Brutal Attack Brings Murder Conviction

By Dave Andrusko

Often justice is not swift, but it was sure last month for Erik Bullock. A jury in Little Rock, Arkansas, convicted Bullock of murder for hiring men to beat his pregnant girlfriend and kill her unborn child.

The victims were Shiwona Pace and her unborn baby, whom she had named Heaven LeShay when an ultrasound revealed that she was going to have a little girl. Heaven was stillborn after Ms. Pace was severely beaten August 26, 1999, by Eric Beulah (who is already serving a 40-year prison sentence) and allegedly Derrick Witherspoon and Lonnie Beulah, who are also awaiting trial on murder charges.

The baby was due to be born the day after the attack.

The case was the first brought under Arkansas's Fetal Protection Act, which went into effect July 30, 1999. The law allows prosecutors to bring charges against those who kill or injure an unborn child against the mother's will for the first time since the state's previous unborn victims' law was repealed in 1964. The law does not cover babies killed by legal abortion or those who are younger than 12 weeks' gestational age.

Shiwona Pace was a 23-year-old student at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock when she was so viciously assaulted she was left with a broken left wrist, black eye, bruised face, and a spleen that had to be removed.

Bullock received a sentence of life in prison. The jury also convicted the 30-year-old Bullock of first-degree battery, which carries a 20-year sentence.

According to the Associated Press (AP), prosecutors told jurors in closing arguments that Bullock was a controlling man who feared Pace's pregnancy would disrupt his relationship with another woman. They said Bullock paid the men $400 - - total - - to beat Pace.

"This defendant was a selfish person who was afraid one railroad track was going to cross into another," said John Johnson. "He hired those guys to ... beat up that little girl's mother so that she 'would not mess up his life.'"

Pace saw her daughter only once, after Heaven had died. "She was a perfect baby, almost seven pounds," Pace told the AP. "It was like she was just sleeping."

According to Ms. Pace's February 23, 2000, testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, she and her five-year-old son had accompanied Erik Bullock to his home that night.

It was there that I was assaulted by three masked men. One of them drug my son and Erik to a room in the back of the house, while the other two proceeded to beat me and demand money. I begged and pleaded for the life of my unborn child but they showed me no mercy. In fact, one of them told "F* you. Your baby is dying tonight." I could hear my son in the background crying and saying that he wanted his mommy, but there was nothing that I could do to comfort him. As I lay face down crying and begging for them to stop, they continued to beat me. I was choked, hit in the face with a gun, slapped, punched, and kicked repeatedly in the stomach. One of them even put a gun in my mouth and threatened to shoot.

After the three "burglars" left, Pace asked Bullock to call 911, but he said his phone was not working, the Arkansas Democrat- Gazette reported. She went next door to call for an ambulance, and was taken to the hospital. However, doctors could do nothing to save the life of the baby.

Police first thought the attack was a robbery gone wrong, according to the Democrat-Gazette. But further police investigation revealed that Bullock had been seen earlier that night with brothers Eric Beulah, Lonnie Beulah, and Derrick Witherspoon, the newspaper reported.

Witnesses told police they heard the four men taking about " beating someone up and putting a gun in their mouth," and Bullock then gave the men a large sum of money. Police also discovered that Bullock tried to persuade Pace to abort her baby.

"Mr. Bullock told [Pace] several times that he did not want children and was urging her to have an abortion," detective Charles Weaver wrote in an affidavit, the Democrat-Gazette reported.

Bullock, Eric Beulah, Lonnie Beulah, and Witherspoon were arrested and charged with first-degree battery for the attack on Pace and capital murder for Heaven LeShay Pace's death, according to the Democrat-Gazette. Witherspoon told police that Bullock also

participated in the beating, and each of the three men hired by Bullock gave taped statements admitting their part in the attack, the Democrat-Gazette reported.A bill to recognize unborn children as human victims when they are injured or killed during the commission of federal crimes was approved April 26 by the U.S. House of Representatives. The Unborn Victims of Violence Act was backed by NRLC and by pro- life President George W. Bush. Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD) has not yet scheduled action on the bill by the Senate.

You can read Ms. Pace's riveting Senate testimony by going to http://www.nrlc.org/Unborn_Victims/ShiwonaPaceStandard.pdf.