Colorado Senate to prepare fetal homicide bill in wake of Longmont attack

[Henry]

State Senate President Bill Cadman, R-Colorado Springs, said
Friday that legislation is being prepared to address attacks
such as the one on Michelle Wilkins, whose fetus was cut from
her womb March 18.

He said the proposal would extend murder charges to the deaths
of "unborn children," although Democrats, who control the House,
said they passed such a measure in 2013 and would block any
proposed law that would undermine abortion rights.

Cadman called the Wilkins case "one of the most horrific crimes
in recent memory."

"This shocking lack of murder charges, in defense of an obvious
murder victim, not only deeply offends our sense of humanity and
justice," he said in a statement. "It also highlights a void in
Colorado law that must be addressed if we want to give a measure
of justice to this child that Boulder's DA can't or won't.

"This was a child. This child was murdered. That Coloradans have
no way to hold the murderer responsible, or deliver justice for
the victims, is a gap in Colorado's justice system which can no
longer be ignored."

Rep. Mike Foote, D-Lafayette, said the law he sponsored two
years ago, called the Crimes Against Pregnant Women Act, gave
prosecutors and judges the ability to "administer justice
without taking away a woman's right to choose."

The law created felony offenses for unlawful termination of a
pregnancy, while excluding medical services for which the mother
gives consent.

Foote said bills such as the one Cadman proposed Friday, which
are raised almost every session by Republicans, seek to define a
fetus as a person with legal rights separate from the mother.

"Those are personhood bills, and they're supported by people who
want to ban abortions in all circumstances," he said. "I don't
think we should do that. I don't think that's the right way to
go."?

http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_27800078/colorado-senate-
prepare-fetal-homicide-bill?source=infinite