Texas Court Upholds Fetal Homicide Law -- Part One of Two

A unanimous Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has upheld a 2003 law allowing an unborn baby to be treated as the second victim in a criminal attack against a pregnant woman.

Terence Lawrence, serving life in prison for killing Antwonyia Smith and her four- to six-week-old unborn baby in 2004, appealed his capital murder sentence, according to the Austin American-Statesman. Prosecutors contended that Lawrence found out Smith was pregnant with his child and told another woman that he would "take care of" it. He killed Smith and the baby with three blasts from a shotgun, the American-Statesman reported.

In his appeal, Lawrence stated that the U.S. Supreme Court's rulings in abortion cases have established that states have "no compelling interest to interfere before a fetus is viable," according to the American-Statesman.

However, on November 21, the appeals court ruled that this standard only applies when the woman chooses to abort her baby. "The 'compelling state interest' test, along with the accompanying 'viability' threshold, has no application to a statute that prohibits a third party from causing the death of the woman's unborn child against her will," Presiding Judge Sharon Keller wrote for the court. "The Legislature is free to protect the lives of those whom it considers to be human beings."

Thirty-five (35) states now have laws that recognize that an unborn child can be the victim of a homicide. Of these, 25 apply throughout the period of pre-natal development. Federal and state courts have consistently rejected legal challenges to these laws.

Factsheets describing the specific state laws and pertinent court decisions can be viewed in the Unborn Victims section of the NRLC website, at http://www.nrlc.org/Unborn_Victims/index.html

Part Two