Adriana Monet Smith, the brain-dead Georgia woman kept on life support until she could deliver her baby, is being laid to rest at a funeral service today in Lithonia.
Hundreds of mourners gathered early Saturday morning at Fairfield Baptist Church and logged onto the funeral livestream on YouTube to support the grieving family.
Described as a wonderful mother to her 7-year-old son Chase, Smith’s mother, April Newkirk, told 11Alive, “She loved to travel, she loved her family. She’s a good mom. And she wanted to advance her education. She loved people.”
As friends and family came together to pay their respects, the controversy that surrounded Smith’s situation was also top of mind.
Patricia Jones, of Vinings, attended the service with her daughter Brittany, who both grew up with Adriana.
“I came out to support the family,” Jones told Capital B Atlanta during the viewing. “I hope more people show up and more media shows up to cover this so maybe they can change this bill. Everybody needs to speak up right now, even if they don’t want to.”
Jones remembers Smith as a “hard worker who loved her job as a nurse” and loved her son.
For Cobie Lyrix Brown of Atlanta, he said he wanted to support Newkirk because of their shared work with kids in the foster care system.
“I wanted to be here in their time of need like they’ve been for so many others,” Brown told Capital B Atlanta.
“This law isn’t right,” he continued. “We should have rights over the children we birth into this world, whose souls we created. It should be the parents decision not the government’s.”
Tuezday Naper told Capital B Atlanta she came today because she was a part of Newkirk’s village.
“It’s awful what’s happened to this family,” she said. “Women’s rights have been taken from this young woman. Our country has got to do better.”
Inside the Celebration of Life
Greeting mourning family and friends inside Fairfield Baptist Church were large images of a smiling Adriana Smith.
Eric Vickers, senior pastor at Fairfield Baptist Church, said at the start of the service: “We are living in critical and perilous times, and Adriana has become a martyr of these times.”
The funeral program, decorated with pink flowers and a white dove, also features several photos of Smith.
The second spread features the obituary and a collection of photos.
The next section features the order of the service and more photos.
The last spread features a “Welcome Home” message and “If You Could See Me Now” reflection.
On the back of the program, a photo of Smith on a tropical vacation included an acknowledgement from the family.
“The family of Adriana Smith wishes to extend their upmost gratitude and appreciation to all who have journeyed with us during this heartbreaking hardship. We thank you all from the bottom of all of our hearts. We wish you all peace and love.”
The Atlanta Metropolitan Nursing Honor Guard made a tribute to Smith, lighting a nightingale candle in her honor. The Florence Nightingale’s Candle serves as a symbol of the nursing profession.
Nya Smith shared the lessons she learned from her older sister.
“I just want to say that I’m thankful for the time that I spent with her, and I’m thankful for everything that she’s taught me, her love, her kindness, her wisdom. I’m just praying that she comes to me moving forward, and she guides me to make the best decisions.”
District 58 Representative Park Cannon read a resolution honoring Adriana Smith’s life and offering condolences to her family.
“We believe bodily autonomy should be upheld here in Georgia by enacting Adriana’s law.”
The proposed law “would allow individuals to retain agency over their bodies and medical decisions, even under restrictive fetal personhood regimes.”
Adriana Smith’s medical timeline
On Feb. 9, Smith began to complain about headaches. The young nurse and mother went to two different hospitals for help, and was sent home with medication. According to her family’s GoFundMe page, the hospitals did not examine her or conduct any medical tests.
A week later, she was found unresponsive at home and on Feb. 19, Smith was officially declared brain-dead.
Read More: She Is Medically Brain Dead. Georgia’s Abortion Law Is Keeping Her Body Alive
Emory officials told her family she could not be removed from life support because she was pregnant, and it would violate Georgia law.
Smith was two months pregnant at the time, putting her just past the cutoff established by Georgia’s LIFE ACT, which bans abortions once fetal cardiac activity can be detected — usually around six weeks.
The health of her baby boy
Adriana’s son Chance, weighing just 1 pound and 13 ounces, was delivered by emergency cesarean section in the early morning on Friday, June 13. Smith’s family announced that his mother was taken off life support four days later.
Adriana’s mother gave an update on her grandson last week.
“He’s just fighting. We just want prayers for him. Just keep praying for him. He’s here now,” she said.
The baby boy was born prematurely and is being treated in the hospital’s NICU.
On June 19, Newkirk posted an update on the family’s GoFundMe page: “I can’t believe this. I can sleep but my God I serve, I trust him. I’m going to be strong but I’m hurting so bad inside.”
Last Sunday, the family celebrated what would have been Smith’s 31st birthday.
The GoFundMe set up by the family has raised over $450,000.
Black women and Georgia’s abortion ban
Adriana Smith is not the first Black woman to have her bodily autonomy impacted by Georgia’s restrictive anti-abortion law. Less than a year ago, ProPublica reported the deaths of Amber Nicole Thurman and Candi Miller, two Black women from metro Atlanta who died from abortion complications.
Read More: Georgia Is One of the Most Unsafe States to Give Birth. Abortion Limits Make It Worse.
Because of Georgia’s law, Thurman and Miller both ordered abortion pills online. Though they are a safe option for people trying to have a self-managed abortion, in both cases the women’s bodies failed to expel the fetal tissue.
Thurman sought medical treatment at Piedmont Henry Hospital, but doctors had to wait until her situation was considered life-threatening or possibly face up to 10 years in prison. By the time they performed the procedure on Thurman, 20 hours later, it was too late, and she died on the operating table at 28.
Miller suffered at home for days, taking painkillers to manage the pain from an incomplete abortion. The 41-year-old had lupus, diabetes, and hypertension, and was warned she could die trying to carry another pregnancy to term. Her family said she chose not to seek medical treatment because of Georgia’s abortion ban.
Miller’s husband found her unresponsive in bed, their 3-year-old daughter by her side.
Smith, Thurman, and Miller all left young children behind when they died.
In the wake of the controversy surrounding Smith’s complex situation, U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams of Atlanta, along with U.S. Reps. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Sara Jacobs of California, introduced a congressional resolution earlier this month urging the government to clarify how anti-abortion and fetal personhood laws should be interpreted by medical professionals.
According to a press release, the resolution urges the government to reaffirm and guarantee autonomy and dignity to pregnant people over their lives, well-being, and medical needs; repeal state laws that ban or criminalize abortion and abortion-related services; repeal laws that exclude pregnant people from having their advance directives come into effect; and clarify how anti-abortion and fetal personhood laws should be interpreted in medical settings.
“Adriana Smith deserved better at every point of this tragedy. Her family, along with baby Chance, remain in my family’s prayers as they navigate life after this unimaginably devastating situation that Georgia’s laws imposed on them,” said Williams in a statement.
Staff writer Alyssa Johnson contributed to this report.
