Don't stay in bed, unless you can make money in bed. - George Burns

Monday, June 06, 2005

I guarantee that this case goes to the Supreme Court.

A 19-year-old accused of causing his teenage girlfriend to miscarry two fetuses by stepping on her stomach was convicted Monday of two counts of murder.

Gerardo Flores received an automatic life sentence because prosecutors did not seek the death penalty, which was available under the state’s 2003 fetus protection law.

Erica Basoria, 17, acknowledged asking Flores to help end her pregnancy; she could not be prosecuted because of her legal right to abortion.

The defense contended that Basoria punched herself while Flores was stepping on her, making it impossible to tell who caused the miscarriage.

Basoria told authorities that, after about four months of pregnancy, she regretted not getting an abortion and started jogging and hitting herself to induce a miscarriage. When her efforts failed, she said she asked her boyfriend to help.

Flores did not testify, but earlier told police that he stepped on Basoria’s stomach several times during the week before she miscarried.

If I were a more conspiratorial person I might think that these laws were passed specifically to get a conviction like this.  Any lawyer worth his salt is going to appeal this.  How can the woman be held completely faultless and the guy get two life convictions?  It seems to me that either a fetus is entitled to legal protections or it is not.  If a woman can abort a fetus up until the 6 month period, and she chooses to abort and has a guy kick her in the stomach, I don’t see how anyone could reasonably consider him a murderer under the abortion laws we have now.  I can’t wait to see how this turns out.  I mean, the anti-abortion folks will say that she is just as guilty as he is, and I think that’s a totally logical, moral, and intellectually defensible argument.  It’s the radical pro-abortion folks who are going to be on the defensive here.  Are they really going to come to the defense of a guy who stomps two fetuses to death by claiming that it was the woman’s choice, that those 4 month old twins weren’t entitled to any sort of legal protection whatsoever?  Then, are the moderate pro-choice people going to claim that there’s a difference between being stomped to death at 4 months or being vacuumed out in pieces?  How so?  Why is there a difference?  If the fetuses were just blobs of goo, where does the line get drawn?

This one is going to be good.  There are all kinds of issues here, equal protection especially.  This could be the case that forces the court to revisit Roe v. Wade.  The plan all along?  You be the judge.