User:Laurenbarr88/Ann Cooper Hewitt

Article body
In 1935, just before Ann's 21st birthday (when she would have attained legal majority), she was hospitalized for appendicitis. Ann's mother told the surgeons at the private hospital where Ann was receiving care that Ann was "feeble minded" and paid them to sterilize her while performing her appendectomy.

After realizing what her physicians and her mother had done, both criminal and civil lawsuits were filed in San Francisco court. The criminal case was ultimately unsuccessful, since at the time, involuntary sterilization of the "feeble minded" was legal in California. In the end, "a lengthy, exhausting trial resulted in the charges being dropped against the doctors and her mother. Ann settled the civil suit for $150,000.". The judges who handled her case were Sylvain Lazarus and Ann Lindsay.

Legacy

The Ann Cooper Hewitt case, which involved court-ordered sterilization did not directly lead to any specific legislative changes, but increased public awareness and scrutiny of sterilization practices .This novel use of U.S. sterilization laws energized the growing public debate about the ethics of eugenics and potential unintended consequences of laws allowing involuntary sterilization.