York officials have refused to comply, citing the state's shield law. As a result, the conservative strategy to punish providers had slowed in state courts, though experts say the cases could end up on the Supreme Court's docket and ultimately reshape medication abortion access.
In the meantime, the federal lawsuit has emerged as a new method to potentially curb abortion access.
Carmel Shachar, a law professor at Harvard Law School, said the
case designed by Mitchell uses a different legal framework, but the end goal remains the same - to 'close that telehealth loophole.'
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