The Associated Press

MILLERSBURG, Ohio - A lay midwife in an Amish community will have to go back to jail if she continues to refuse to disclose the source of drugs she used to treat a patient, a judge has ruled.

Freida Miller, 48, of Berlin Township, has until March 14 to say where she got the drugs, Judge Thomas White of Holmes County Common Pleas Court said in a ruling issued on Thursday. She previously served 55 days for refusing to name her source to a grand jury.

She could be jailed until June 18, the end of the grand jury's term.

The 5th Ohio District Court of Appeals, in Canton, allowed Miller to be released on bond in December while it considered her appeal of a ruling finding her in contempt of court. The appeals court on Tuesday backed White's decision to jail her.

Miller will not say who gave her the prescription drugs Pitocin and Methergine that she illegally injected into a new mother to stop bleeding after a birth.

She pleaded guilty in May to attempted unauthorized practice of medicine and possession of dangerous drugs. Lay midwives are not licensed by the state.

White sentenced Miller to about a year in jail, but suspended the sentence in favor of three years of probation and ordered her to cooperate with authorities.

She has said that revealing the information could hurt the relationship between midwives and doctors.

Miller works extensively in the Amish and Mennonite communities in Holmes and Wayne counties, about 65 miles south of Cleveland. Miller, a Mennonite, estimates she has assisted in nearly 2,000 births over 17 years.

Her attorney, James Banks, said Miller believes providing the names would violate her religious beliefs.

White said he gave Miller a week to report to jail in part so she could help her clients plan for the birth of their children.