Jailing a mother of three - WTF

No because that would be needlessly cruel. A medically correct definition is not required in that case. This case is different- "baby-killer" is an accusation that pro-life advocates throw around to demonise the pro-choice - and its wrong.

Really. Can you explain how taking an abortion tablet removes the limbs of a foetus.

Basically I have heard everything people like you have to say before. I’m not interested. I’m not emotive about unborn babies and I value women and their rights more highly than the foetus they are carrying. In all circumstances.

I agree with this.

I am passionately pro choice and don’t think a woman should be made to continue a pregnancy against her will.

However, at 32-34 weeks, just because you no longer want to be pregnant, doesn’t mean the baby has to die. She could easily have been supported to be induced as early as safely possible- probably only a week or two later,
if that- or had an elective section under GA if she didn’t want to go through labour. The child could have lived. She didn’t have to have any involvement whatsoever after that point if she didn’t want to. What she did was so unnecessary and yes, so illegal.

That is exactly what they do in late term abortions actually!!

Yes this is where I am with it. If we consider a baby at this stage to be viable (and it is) and worth protecting from harm then that counts for whoever might harm them.

I also find it offensive for posters to keep insinuating or even outright claiming that she must have been mentally ill to have done this. People dont have to be mentally ill to commit crimes or harm their children.

Using emotive language like torn limb from limb shows exactly your agenda.

I support the rights of women over their own body above the rights of the unborn. I agree there has to be a line drawn somewhere. For me it is birth.

Always baffled at how pro-late-term-abortion people find themselves appalled if a mother were to smother her new born baby to death...but getting a 35-40 weeker torn limb from limb is A-OK

It's not A-OK. It's the best of a very very awful and troubling set of options. Because removing personhood from women and making them into a walking incubator, subject to forced birth is the worst option.

Women's choice up to birth is all we have until we can magically teleport fetuses into men/incubators.

If "she must have been in an awful way to do such a thing" is a reason she shouldn't be punished for this. Why isn't this also acceptable for parents who kill newborn babies? That's even harder to comprehend to be, and the parents very likely absolutely desparate (and guilt ridden afterwards) Yet somehow we do know that that's still wrong, very wrong.

She was also given less time as she pleaded guilty before it went to trial , I think that starts at 3 years up to life

That would make sense if there were a minimum legal term that the judge was obliged to give her. But I'm not sure there is in this case is there? The judge could have decided to give her 23 months and suspended it if they wanted to couldn't they?

I'm sorry to say whilst I feel deep empathy for her, she has done something that I consider, as does the law, to be criminal. So I agree with you too. I'm not doubting she was in a bad way, but given the reported Google searches, she new what she was doing.

Thank you for explaining that

He may have been able to suspend her jail sentance because ahe would have had time knocked off for an early guilty plea which would have taken the sentance to 24 months or under, which he could then have suspended. Not because he was cross and did it out of spite

What difference does it make whether women "take the decision easily/lightly" or not? The action itself is what the issue is..not how they feel about doing it.

The magical vaginal birth canal doesn't turn it into a human.

Always baffled at how pro-late-term-abortion people find themselves appalled if a mother were to smother her new born baby to death...but getting a 35-40 weeker torn limb from limb is A-OK 👌🏻

Blaming lockdown also seems a bit dubious - the baby was stillborn/aborted on the 11 May 2020 and estimated to be 32-34 weeks. So the women would have already been around the 24 week legal limit when lockdown started (and should have been seeking medical care much earlier than this, having conceived around October 2019.)

I'm not sure that she would be allowed to remain in custody of her children regardless.

I'm not sure those children would be best in her care. I wonder what they will think when they learn about what she did to their sibling.

It's seems very arbitrary for a judge to impose significant jail time 'because' she didn't plead guilty earlier. I can understand it where there is a victims family being put through a trial unnecessarily but surely in this case the only person who suffered more through having a trial is the woman herself?

32-34 weeks is basically fully cooked. Very viable outside the womb with NICU support. I gather from the news articles that she shagged someone else then returned to her original partner and found out she was pregnant. Spent 3+ months spinning her wheels in a panic before seizing the chance lockdown provided and lying to obtain the abortion drugs.

Women are oppressed by their reproductive biology. But they can also be shitty, dishonest people. I’m pro choice. But I don’t believe that human life doesn’t matter until it exits the womb. The hard thing is that it does. That’s why society has to try and work out some sort of balance. Killing a healthy 32-34 week old baby because you fucked around is not okay. I think that’s a perfectly reasonable feminist position.

Oh ok. So should we be telling mothers who lose a baby at 34 weeks gestation that it's not a baby but a foetus?

That's what the BBC article implies yes https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-65882169

I totally agree with the sentence, what she did is appalling

You think the judge was cross and that was why they didn't suspend the sentence?

I feel sick. Its so awful on all fronts. I'm mostly angry at those in the nhs who made getting abortion pills so damn easy. She must have been desperate and mentally ill to lie about this, and once she saw the consequences- her own dead child, I can't see how she can cling on to sanity. I think she's been failed by the health care system then failed by the legal system. And her poor dc are being subjected to this ordeal. Who know what it does to their life chances.

Whoever thought making abortion this easy to access was a good idea should be jailed. This scenario is very easy to forsee. That's the problem in this country. Not only are our institutions rotten, lazy and motivated by the financial not the human cost but also there's no accountability.

She'd have got less jail time if she were male if she'd run someone over with her car. Meanwhile rapists go free. Go figure.

Abortion isn't legal at 28 weeks @gogohmm. The legal limit is 24 weeks. So she knew both that she was lying and also that she was significantly over the legal limit and also over the stage at which a baby born can survive independently. If she'd not taken the pills and waited a few more weeks the baby could have been born, given up for adoption (if she wanted) and lived. I'm pro choice for early term abortions but saying that the unborn baby "isn't a human" because it's not yet recognised as such in law seems to me to be missing the point that it's a person capable of life, just a few weeks shy of birth.

Agree that the sentencing does seem harsh but from the article in the BBC it sounds as if you judge was cross that she didn't plead guilty until the 11th hour - says she might have had suspended sentence otherwise. I'd have thought a suspended sentence more appropriate in these circumstances as she's no danger to anyone (unless she gets pregnant again I guess)

I'm so upset about this case. The poor woman. Even if you're against abortion (which I'm not) how can anyone think that taking a mum away from her kids for over 2 years is the right thing to do? It's just awful.

I fully support decriminalisation of abortion.