## Facts

- Darlene Brown, a 26-year-old Jehovah’s Witness, was approximately 34 weeks pregnant when she underwent surgery to remove a urethral mass at a hospital.
- During surgery, she lost significant blood and, while conscious and deemed competent, refused a blood transfusion for religious reasons; the surgery was completed using non-blood techniques.
- Postoperatively, Brown’s hemoglobin dropped to critically low levels; her physician believed both Brown and the viable fetus faced life-threatening risk without transfusion and estimated a very high likelihood of death absent transfusion.
- The State filed a petition under the Illinois Juvenile Court Act seeking adjudication of wardship and temporary custody of the viable fetus, requesting authority for a hospital administrator to consent to transfusions on the fetus’s behalf.
- The trial court granted temporary custody to the hospital administrator, who consented to transfusions; Brown was restrained and sedated and received multiple units of blood over her objections.
- Brown later delivered a healthy baby; the temporary custody order was vacated after discharge.
- Brown appealed the temporary custody order; the appellate court addressed the merits under the “capable of repetition, yet evading review” exception to mootness.

## Issues

1. Whether the State may obtain temporary custody/wardship of a viable fetus under the Illinois Juvenile Court Act to override a competent pregnant woman’s refusal of medically indicated blood transfusions.
2. Whether the State’s interest in protecting a viable fetus justifies compelled, physically coercive medical treatment of a competent pregnant woman who refuses treatment on religious grounds.

## Decision

- The appellate court reversed the temporary custody order.
- The court held that a competent pregnant woman retains the right to refuse medical treatment, including life-saving blood transfusions, even when refusal risks the life or health of a viable fetus.
- The court held the Juvenile Court Act could not be used to treat a fetus as a ward to authorize forced medical intervention on the pregnant woman through a surrogate decision-maker.

## Legal Principles

- A competent adult has a strong common-law right to bodily integrity and self-determination, including the right to refuse medical treatment even if refusal may result in death.
- Constitutional protections of liberty, privacy, and religious freedom support a competent person’s right to refuse treatment on sincerely held religious grounds.
- The State has a substantial interest in protecting potential life, including a viable fetus, but that interest is not absolute and does not automatically override a competent pregnant woman’s refusal of invasive medical treatment.
- Child-protection/wardship authority aimed at born children does not authorize treating a fetus as a separate ward to compel medical procedures on the pregnant woman’s body.

## Conclusion

The court invalidated the State’s use of fetal wardship under the Juvenile Court Act to compel blood transfusions, ruling that fetal welfare interests did not permit overriding a competent pregnant woman’s refusal of treatment grounded in bodily integrity and religious liberty.


In re Fetus Brown, 689 N.E.2d 397 (Ill. App. Ct. 1997)