A paramedic has been sentenced to 10 years in prison after tricking a woman into having an abortion by putting drugs inside her during sex.
The High Court in Glasgow heard Stephen Doohan, 33, met the woman on a Spanish holiday in 2021 and began a long-distance relationship, despite being married at the time.
After learning she was pregnant, the woman travelled to Edinburgh in March 2023, where Doohan inserted an abortion drug inside the woman during consensual sex and steered her conversation with medics after she had discovered what he had done.
Doohan convinced the woman to lie to hospital staff at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary because he knew he would be arrested if she told them the whole truth.
The victim attended a different hospital with her sister the following day and was informed that she was having a miscarriage.
An investigation was then launched after the woman complained to the Scottish Ambulance Service, which revealing Doohan used the NHS intranet to search for abortion drugs on March 14, the day the woman told Doohan she was pregnant.
Police were then called in to investigate further, uncovering Doohan’s crimes over four days in March 2023.
Doohan, who had no previous convictions, had already pleaded guilty to sexual assault and depositing a drug into her vagina causing her to abort, and depositing with intent to cause her to abort.
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Stephen Doohan has been jailed for a decade
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On Monday at the High Court in Glasgow, judge Lord Colbeck sentenced him to 10 years and six months in prison.
Lord Colbeck acknowledged Doohan told the victim he did not want to have children before the victim became pregnant, but his escalated response caused her a “lifetime of pain and loss” and “long-term psychological injury”.
He said: “She felt something hard being inserted into her vagina and believed this was a sex toy.
“She felt you inserting something hard from under the mattress. She was suspicious of your actions.
He was sentenced at the High Court in Glasgow
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“When you went to the bathroom, she took the opportunity to look under the mattress.”
The court heard that the woman found some tablets hidden under the mattress, and after carrying out an internet search for abortion tablets, confronted Doohan over his actions.
Lord Colbert said Doohan “rehearsed what she was to say” before attending the hospital in Edinburgh with stomach cramps on March 18.
But she attended a regional hospital with her sister the following day so she could properly “disclose” Doohan’s actions, but a healthcare worker told her it was too late and she was miscarrying.
Lord Colbeck said: “You planned out what you did to your victim using resources available to you as a paramedic.”
Doohan’s defending counsel, Mark Stewart KC, expressed, “Mr Doohan’s deep sorrow and regret for the actions he is now in the court charged with.
“His position is that he is filled with remorse for the harm he has caused, and the breach of trust his actions represented.”
Mr Steward said Doohan’s life up until March 2023 had been “positive and useful” but his decision to trick the victim into having an abortion resulted in a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).