Jail Guard Refused to Give Rape Victim Morning After Pill

A Florida jail guard crossed the line when she refused to provide a rape victim with the second half of her prescribed morning-after-pill dosage. This is an atrocious case of what happens when you let the idiocy of religion interfere with the lives of others. Leave it to Florida to have a "Conscience Clause" -- which prevents medical workers from being required to provide contraceptives to patients. This is the same glorious state that brought you Casey Anthony's ridiculous acquittal and the "Stand your Ground" law that led George Zimmerman to fatally shoot a 17-year-old boy. It's pathetic.

Here's the thing, though; Michele Spinelli isn't a physician or chemist. She's a lowly guard at the Hillsborough County Jail. She is an employee of the government, not of the private sector. She is expected to behave in a way that supports the government, which means she must respect the separation of church and state. Nonetheless, this nimrod cited her religious beliefs as reasoning for refusing to give a rape victim the second half of her emergency birth control.

The rape victim, who is not being identified for her safety, was given a prescription of two morning after pills when she reported the rape. She took one of the pills, and was to take the second pill the next day. However, it was discovered in the process of reporting the horrendous crime that she had a warrant for her arrest. She was wanted on a failure to appear and inability to pay court restitution -- bench warrants, basically. Because of this her second dosage was confiscated and she was booked. However, the pill was put in the hands of Spinelli, who was to give to the rape victim the next day.

She cited her religious reasoning when she outright refused to give the woman the second dosage. This, obviously, put the woman in unnecessary stress after living through a crime that some believe is "worse than death." She was raped, and as far as she knew the rapist could have infected her with a terminal STD and gotten her pregnant. That's the thing about rape; you just don't know. To force a woman to live with an unwanted pregnancy is just barbaric.

Fortunately the woman didn't end up pregnant, but had she gotten pregnant after taking a dose of the morning after contraceptive, it could have potentially posed risks to the fetus. This means Michele Spinelli could have been singlehandedly responsible for forcing a woman into carrying a defected fetus -- which probably would have been aborted later if the rape victim were to choose. The unidentified victim is suing Spinelli and rightfully so. To be honest, this so-called "guard" should lose her job and be brought to some kind of justice for representing a government position as one that violates the separation of church and state.

Crime analyst and profiler Chelsea Hoffman can be found on The Huffington Post, Chelsea Hoffman: Case to Case and many other outlets. Follow @TheRealChelseaH on Twitter or click here to contact Chelsea directly.

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