‘Have you had an abortion?’: US customs asks Australian woman
- Madolline Gourley was travelling to Canada where she planned to cat-sit when a US border officer in Los Angeles asked if she had recently had an abortion
- The 30-year-old Australian woman said she was photographed, patted down, and interrogated twice as she moved from one detention room to the next
An Australian woman travelling through the United States was detained and interrogated by a border official about whether she had recently had an abortion.
Madolline Gourley was travelling from Australia to Canada where she planned to house- and cat-sit. Gourley has a travel blog where she documents her excursions.
The 30-year-old said she was treated like a criminal during her stop in Los Angeles on June 30, when border officials became suspicious about why she was travelling to Canada, The Guardian reported.
After being photographed, patted down, and interrogated twice, Gourley was asked whether she was pregnant. As she moved from one detention room to the next, she was asked again by an agent if she was pregnant. When she said she wasn’t, she was asked whether she had had an abortion.
“I don’t know if she had forgotten, or she wanted to work out if I was lying or something,” Gourley said. “I said no, and she looked at me again and said, ‘Have you recently had an abortion?’”
“I don’t know the thought process behind that … I just thought, ‘What’s the relevance of that to my situation?’”
A spokesperson for US Customs and Border Protection said the organisation took “allegations of unprofessional behaviour seriously”.