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LIFE Press Release on Laci and Connor's Law March 18, 2004
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Press
Release
One
Victim Or Two?
Laci and Connor's
Law Faces Vote In Senate
FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE March 18, 2004
The Following Statement Can Be
Attributed To Nevada LIFE President Don Nelson.
The Unborn Victims Of Violence Act
known as Laci and Connor’s law at the request of Dennis
and Sharon Rocha after their daughter Laci Peterson and
her murdered unborn son, Conner, will be voted on by the
United States Senate March 23rd-25th. It has passed the house twice previously, but has never come
to a Senate vote. This
act will allow federal and military prosecutors to bring
charges on behalf of a "child in utero" when he
or she is a victim of a violent federal or military crime.
It recognizes that there are two victims instead of
one. In a
letter to Senator Harry Reid, Laci Peterson’s mother,
Mrs. Rocha writes, “If
my daughter had been killed in a federal jurisdiction, or
during commission of a federal crime, however, my
grandson's murder would not be recognized or charged.
It is that gap in federal law that we seek to
correct with Laci and Conner's Law.”
This legislation is needed to give proper dignity and
justice to unborn children and their families when unborn
children are victims of violence.
It is also needed to offer a greater threat to
perpetrators of these acts.
Feminists For Life President Serrin Foster says
that according to the “Journal of the American Medical
Association, a Maryland study concluded that, ‘A
pregnant or recently pregnant woman is more likely to be a
victim of homicide than to die of any other cause.’”
Senator John Ensign supports this bill.
Senator Reid’s position is unknown.
Reid opponent Richard Ziser supports it.
An alternative single victim bill by California Senator
Diane Feinstein does not recognize a second victim and
does not contain real penalties for the killing or injury
of unborn victims of violence.
In
her letter to Harry Reid, Sharon Rocha, also tells
of the necessity to oppose the Feinstein substitute:
“I
urge you to oppose the single-victim bill. That bill would
not recognize that there are two victims in cases like my
family's. In fact, it would enshrine in law the offensive
concept that such crimes have only a single victim -the
pregnant woman.
“Please
understand how adoption of such a single-victim proposal
would be a painful blow to those, like me who are left to
grieve after a two-victim crime, because Congress would be
saying that Conner and other innocent victims like him are
not really victims --indeed, that they never really
existed at all. But our grandson did live. He had a name,
he was loved and his life was violently taken from him
before he ever saw the sun.
“And
what about mothers who survive criminal attacks but lose
their babies? I don't understand how any legislator can
vote to force prosecutors to tell such a grieving mother
that she didn't really lose a baby -- when she knows to
the depths of her soul that she did. … If this
single-victim bill were the law in California, there would
be no second homicide charge for the murder of Conner. But
there were two bodies that washed up in San Francisco Bay,
and the law should recognize that reality.”
Laci
and Connor’s law is supported in two polls by 84 percent of
Americans and in another by 79 percent, including 69
percent by those who call themselves pro-choice.
Laci and Connor’s Law will probably depend on
Harry Reid’s support.
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