HB1274

The amendment substantially restructures the bill to shift from a civil wrongful death action framework to a criminal prohibition with civil penalties—removing provisions allowing relatives to sue for wrongful death and instead making it a Class felony to knowingly dispense, distribute, sell, or advertise items for unlawful abortion, with civil penalties capped at ten thousand dollars per violation rather than per dose. This change NARROWS and REDIRECTS the bill from a private civil remedy system to a state enforcement mechanism focused on criminal penalties and attorney general enforcement.

The amendment adds a new Section 1 that establishes criminal penalties for administering abortion-inducing substances or instruments (existing law under § 22-17-5.1), then reorganizes the remaining sections to prohibit dispensing, distributing, selling, or advertising articles intended for unlawful abortion, with civil and injunctive enforcement mechanisms—effectively BROADENING the bill from targeting abortion providers to also targeting suppliers and advertisers of abortion-related materials.

This change converted the bill from an engrossed version (with legislative markup showing edits) to an enrolled version (the final, clean copy ready for the Governor's signature), removing all the underscores and strikethroughs that tracked amendments while preserving the substantive law unchanged. No changes to the bill's actual content or purpose occurred—this is a purely formatting/procedural step that finalizes the legislation.