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Woman jailed for miscarriage

zooterkin

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zooterkin
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Not sure if this belongs here or in Trials and Errors.

A woman has been found guilty of both harming a foetus by having an abortion and of killing a baby (the same child); which is bizarre, as well as the issue of whether she should have been found guilty of either charge.

Patel showed up at an emergency room in South Bend, Indiana, in July 2013 with heavy vaginal bleeding. She eventually told doctors that she had been pregnant, gave birth to a stillborn, and threw the fetus in a dumpster. Prosecutors claim that Patel had sent text messages indicating that she had purchased black-market abortion drugs, but there's no evidence that she took the drugs, as they didn't show up in blood tests.

But even if Patel had deliberately aborted a pregnancy illegally, this case is outrageous. That's because she was convicted both of killing a baby and killing a fetus. The problem with this verdict, as Ed Pilkington of the Guardian explained before it was delivered, is that it really should have to be one or the other:
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Is the American legal system (or maybe only parts of it) heading into the Middle Ages?
 
Seems like there are two separate crimes here: An induced miscarriage after the legal cutoff for doing so, and murder.

Does the US legal system normally consider only a single charge, when several related crimes are committed together?
 
zooterkin said:
Not sure if this belongs here or in Trials and Errors.

A woman has been found guilty of both harming a foetus by having an abortion and of killing a baby (the same child); which is bizarre, as well as the issue of whether she should have been found guilty of either charge.
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I wonder if its a case of the police/prosecutors not being sure what charge was applicable (i.e. not knowing for sure if the fetus was alive or not) so they charged her with multiple counts with the intent to drop one or the other when more evidence presents itself.
 
Segnosaur said:
I wonder if its a case of the police/prosecutors not being sure what charge was applicable (i.e. not knowing for sure if the fetus was alive or not) so they charged her with multiple counts with the intent to drop one or the other when more evidence presents itself.
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Read the article. Pruvi Patel was convicted by a jury on both counts. Obviously prosecutor did not drop either one.

And to answer OP:
zooterkin said:
Is the American legal system (or maybe only parts of it) heading into the Middle Ages?
Click to expand...
Indiana definitely is heading that way.
 
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How is justice best served by charging and convicting of two closely related crimes? Why isn't one enough in this case?
 
If you take drugs with a fetus on board it might very well fall under the "harming a fetus" bit. Then, after the birth, it's a baby and subject to a murder charge (assuming the kid was born alive). The status of the victim changed during the crime.

Here's a parallel. Someone who is beating their kid from just before midnight until just after. It's the kid's 18th birthday. The beater might face child abuse charges before midnight because the kid isn't yet 18, and face battery charges after.
 
The Norseman said:
How is justice best served by charging and convicting of two closely related crimes? Why isn't one enough in this case?
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Not closely related, conflicting.

The two charges that Patel now faces – the initial count of neglect of a dependent, and the new charge of feticide – appear to be legally contradictory. Under Indiana law, a woman can only be convicted of neglecting a dependent if it can be proved that she gave birth to a live baby.
By contrast, feticide requires the baby to have been born dead. Its definition in Indiana law is that the woman “knowingly or intentionally terminates a human pregnancy with an intention other than to produce a live birth or to remove a dead fetus."
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zooterkin said:
Not closely related, conflicting.
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The two charges that Patel now faces – the initial count of neglect of a dependent, and the new charge of feticide – appear to be legally contradictory. Under Indiana law, a woman can only be convicted of neglecting a dependent if it can be proved that she gave birth to a live baby.
By contrast, feticide requires the baby to have been born dead. Its definition in Indiana law is that the woman “knowingly or intentionally terminates a human pregnancy with an intention other than to produce a live birth or to remove a dead fetus."​
Maybe they are conflicting, but the definition of feticide that you quoted only requires that the woman intends an outcome other than live birth or removing a dead fetus, not that the intended outcome actually happens. Did you mean to cite a different definition?

By the definition you cited, I don't see a legal conflict if a pregnant woman who intends to kill her child a) commits the crime feticide by inducing a miscarriage with an intention other than to produce a live birth or to remove a dead fetus, and then b) commits the crime of neglect of a dependent when the child was not already dead after the commission of the first crime. The intent is to kill the child. First, a feticide is committed with that intent. Second, neglect is committed with the same intent. Both are crimes. If the child had been stillborn, only one crime would have been committed. That's the way I read it, anyway. Maybe there's another legal definition in Indiana that defines feticide as requiring a dead baby as its outcome. If so, I'll agree there's a contradiction in the charges.
 
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theprestige said:
Maybe they are conflicting, but the definition of feticide that you quoted only requires that the woman intends an outcome other than live birth or removing a dead fetus, not that the intended outcome actually happens. Did you mean to cite a different definition?
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It requires termination of the pregnancy, a term which does not include a live birth.
 
It sounds a bit daft, but if she deliberately terminated a pregnancy, then delivered a live but non-viable foetus/baby, might it be possible to get both charges to stick?

There's a fairly grey area between a foetus and a baby. Instinct says, pick one and stick with it. Maybe go for inflated lungs, but then, how inflated? It can be minimal if the foetus took one weak gasp then expired. (We go for colostrum in the stomach, for operational reasons, but that's probably not applicable in this case.)

It's hazy, but I'd still have thought they ought to have decided on one thing or the other.
 
zooterkin said:
Is the American legal system (or maybe only parts of it) heading into the Middle Ages?
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its been heading there for quite some time

- Travyon Martin / George Zimmerman
- Nicole Brown & Ronald Goldman / O J Simpson
- Vincent Chin / Ronald Ebens & Michael Nitz
- Declan Lyons / Isaac Turnbaugh
- Casey Anthony / Cayley Anthony
- Don King (yes, that Don King) / Hillary Brown, Sam Garrett

and many more!!!
 
zooterkin said:
It requires termination of the pregnancy, a term which does not include a live birth.
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I really do think you'll need a citation of the relevant Indiana law for this one. Right now it just looks like you're inventing requirements and terminology that support your argument. I for one would like to see how your invention compares to the law as written, and to the case as it was actually argued in court. And because a jury convicted, and a judge upheld the conviction, I think the burden of proof is on you to show that the conviction is not supported in law.
 
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