A Texas attorney who previously served time for slipping abortion drugs into his wife’s drinks in hopes of aborting their baby has been sentenced to eight years in prison for a probation violation. They have since divorced.
The Houston-based KTRK News reported last week that Mason Herring was sentenced to eight years in prison after violating a protection order filed by his ex-wife, Catherine Herring.
According to the parameters of the protection order, Herring was required to cease any communication with his ex-wife and to be at least 500 feet away from her.
However, as KTRK reported in May, his ex-wife told authorities that he violated this order multiple times, including one day in February when he tried to call her twice and a separate incident in March when he drove near her during supervised visits.
In March 2022, Herring’s wife was pregnant with their third child when he attempted to terminate the pregnancy by mixing abortion-inducing drugs in her water.
The couple, who had been married for 11 years and had two other children, were undergoing a separation at the time. They finalized their divorce in May 2022.
Complications from the drugs led to her being hospitalized with severe bleeding and giving birth to her daughter prematurely. The baby survived after being born 10 weeks early.
According to court records, Mason Herring attempted to have his wife drink abortion-laced drinks on multiple occasions, with her refusing to do so.
Herring was eventually charged with felony assault to induce abortion, and in February 2024 pleaded guilty to the charge of injury to a child and assault of a pregnant woman.
The ex-husband was given 180 days in jail and received 10 years’ probation, a sentence that some, including his ex-wife, considered far too lenient given the nature of the crime.
For her part, Catherine Herring considered her ex-husband’s actions to be “a wicked act of deception” and labeled the six-month jail sentence “a flagrant and profound injustice.”
“I do not believe that 180 days is justice for attempting to kill your child seven separate times,” she stated last year.
