A panel of state lawmakers Thursday rejected a Republican’s effort to create a “Laci Peterson” law that would make killing a fetus first-degree murder.
Rep. David Schultheis, R-Colorado Springs, said he simply wanted Colorado to join the federal government and other states in getting tough on killers of pregnant women and their unborn children.
Opponents of the bill saw another motive. They say Schultheis, one of the legislature’s stalwart opponents of abortion rights, wanted to put abortion providers out of business.
“This bill terrifies me,” said Dr. Warren Hern, director of the Boulder Abortion Clinic. “It obviously appears to me to be a fatwa against doctors who do abortions by the mullahs who are anti-abortion fanatics.”
Under House Bill 1128, first-degree murder would be redefined as the death of a person, including a fetus, caused by another person. The bill listed abortion as an “affirmative defense” to the charge.
That language would allow law enforcement officers to charge abortion doctors with first-degree murder and face a possible death sentence, said Kevin Paul, a lawyer for Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains.
Schultheis said he intended to target the killers of pregnant women who wanted to have their babies, just like Peterson, a California woman who was murdered in 2002.
“The real issue is the homicide issue,” said Schultheis. “Abortion is just not an issue here in this bill.”
Two women from Colorado Springs offered emotional testimony about the murder of their pregnant daughters. Erin-Lea Hanson said her daughter was four months’ pregnant when she was strangled.
Carla Neal held a photo of her grandson, Jeremiah, delivered by cesarean section after Neal’s daughter was shot in the head. Neal’s daughter, Leah, was 24 years old and 28 weeks’ pregnant when she was killed.
Neal said the legal system failed to address the death of her grandson.
“When we went to court for the murder of my daughter, there’s no mention of this person,” Neal said holding the photo. “It’s like that never happened, that he wasn’t real. It was very horrific for my family. … I feel Jeremiah needs to have a voice.”
Democratic lawmakers said changing the definition of first-degree murder was unnecessary because Colorado law already allows for tougher penalties in “aggravated” cases. Killing a pregnant woman is such a case.
The House Judiciary Committee rejected the bill on a 6-5 party-line vote.
Schultheis took the vote as a sign Democrats were unwilling to work with him to amend his bill so that it would exempt abortion doctors from possible prosecution.
“This committee is so ideologue-oriented that they were not even about to acknowledge the personhood of the fetus,” he said after the vote.
