“I hate sitting quietly now,” Nikki Packer said. A quiet room reminded her of the police cell she was locked in just a few hours after experiencing a traumatic stillbirth.

While she was still recovering from the surgery, she was arrested in the hospital by a uniformed official and charged with an illegal abortion. Her case took four and a half years to appear in court, where she was unanimously cleared by a jury last week.

Packer, 45, was charged with “illegal management of poison or other harmful things” and “intentionally promoting miscarriage” after being prescribed by a registered provider’s abortion pill during Covid Lockdown in November 2020.

Under emergency legislation introduced during the pandemic, later permanent drugs can be passed through the postal period for a 10-week pregnancy pregnancy.

Packer continues to provide fetuses estimated to be around 26 weeks of gestation. Prosecutors claimed she knew she was 10 weeks pregnant when she was taking the medication. The accusation packers have been denied.

She may have been found innocent, but Packer knows she will never be the same. She is now worried about seeking medical help.

During her trial, prosecutors tried to claim she was saying she didn't initially tell medical staff (continue to call police) she was taking abortion pills because she was lying because she was worried that it would affect the quality of care she received.

"But they didn't really help me, right?" she said. “So I think it’s right for me to be scared.”

And she no longer trusted the police - when her phone died and when she needed help, she asked for instructions from drunken men outside the London station, not the police.

She also knows she hasn't fully handled what happened. She said a few days after the verdict “I’m still running on the adrenaline.” But she is seeking answers on how the Crown Prosecution Service and Metropolitan Police get here.

"I could have handled other ways after I was in the hospital," she said. "I could have been sent home to recover. There was no legal need to be taken directly to the police station.

"It was absolutely terrible from the hospital to the Charing Cross Police Department," she added. She was placed behind the police car because there was no car, "I had to sit on a piece of wood with no seat belts on it, and drive around London like that." In custody, she did not give her anti-enclosure medicine on time, which he said was not a "priority."

"I'm still in pain, I'm very tired, I feel very weak and mental, just don't know much about what's going on," she said.

The prosecution has cast her life for nearly five years. "I've been doing things, but you haven't fully shown up yet," she said.

She spent tens of thousands of pounds on defense. Crowdfunding helps meet at least some of her expenses. "I read all (comments) a few times," she said. "I was reading them both during the performance and during the trial. There were a lot of people out there who thought this should happen, and there was a lot of support."

A few years before her case arrived at Easterworth Crown Court, Parker's attorney Fiona Horlick KC asked her what she feared the most.

"I'm most afraid of going to jail," she said. The next worst thing is "a trial, just providing evidence, having to speak in front of all these people."

She said she knew she could choose to plead guilty, but she thought it was more than just "a split for a second." "I can't watch myself do it because that's not true."

While she waited for the case to go to court, she saw another woman, Carla Foster, being sentenced and convicted of conviction, and then suspended her sentence by the Court of Appeal.

"I'm really angry, angry that she has to go through this," Packer said. "She's been in jail for 35 days. Why? How does that help? What's the point? It doesn't make sense to send her to jail, and then you have to think about the impact on the rest of her life."

However, the case also brought the reality she faced back to reality, and she began to raise issues that she had never thought she had to consider. "How do I prepare for the worst?" she said. "Will I rent an apartment and cancel Netflix? What should I do? I don't know. I've never been to this before."

"The rational part of the brain can tell you that it's unlikely to happen, but the other part...it can still happen," she added. "So it's a terrible thing to live below, and this thing really has a potential life (sentence) in prison."

When Packer's trial finally took place in late April, prosecutors opened up to include details of her sex life, including her alternative relationship.

"It's totally unnecessary, just making me look bad," she said. "And, you're probably dealing with things that people may never have heard of, maybe not understood, maybe there might be a bad view. It's totally unnecessarily."

At one point, Packer was forced to sit in court, and the lawyer discussed her nipple size with the judge. Her intimate photos have been shown to the jury. Evidence of her flat belly.

"It's a shame," she said. "I don't want anyone to see these pictures, but I know it's for my own benefit.

"We hide what we can do, but because my nipples are a hot topic, we can't cover them up in the pictures," she said. "It's not good to know that people have seen such intimate photos of you."

"It's terrible evidence, absolutely terrible," she said. "It's very frustrating, I've been doing it most of the time, but I've gone through it because I know I'm right."

The jury agreed that after about six hours of deliberation, she was found innocent.

"It's great to get this sentence," she said. "I just feel that while the last four and a half years have been absolutely terrible, I don't know if it's worth it at the moment, but it's awesome to get verified by the jury of my peers that it's unanimously not guilty," she said.

After clearing her name, Packer now leaves her weight behind, demanding a change in the law to legalize abortion. The issue is expected to be voted in parliament this summer.

"I do hope the law does change - it should be done," she said. "Abortion is health care. It should not be considered as other than that."

A CPS spokesman said: "We recognize the profound powers that these cases arouse, but have the responsibility to apply fairly for the laws passed by Parliament."

They said the role of CPS is not to decide whether Packer’s behavior is right or wrong, “but to make a factual judgment on whether she knows whether she knows whether she has exceeded legal restrictions when she has aborted”, which believes there is enough evidence to bring the case to the court.

Regarding sharing sensitive details and intimate images in court, a CPS spokesperson said this is often part of the judicial process. In the case of the Packer, it is “to determine the timing of her pregnancy through prosecution and defense and her understanding of abortion medications during pregnancy.”

“Our intention is by no means to let the evidence we present makes anyone publicly embarrass or humiliate anyone,” they said.

Packer said this kind of prosecution "can happen to anyone, and I think it's really scary. With the existence of the law, it's a tragic accident and you're in trial, and that's why the law needs to change."

Packer hopes to make history the last woman in England to be prosecuted for abortion. She has heard of women in other cases in the early stages of the criminal justice system and she wants to use her voice to make sure they never see the inside of the court.

"I can't really say it's worth it, but at least it means anything," she said.

In addition to campaign legislation changes, how does Packer plan to continue moving forward? "It's a very good question," she said. "I do have a little bit of a need to find myself again."

While awaiting trial, she seeks comfort on familiar music and television. She listened to the same album by her favorite rock artist while repeating, re-watching her favorite series back-to-back. But she found that she could no longer see the orange as new black.

"I have to close it," she said. "I can't see it anymore because I'm starting to feel very weird; it's in jail, and I might go to jail."

But, she added: “I started watching it again last night.”