DOJ Employee Charged With Murder for Allegedly Drugging Girlfriend Into Having Abortion Without Her Knowledge
Authorities in Texas allege that Justin Anthony Banta secretly drugged his girlfriend after she refused to end her pregnancy.

A Department of Justice employee in Texas has been arrested for capital murder after allegedly slipping drugs to his pregnant girlfriend to induce a forced abortion against her will.
Justin Anthony Banta, an IT employee with the DOJ, was recently arrested by the Parker County Sheriffâs Office after a lengthy investigation and is also facing additional charges of tampering with physical evidence, according to a press release.
Sheriff Russ Authier said the investigation was launched after the unidentified woman reported the incident, saying that her then-boyfriend, Mr. Banta, had slipped âPlan Câ pills into her drink last October â a month after he had told her that he would cover the cost of an abortion when she told him she was pregnant. The woman said she wanted to keep the baby.
A month later, the couple met at a coffee shop in nearby Tarrant County after a doctorâs appointment, where she learned that the fetus had a strong heartbeat and good vitals. The victim told investigators that she suspected that Mr. Banta had slipped drugs in her drink after she began to suffer âextreme fatigue and heavy bleedingâ the next day and was forced to head to the emergency room. The next day, she lost the pregnancy.
Mr. Banta was then brought in for questioning, and he immediately told officers that he knew they wanted to speak with him about the miscarriage and about ordering the âPlan Câ pills on his computer, according to FOX4 KDFW.
Investigators believe he remotely reset his phone to the factory default settings after it was collected as evidence to delete any record of his purchase.
Mr. Banta was charged with capital murder and evidence tampering and released from jail after posting a $520,000 bond.
Earlier this year, a Louisiana woman was indicted after allegedly obtaining abortion pills from a doctor in New York after her teenage daughter said she did not want to end her pregnancy. Both she and the doctor, Margaret Carpenter, are facing indictments for criminal abortion.
Louisiana officials have been seeking to extradite Dr. Carpenter. Still, New Yorkâs governor, Kathy Hochul, has defiantly declared that she will not honor the extradition request, and the standoff seems to have been frozen in place.
Louisianaâs attorney general, Elizabeth Murrill, said last month that state officials are investigating Dr. Carpenter for another incident of sending abortion medication to another woman in the state.