Wednesday, November 12, 2014

A Midwife, a Doc, and an Unknown Perp

On October 12, 1877, Nellie Ryan, an unmarried 21-year-old white woman from Turner Junction, Illinois, died in Chicago due to a criminal abortion perpetrated two weeks earlier. I have no information on who the abortionist was.

On November 12, 1917, 22-year-old homemaker Margaret Linstrom died at Chicago's American Hospital from an abortion perpetrated by Dr. Anna Sorenson, who was indicted and released. Sorenson had performed the fatal abortion on Emelia Gorman earlier that year, and went on to kill Margaret Crowe in January of the following year. Her chain of death ended with her own death in prison while awaiting trial after her January 15, 1918 arrest.

On November 12, 1952, 22-year-old Mrs. Isabell Cuda died in Rockford, Illinois from complications of an abortion. A 75-year-old midwife named Mary Murawski was convicted in Isabell's death.

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