WORLD NEWS AUGUST 15, 2019 / 8:02 AM / UPDATED 2 HOURS AGO

Retrial resumes of Salvadoran woman on homicide charge after delivering stillborn son

Nelson Renteria
2 MIN READ

CIUDAD DELGADO, El Salvador (Reuters) - The retrial of a Salvadoran woman convicted of aggravated homicide after a stillbirth resumed on Thursday, offering a chance to overturn her 30-year sentence in a country that bans abortion in all circumstances.

“I only wish to tell you that I am an innocent girl. I have always told you that I am innocent,” Evelyn Hernandez, 21, told reporters as she entered the court.

In February, the Supreme Court had ordered Evelyn Hernandez released and retried because the original judge’s decision was based on prejudice and insufficient evidence.

Hernandez has served three years of a three-decade sentence that was handed down after prosecutors said she had induced an abortion, despite her account that she was unaware of her pregnancy when she delivered a stillborn son in 2016.

She again stated her innocence in the retrial, which began in mid-July but went on recess due to the illness of a witness. Hernandez, a domestic worker who was studying to be a nurse, has said she was impregnated after being raped by a gang member.

-snip-