A Texas man has filed a lawsuit against a California doctor for allegedly sending abortion pills into the state, marking the first legal action under a recently enacted Texas statute that allows private individuals to sue providers who mail abortion medication to Texas.
The case was brought by Jerry Rodriguez, who claims Dr Remy Coeytaux, a physician based in the San Francisco Bay Area, violated Texas's House Bill 7 – also known as the Woman and Child Protection Act. The lawsuit alleges Coeytaux mailed abortion pills to end the pregnancies of Rodriguez's girlfriend twice, once in 2024 and again in early 2025. Rodriguez is seeking $100,000 in damages for wrongful death.
The Texas law, which came into effect in December 2024, authorises private citizens to sue anyone who “manufactures, distributes, mails, transports, delivers, prescribes, or provides” abortion pills to people in Texas. It allows plaintiffs to seek damages and injunctions against providers. Rodriguez's attorney, Jonathan Mitchell, was one of the architects of Texas's original abortion ban.
This lawsuit follows a separate move by Louisiana, which sought Coeytaux's extradition last month for allegedly sending abortion pills into that state. California Governor Gavin Newsom has refused to comply with the extradition request. California is one of several states with “shield laws” designed to protect abortion providers from out-of-state legal actions after the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade in 2022.
The Center for Reproductive Rights, representing Dr Coeytaux, condemned the lawsuit. Marc Hearron, associate litigation director, said: “This law goes against everything Texans value. It’s anti-freedom, anti-privacy and anti-family.” He argued that the law is an attempt to scare doctors and patients away from using abortion pills, which are safe and widely used.
The case underscores the intensifying conflict between states with restrictive abortion policies and those with protective shield laws, as demand for abortion pills has surged in Republican-led states since Roe v Wade was overturned.
