Jenniffer González, Puerto Rico's governor, signed a bill that amends a law to recognize an unborn baby as a human being. (AP Photo/Alejandro Granadillo)
The legislation was named after Keishla Rodríguez, a pregnant woman who was killed in April 2021. Her partner, former Puerto Rican boxer Félix Verdejo, was convicted in the killing and received two life sentences.
Supporters of the law said it was designed to provide consistency between civil and criminal codes and focus on harsher punishments for the murder of pregnant women and that it was unrelated to abortion, but critics argued that it opens the door to eventually criminalizing the procedure in Puerto Rico, which remains legal.
"A zygote was given legal personality," Rosa Seguí Cordero, an attorney and spokesperson for the National Campaign for Free, Safe and Accessible Abortion in Puerto Rico, told The Associated Press. "We women were stripped of our rights."
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Critics of the law argued that it opens the door to eventually criminalizing abortion in Puerto Rico. (KAREN BLEIER/AFP via Getty Images)
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Opponents of the law also said the amendment was approved without public hearings.
"There is no doubt that the measure did not undergo adequate analysis before its approval and leaves an unacceptable space for ambiguity regarding civil rights," Annette Martínez Orabona, executive director for the American Civil Liberties Union in Puerto Rico, told The Associated Press. "The legislative leadership failed to fulfill its responsibility to the people, and so did the governor."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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