No. The uterus is made primarily of muscle, and it has an excellent blood supply (especially in pregnancy), which means it will heal quickly. As long as she didn't hit any major blood vessels requiring an emergency hysterectomy, her uterus will be fine in the long run. As for her state of mind, that's another matter.
No. The uterus is made primarily of muscle, and it has an excellent blood supply (especially in pregnancy), which means it will heal quickly. As long as she didn't hit any major blood vessels requiring an emergency hysterectomy, her uterus will be fine in the long run. As for her state of mind, that's another matter.
Darth Rotor
Salted Sith Cynic
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A lot of passages in the Bible have passed into the language as common phrases, even throwaways, without immediate religious context.
I didn't want to quote that as Scripture and possibly derail the thread along religious lines. I was using the "throwaway" style of usage.
I owe you a beer for doing a job I wouldn't do. Tecate and lime?
On me. *Piercing Whistle*
Waiter, my friend ID here is parched. Tecate and lime wedge, and step on it!
*Burt Reynolds whacks DR in the back of the head*
"Don't fruit the beer! That's man law!"
Ouch.
DR
I don't buy the insanity angle. For her to be legally insane, she would have to not know it was a living human being she was killing. And every mother will tell you they know it is a living human being from the first time they feel it kick inside them.
I don't know about the judge, but I suspect that the pro-choice groups won't want her prosecuted (or at least convicted) because it might set a precident that could ultimately lead to an abortion challenge. If a woman can be convicted of murdering her unborn child at term, the next step to pursue would be to outlaw "murder" (aka abortion) at any time in the pregnancy even early on.
In my mind, killing a full term infant is quite different than aborting a first trimester embryo, but the slippery slope can be a dangerous thing.
Then again, I'm no lawyer, but this is what went through my mind.
ImaginalDisc
Penultimate Amazing
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A lot of passages in the Bible have passed into the language as common phrases, even throwaways, without immediate religious context.
I didn't want to quote that as Scripture and possibly derail the thread along religious lines. I was using the "throwaway" style of usage.
I owe you a beer for doing a job I wouldn't do. Tecate and lime?
*Piercing Whistle*
Waiter, my friend ID here is parched. Tecate and lime wedge, and step on it!
*Burt Reynolds whacks DR in the back of the head*
"Don't fruit the beer! That's man law!"
Ouch.
DR
I guess you mean to say that you were using it as a minced oath.
Come again?
Where do you have that from?
Didn't Andrea Yates know that her children were human beings?
Darth Rotor
Salted Sith Cynic
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Not intentionally, nor consciously Funnily enough, it doesn't turn up in Wiki's nice list of minced oaths, though it probably ought to.
From the Wiki entry:
I first was exposed to the phrase (via Dan Jenkins) as a game / headline writing exercise used by ink stained wretches.
Jesus Wept, Dodgers lose it in Six
Jesus Wept, Dewey loses to Truman
And so on.
Now that you point to minced oaths, I suspect that is exactly what I have been doing with it, and never realized it!
Thanks.
*sulks*
I never thought I would be a mincer of oaths. It somehow feels unmanly.
DR Wept
Virginia seems to have one of the lower thresholds for insanity defense - that of having "a mental disease or defect causing the accused to lack the capacity either to appreciate the wrongfulness of his act, or to conform his act to the requirements of the law." Emphasis is mine.
That second clause covers a myriad of sins.
That second clause covers a myriad of sins.
ImaginalDisc
Penultimate Amazing
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Now that you point to minced oaths, I suspect that is exactly what I have been doing with it, and never realized it!
Thanks.
*sulks*
I never thought I would be a mincer of oaths. It somehow feels unmanly.
DR Wept
Not a problem, though any "expletive" that doesn't show up as **** is almost certainly a minced oath.
I was wondering whether it revolves around a possible "legal" definition that a baby is not an individual until after it's been delivered, so what she did was to shoot herself?
That's certainly a plausible scenario, absent more information on what the hell Virginia law does say.
Darth Rotor
Salted Sith Cynic
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One hopes that the statute clearly states that you are free to shoot yourself. On that optimistic note, perhaps more citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia who really ought to exit the gene pool will avail themselves of this statute's provisions and proceed forthwith to exercise said freedom.
'Tis most likely a vain hope that the law is that clear.
ETA: my review of the Virginia Statutes finds, as yours apparently did, that no express prohibition against suicide, nor against self injury, is on the books in Virginia. In Virginia, one is free to kill one's self without fear of criminal prosecution. In this case, it appears that the Law holds, per the previous comments, that the baby inside the woman is a part of her "self" for these purposes.
How interesting, regardless of how sad the story that induced this query.
dr, it appears to me that what the law doesn't say is wha tis important. Absent a statute expressly forbidding an action, one would normally conclude its legality.
There was an old guideline that I still cotton to: A law that protects me from another is likely a sound law, a law that protects me from myself is not necessary.
DR
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Mycroft
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Even so one would think that shooting oneself would be against the law. Or maybe performing a late-term abortion, or practicing medicine without a license.
slingblade
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Actually, I think that's too precise. From what I've heard, she has to be unable to distinguish between right and wrong. She has to be unable to understand that what she did was wrong.
That is not the same as saying what she did was wrong, although I certainly think it was. And just about any reasonable person would think it wrong. But I've seen plenty of cases where someone did something no one reasonable would think right to do, yet the perpetrator called the police him- or herself afterward. That's enough right there, from what I can tell, to prove they knew what they'd done was wrong, no matter how bizarre it was.
So she doesn't have to have known she was killing a living being--I think she knew that, since we don't try to kill the dead. She just has to have had no notion that what she'd done would be wrong, to have a chance at an insanity defense.
I think.
I'm genuinely surprised you think suicide should be (re)criminalized.
Mycroft
High Priest of Ed
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Ah, so that's what you want to argue: Suicide and killing the fetus. Now we are getting somewhere.
Why should it be illegal to commit suicide? Suicide is a cry for help. People who try to commit suicide shouldn't have a sentence thrown on top of their problems.
Why do you think you help people who try to commit suicide by throwing them in the slammer? Or you just want to punish people with severe personal problems?
To answer my own question - just looked it up and suicide is not illegal in any USA state.