Norma McCorvey, best known as “Jane Roe,” died on Friday at the age of 69 due to a heart ailment, according to reports.
Her death was confirmed by a journalist, Joshua Prager, who is working on a book about the landmark case, the Washington Post reported. She died in an assisted-living facility in Katy, Texas. When McCorvey was 22, she had an unwanted pregnancy and became the center of the 173 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Roe. v. Wade, which legalized abortion.
RELATED:The future of Roe v. Wade and abortion rights in America McCorvey was not looking to make changes to American history, according to reports. She merely wanted a way out of her pregnancy and abortion was illegal in her home state of Texas, unless the mother’s life was in danger. The young woman intially claimed her pregnancy was the product of rape and it wasn’t until 1987 that she admitted the baby was conceived “through what I thought was love.”
After McCorvey’s first child, Melissa, was born in 1965, she confessed to her mother that she preferred relationships with women, McCorveytold The New York Times. She said her mother kicked her out of the house and raised Melissa herself until she tricked a drunk McCorvey into signing adoption papers.
This story is developing. Please refresh your browser.
