Woman jailed for miscarriage

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.

Quote:

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:

Is the American legal system (or maybe only parts of it) heading into the Middle Ages?

via International Skeptics Forum http://ift.tt/1zvNCG4