Posted on 06/15/2006 1:51:26 PM PDT by freepatriot32
MACON, Ga. - A 27-year-old woman was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison for leaving her newborn daughter in a Wal-Mart restroom last year.
Amy Shorter covered her face after the verdict was read Wednesday, and several relatives cried as they left the courtroom. They declined to comment.
The jury found Shorter guilty of felony murder for causing the baby's death while committing first-degree cruelty to children.
Defense attorney Elizabeth Lane had argued that Shorter did not intend to kill her child. Lane said Shorter didn't know she was pregnant and panicked after giving birth in the Macon store restroom on Aug. 14, 2005. She left the baby there on impulse, Lane said.
The 8-pound infant died five days later at a hospital.
"I've seen you express remorse. I don't know what was in your mind that day," said Superior Court Judge Byron Smith.
Are you a teenager? This woman probably went into the restroom because her water broke. That doesn't have the same odor as urine nor does it exit the body in the same manner. It gushes out without any muscle clenching.
Her breasts probably had been dripping milk for the previous month. She would have noticed stains on her bed clothes. Her periods would have ceased for nine months. She would have had to spread her legs very wide for the infant to pass thru the birth canal. That isn't the normal seating position to go to the bathroom.
After the child came out she would have had to ease the afterbirth out of her birth canal during which time she was undoubtably watching the baby squirming beneath her in the toilet bowl.
Then she would have had to clean herself. She killed this baby as sure as if she took a knife to its throat. Yes, she deserves a sentence that shows premeditated murder!
If she dumped the baby in the toilet, the sentence was fitting and correct.
What a feeding frenzy !
"But an 8 pound baby would tend to show, one would think, if the person in question was a flyweight like myself."
I worked with a woman who was a PERFECT size 6, saw her go through 2 pregnancies, she could really have hid it had she wanted to. I don't think she ever even wore maternity clothes. And the babies were not little upon birth either.
However, I DO think this woman would have noticed her own weight gain, that I will say.
Unreal. You actually believe that, don't you?
How can these women not think something's up when their period stops for months? You'd think that would give them a clue they might be . . . pregnant!
I don't know.
Not being a girl :)
My guess is they are either very naive, or rubes or both.
That's really not the point...the point is, she killed her baby.
Plain and simple.
We know....
A similar story ....but, an entirely different outcome. Unbelievable.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Pregnant woman who shot herself is free
A defense attorney argued in the Suffolk case that a woman couldn't be charged with aborting her child.
The Daily Press
BY SABINE C. HIRSCHAUER
May 9, 2006
SUFFOLK, VA -- A judge dismissed on Monday charges against a 22-year-old pregnant Suffolk woman who shot herself in the stomach to abort her unborn child.
If the case had gone forward, it would have been the first time that a woman would have been tried in Virginia for aborting her own baby.
Tammy Skinner - scheduled to give birth to her third daughter on the day of the shooting - called 911 early Feb. 23 from a downtown parking lot and told the dispatcher that someone shot her.
Police later charged her with illegally inducing her own abortion, filing a false police report and using a firearm in the commission of a felony. On Monday, Judge James D. Moore sentenced Skinner to 30 days in jail for filing a false police report then suspended all her jail time. Prosecutors asked Moore to drop the firearms charge because it doesn't apply to inducing an abortion.
On July 10, Moore will decide whether Skinner has to pay between $750 and $1,500 for the cost of the investigation.
Skinner, unemployed and living on welfare, initially told police she couldn't remember the last name of the man who picked her up, shot her and then pushed her out of a car Feb. 23. Later, she told police that the unborn child's father shot her. Skinner is the mother of two girls, 1 and 4.
During the investigation, a neighbor said Skinner was at the neighbor's apartment about 3 a.m. the day of the shooting. Skinner called 911 about an hour later from a parking lot. Officers found a red stain on the driver's seat in her car, a .22-caliber gun and a magazine with three bullets, a search warrant indicated. The abortion charge turned into a legal headache for prosecutors because Virginia's statute has remained untested for nearly 50 years. Skinner's lawyer, Kevin E. Martingayle, argued on Monday that in two similar Florida and Georgia cases, the courts sided with mothers who shot themselves and aborted their children.
In the Florida case, an unwed teenager about 26 weeks pregnant shot herself in 1994. Her baby lived for 15 days. The state Supreme Court ruled in 1997 that a pregnant woman couldn't be held criminally liable for killing her fetus.
In a 1998 Georgia case, the Georgia Courts of Appeals also sided with a mother who shot herself, resulting in the death of her fetus.
"If you put the Georgia statute next to the Virginia statute, ... the language is almost word for word (identical) ... ," Martingayle said.
Prosecutors argued against the dismissal. But they found themselves on unstable legal ground: There isn't a similar case in Virginia or elsewhere that convicted a mother for aborting her own child. The prosecutor's office now has to decide whether to accept the dismissal or opt for a grand jury indictment, Deputy Commonwealth's Attorney Marie Walls said after the hearing Monday. An indictment means that the grand jury would need to conclude there's enough evidence against Skinner to send the case to trial. Walls wouldn't say whether prosecutors want Skinner indicted on different charges.
Neither Skinner nor her family would comment on the judge's decision Monday. "She is devastated ... ," Martingayle said. "She will pay for what she did for the rest of her life. ... The courts don't have to do that."
Absolutely horrific.
Still didn't say how she killed her.
Simple abandonment wouldn't have done it.
See posts #11 and #38.
Probably, considering she dumped the baby into the toilet, covered it with seat covers, and fled.
She knew she was pregnant.
Although it's commendable that judges are passing out stiffer sentences for those who murder children, a life sentence in this sad case seems extreme.
I don't know about her state, but most states have laws that say you can take a newborn to a police station, fire station or hospital and leave it with them and just walk away, no questions asked. She had other options and she chose to let the child drown.
The baby's life was a precious as a two year old, a thirty year old, a seventy year old and anywhere in between. Would you have objected to a life sentence if her child was killed at six weeks of age? She murdered a human being, lied to get out of trouble and was unsuccessful. Sounds like a typical murder case to me.
Have they done any IQ testing on this woman? Did she register in positive numbers, or negative?
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