Oklahoma House Approves Legislation to Protect Pregnant Women

[The Straight Story]

House Approves Legislation to Protect Pregnant Women


OKLAHOMA CITY – Legislation increasing legal protections for pregnant women and their unborn children passed the full House this week.

Senate Bill 1103, by state Sen. Glenn Coffee and state Rep. Mike Thompson, would create the “Use of Force for the Protection of the Unborn Act.”

“Pregnant women who refuse to abort their child are too often attacked by their partner in an effort to force a miscarriage,” said Thompson, R-Oklahoma City. “Women put in this position should have the legal right to defend themselves, with lethal force if necessary.”

Under the bill, a pregnant woman is legally justified in using deadly force if she “reasonably believes” an attacker is “threatening her unborn child” and “use of force or deadly force are immediately necessary to protect her unborn child.”

“Senate Bill 1103, once approved by the governor, will make it crystal clear that women will not be faulted for using lethal force to protect the life of their child in those cases,” Thompson said.


http://www.bixbybulletin.com/articles/2009/04/01/opinion/doc49d3b2f813ba8035371314.txt

[BlooInBloo]

1. That's a novel way to nibble at the edges of banning abortion.

[The Straight Story]

5. yeah, I thought about that when I heard on radio. Or even worse:

Joe blow could kill an abortion doctor and claim he was just doing what the woman was allowed to do, protect the unborn from someone who wanted to kill it.

[Catch22Dem]

2. I don't see anything here

Does this law allow a woman to do anything MORE than they can legally do to defend themselves today?

[The Straight Story]

3. I think, perhaps, it might work like this:

Boyfriend does not want her to have baby, hits her in stomach - I am guessing with this it would be considered attempted murder and should could kill his sorry ass.

[Warpy]

4. Yeah, but forget about defending herself if she isn't preggers, right?

As usual, the woman gets lost while they're protecting the holy fetus.

[The Straight Story]

6. Well, if she would stay barefoot and pregnant and in the kitchen it wouldn't be an issue

:rofl:

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

7. Any assault that would cause a miscarriage would also jeopardize the life of the mom.

She would be justified in using deadly force without this law.

David

[JI7]

8. does a woman have a right to defend herself if she isn't pregnant or wants an abortion and her

partner doesn't want her to ?

[Quantess]

9. Sounds like some high-falutin' bombastic legislation to me.

If the guy's serious, he tends to just murder the pregnant woman and kill two birds with one stone, so to speak. Women are more likely to be murdered when pregnant.

I don't know...does this law have any basis in fact to support this legislation? To me, it sounds like just more anti-choice nonsense.

[earthboundmisfit]

10. Self-defense is already in place for cases like this - even for women in Oklahoma

This is a waste of OK taxpayer money and something to keep Coffee's and Thompson's fundie base happy.
The Bixby Bulletin (down the road just a bit from me) should be flattered to be cited on DU!

[The Straight Story]

11. as an aside

http://www.usnpl.com

A cool site to read all the papers by state, small town to big city.

I love the small town papers :)

[earthboundmisfit]

12. Thanks!

I love it, just used it to visit the papers I grew up reading in little towns in Minnesota & Missouri - happy to see they're still publishing! Thanks again.:yourock:

[The Straight Story]

13. If you find some cool stories make sure you post them :)

I love reading little town papers from places, they have the coolest stories!

[Control-Z]

14. And why wouldn't a non-pregnant woman

have the exact same rights to protect herself? I don't get it. Does it take pregnancy to make a woman valuable? I call BS.

[rebecca_herman]

15. Well the guy who prompted this law was scum

The girlfriend was pregnant with I think triplets or quadruplets? He started beating her up and punching her in the stomach. She stabbed him when he was assaulting her and he died as a result. She also lost the pregnancy. And yet she was freaking convicted of manslaughter. The safety of any woman being beaten violently enough that it could a miscarriage is absolutely at risk and they needed to fix the existing self-defense laws so a lousy, unjust conviction like this could never happen again.