A Houston-area midwife was arrested and charged with providing abortions and illegally operating a network of clinics without a medical license, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced on Monday.
The case is one of the first of its kind anywhere in the country following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade federal protections for abortion in June 2022, which opened the door for states to impose criminal penalties on abortion providers.
Maria Margarita Rojas, 48, is accused of owning and operating three clinics in the Houston area and unlawfully employing unlicensed individuals who presented themselves to patients as medical professionals.
Paxton’s press release indicates that Rojas also performed abortions at her clinics in direct violation of the Texas Human Life Protection Act, passed in 2021.
Both performing abortions and practicing medicine without a license are felonies in Texas. Abortion at any stage in pregnancy is illegal except to save the mother’s life or to prevent serious risk to her physical health.
“In Texas, life is sacred,” Paxton said in a statement. “I will always do everything in my power to protect the unborn, defend our state’s anti-abortion laws, and work to ensure that unlicensed individuals endangering the lives of women by performing illegal abortions are fully prosecuted.”
Rojas’s biography on the website for Houston Birth House, a birthing center in Cypress, Texas, says that she has been studying women’s health since she was 16. She is originally from Peru.
The website says she has been certified as a midwife in Texas since 2018 and has attended more than 700 births, but court documents indicate that Rojas has presented herself to patients as an obstetrician on multiple occasions.
The three clinics operated by Rojas, Clinicas Laintoamericanas, offered family medicine services, nutrition services, and vaccinations, as well as gynecologic care, according to their website.
Court records indicate that Rojas, along with her employee Jose Ley, attempted an abortion on a patient identified as E.G. on two separate occasions in March. The gestational age of the pregnancy or and the circumstances of the procedure are unclear.
Ley, who was charged along with Rojas, does not have a medical license.
Holly Shearman, operator of the Tomball Birth Center, where Rojas worked part-time, told the Texas Tribune that she was “shocked” by the news of the arrest. She told the outlet that Rojas is a devout Catholic and does not believe the allegations.
“I just can’t picture Maria being involved in something like this,” said Shearman.
Texas’s Human Life Protection Act, signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbot in June 2021, makes providing an abortion a first-degree felony, punishable by up to 99 years in prison and a maximum fine of $10,000. The statute was passed as a so-called “trigger law,” to take effect upon the demise of Roe.
The law also allows for the attorney general to file a civil lawsuit against violators seeking damages of $100,000 per abortion.
Court records indicate that Rojas was initially arrested and booked into jail on March 6 on a charge of practicing medicine without a license and was released on $10,000 bond the following day.
The abortion-related charges were added Monday, with the bond for practicing without a medical license being set at $200,000 and $500,000 for performing abortions, according to Waller County jail records.
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In December, Paxton launched a complaint against a New York doctor, Margaret Carpenter, for prescribing abortion pills to women in Texas in violation of his state’s anti-abortion statutes. A Texas judge last month ordered Carpenter stop prescribing abortion pills to Texas patients and to pay a penalty of more than $100,000.
“Texas law protecting life is clear, and we will hold those who violate it accountable,” Paxton said Monday in connection to the Rojas case.
