For a variety of reasons I held off talking about the very sad but fortunately not fatal assault on a pregnant woman last week in which the attacker attempted to cut the woman's unborn child out of the victim's womb. Peggy Jo Conner is charged with attacking Valerie Oskin, who was eight months pregnant, with a baseball bat, dragging her into the woods, and beginning to cut her open in an attempt to rip the unborn baby from her womb, according to the Associated Press (AP).

 

If ever there was a story with a hero, this is it--seventeen-year-old Adam Silvas--without whose quick thinking both Ms. Oskin and her baby would be dead, according to Armstrong County (Pennsylvania) District Attorney Scott Andreassi. Though badly beating, Ms. Oskin is now off the ventilator and her son is doing well following an emergency C-section. According to the AP, she has identified Ms. Conner, her neighbor in the Pattonville trailer park, as her attacker. Connor is being held without bond pending a preliminary hearing tentatively scheduled for Tuesday.

 

The bizarre, but thankfully highly unusual attack, took place last Wednesday. Silvas had just left home on a routine check of a tree stand in preparation for hunting season.

 

Riding his ATV, Silvas "said he saw Ms. Conner lurking over what seemed to be another person in the woods," according to the Post-Gazette. "He saw blood and Ms. Oskin on the ground mumbling and writhing in pain."

 

Silvas told a CNN affiliate, "When I first saw it, I knew it was foul play because it was just very suspicious happening. The lady acted really weird."  O'Connor tried to reassure him that "everything was fine." Silvas knew otherwise and told her he going off into the woods to ride.

 

"I didn't really say too much because I knew something was wrong," he told television station WTAE in Pittsburgh.  "I had seen somebody laying beside the car.”

 

Silvas fetched his dad, Andrew Silvas, and they returned to the rural dirt road in Wayne Township, about 12 miles northeast of Kittanning County. Mr. Silvas asked Connor what she was doing and she said," Nothing, nothing," according to CNN. Connor said she planned to take the bloodied woman to the hospital.

 

Mr. Silvas told WTAE he asked, "How come you didn't ask my son for help?" She replied, 'I don't know.'' Mr. Silvas told his son to return to their home and tell his mother to call 911.

 

Although there is enormous attention when abductors seek to cut babies from their mother's womb, such tragedies are very rare, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in Alexandria, Virginia, which tracks child abductions. From 1987 until 2004, there have been only eight cases involved forcible Caesarean sections that were performed to obtain babies. Sadly, "All but one of the mothers and two of the babies died."

 

CNN reports that Adam Silvas said he doesn't want to be viewed as a hero, adding that he's "extremely happy that Oskin and her baby are doing well." His dad expressed what any dad would feel.

 

"I'm extremely proud of him. He handled himself very well."
 

Please send your comments to me at dandrusko@nrlc.org