Poll of the Day > Democrat demands RELEASE of PREGNANT Girl whose Unborn Child Died of METH!!!

(+) Yeah! (+)

California Democratic D.A Xavier Becerra, the most senior legal official has thrown his support behind 26 y/o Chelsea Becker, the mother charged with MURDER of her STILLBORN baby boy who was found to have METH in his system!!

He has filed an amicus brief in support of the mother who delivered her dead child on September 2019 as she has been in prison since November 2019

She's been trying to get the charges against her dismissed and he has backed her efforts and is encouraging the Fifth Court of Appeals to dismiss the case on procedural grounds and have the charges thrown out

She took her case to the Supreme Court where they rejected the appeal to have the case thrown out

Becerra says "In the AG's view as set out in full in the amicus brief filled in the court of appeal, when the Legislature amended the Penal Code to include the death of a fetus, it did not intend to sweep in a woman's own actions that might result in a miscarriage or stillbirth. We believe the law was misapplied and misinterpreted. The Penal Code was intended to protect pregnant women from harm not charge them with murder. Our laws in California do not convict women who sufer the loss of their pregnancy. We will work to end the prosecution and imprisonment of Ms Becker so we can focus on applying this law to those who put the lives of pregnant women in danger"

Jennifer Chou of the ACLU tells dailymail that this cases raises very serious issues

On the day of the baby's death, they ruled it as suspicious and then said it was homicide due to toxic levels of meth and police were later contacted who arrested the mother as well as had her multiple children removed from her custody.

Lynn Paltrow, an executive director for advocates of Pregnant Women calls the charges outrageous

Her case has gained the support of medical and civil rights organizations with 15 groups calling for the dismissal of the charge

Do you think this is murder?

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What determines if you ask us a moral question vs. a "is she hot" question?

If the meth was deliberately used for the purpose of terminating her pregnancy (say for example, if investigations found that she had recently made Google searches on how to use drugs to kill an unborn baby), then yes. Under any other circumstances, no.

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If she wouldn't be charged with murder for getting an abortion, then even if we presume that she took the meth solely for the purpose of killing her child, she shouldn't be charged with murder. If we don't make that assumption (which is a rather outlandish assumption), then there's really no basis to charge her with murder in the first place. Possibly manslaughter or something related, but a murder conviction requires intent.

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You are basically dancing with the devil if you decide to impose your unsafe habits on an unborn child. She's surprised it died? I thought it was well known in practice that if you can't or don't take the option to abort, the next best step is take a lot of drugs and that's exactly what's gonna happen.

Or the baby lives anyway and you suck because you screwed up its development.

I think its safe to say the baby became familiar with hearing a lot more voices than it's own mother

I'd like to know what "toxic levels" are, meaning did it die over periods of whatever amount her regular use was, and she's an idiot, or she decided to overdose (which would imply intention to terminate the child).

Cause they make it seem like an accident, when either way, it was her fault

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Shadowbird_RH posted...

Under any other circumstances, no.

Negligent homicide? Or whatever the term is I am looking for...

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Intent that would have been proven by evidence that she used the meth with the intent of killing her unborn baby.
That aside, I agree with the part about if abortion was legally valid, then pregnancy termination by other means is equally valid, so timeframe is important here. If the fetus died or was terminally damaged prior to the cut-off point (ideally not as determined by the "heart beat law"), then no foul play should be ruled.

Nichtcrawler X posted...

Negligent homicide? Or whatever the term is I am looking for...

If past the abortion cut-off point, that'd be the most that could reasonably be charged, but that's still a bit short of murder.

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Not murder but she should definitely be charged with something.
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I doubt she did it with the intent to kill the baby, but even if she did, good luck proving it since she wouldn't admit to it (lack of accountability and all that).

She does need to be made an example of and be held accountable, but I doubt society will do that due to... obvious reasons.

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Full Throttle posted...

Lynn Paltrow, an executive director for advocates of Pregnant Women calls the charges outrageous

I find it outrageous that an executive director of an advocacy group for pregnant women would defend a woman who chose to do meth while pregnant.

I'm not sure this was "murder", but it's definitely negligent behaviour and there should be a penalty for it. This is pathetic.

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This isn't murder no.

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Defeating natural selection was a self-inflicted gunshot wound on humanity's part.

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adjl posted...

If she wouldn't be charged with murder for getting an abortion, then even if we presume that she took the meth solely for the purpose of killing her child, she shouldn't be charged with murder.

...what? I completely disagree with that. If legal, medical abortions are available, she has no excuse to "wire hanger" her fetus away.

If we don't make that assumption (which is a rather outlandish assumption), then there's really no basis to charge her with murder in the first place. Possibly manslaughter or something related, but a murder conviction requires intent.

I agree w/ this, though. Seems much more like a manslaughter charge than murder, or at least way easier to prove.

In any case, there were only 2 options in the poll so I said yes. Would've rather said, "she's guilty, but of manslaughter" but oh well.

Full Throttle posted...

Becerra says "In the AG's view as set out in full in the amicus brief filled in the court of appeal, when the Legislature amended the Penal Code to include the death of a fetus, it did not intend to sweep in a woman's own actions that might result in a miscarriage or stillbirth. We believe the law was misapplied and misinterpreted. The Penal Code was intended to protect pregnant women from harm not charge them with murder. Our laws in California do not convict women who sufer the loss of their pregnancy. We will work to end the prosecution and imprisonment of Ms Becker so we can focus on applying this law to those who put the lives of pregnant women in danger"

Then get rid of the law? Can't have it both ways. She pretty directly did something reckless that resulted in the death of her child. And comparing this to other miscarriages is an insult to expectant mothers who didn't deliberately engage in reckless behavior. Granted, you might be better off putting her in rehab rather than prison.

Full Throttle posted...

On the day of the baby's death, they ruled it as suspicious and then said it was homicide due to toxic levels of meth and police were later contacted who arrested the mother as well as had her multiple children removed from her custody.

Yeah, if the mother is doing meth, you should probably remove the kids from her custody.

Full Throttle posted...

Do you think this is murder?

Manslaughter, maybe. I guess you could make a callous indifference argument, though.

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Not murder

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I have mixed feelings here.

Oh cool. One of my arguments for not all people deserve to be parents manifested itself in this woman.

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keep her locked up

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A terrible person doing terrible things proving they would be terrible at parenting, at best, gets no sympathy from me when it comes to consequences. Let time be served, and lessons learned here.

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streamofthesky posted...

...what? I completely disagree with that. If legal, medical abortions are available, she has no excuse to "wire hanger" her fetus away.

I figure the outcome's the same. If she wants to take an approach that has greater risk to her because reasons, that's her choice, but treating deliberately killing the fetus with meth as murder while deliberately killing the same fetus in a medical setting would be completely legal seems like a weird, pointless double standard to me.

Zeus posted...

She pretty directly did something reckless that resulted in the death of her child. And comparing this to other miscarriages is an insult to expectant mothers who didn't deliberately engage in reckless behavior.

That's a tricky line to draw. Doing meth is pretty clearly on the "unreasonably reckless" side of said line, wherever it does get drawn, but I'm always very wary of saying "you did something stupid, you deserved to lose your pregnancy." Taken to extremes, that can be applied to every woman that doesn't spend the whole pregnancy on bed rest while eating a diet and supplement regimen strictly dictated by an obstetrician. Do we berate a pregnant woman who chooses to take the stairs instead of the elevator when she falls down those stairs? Do we berate a pregnant woman who chooses to eat a bunch of eggs instead of taking Vitamin K supplements for losing a baby to neural tube defects?

Again, taking drugs and alcohol while pregnant are pretty clearly bad ideas and really not moral grey areas of reckless behaviour, but in general I try to avoid making myself arbiter of what would constitute appropriate caution while pregnant. It's really just not my place to dictate how upset somebody should be by a miscarriage. Given the addictive nature of drugs/alcohol, I also hesitate to criticize their use as a "reckless decision" because it's very often not a fully voluntary decision. I doubt this was a matter of "hey, I'm gonna try out meth today even though I'm pregnant" so much as it was feeling the need for a hit of meth due to an addiction that predated her pregnancy.

Zeus posted...

Granted, you might be better off putting her in rehab rather than prison.

Indeed. This is actually making me think that supplying birth control as part of rehab programs might not be a bad idea. It skirts with eugenics (in that it's deliberately reducing the reproductive success of a certain population), but it would help avoid fetal deaths stemming from drug addiction.

Zeus posted...

Yeah, if the mother is doing meth, you should probably remove the kids from her custody.

That, I can agree with. Meth and parenting don't really mix.

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adjl posted...

I figure the outcome's the same. If she wants to take an approach that has greater risk to her because reasons, that's her choice, but treating deliberately killing the fetus with meth as murder while deliberately killing the same fetus in a medical setting would be completely legal seems like a weird, pointless double standard to me.

Part of it would be to discourage the unsafe attempted abortions over the safe medical options, the same way anything defined as a crime is at least partly done so in order to dissuade people from doing it.

I'm not an expert so maybe it's not possible, but I would think doing some sort of "backyard abortion" also has a chance of...botching it.... and leaving the fetus in some horrific "still there but fucked up" state and thus way less humane. Nevermind the potential for the pregnant woman to inadvertently hurt herself.

Making these unprofessional abortions completely pointless is one of the biggest benefits of having widely available legal medical options. Specifically because we DON'T want women resorting to wire hangers, drug overdoses, etc...

streamofthesky posted...

Part of it would be to discourage the unsafe attempted abortions over the safe medical options, the same way anything defined as a crime is at least partly done so in order to dissuade people from doing it.

I'm not an expert so maybe it's not possible, but I would think doing some sort of "backyard abortion" also has a chance of...botching it.... and leaving the fetus in some horrific "still there but fucked up" state and thus way less humane. Never mind the potential for the pregnant woman to inadvertently hurt herself.

Making these unprofessional abortions completely pointless is one of the biggest benefits of having widely available legal medical options. Specifically because we DON'T want women resorting to wire hangers, drug overdoses, etc...
It's not about whether women get an abortion or not. It's whether they get safe and humane abortions or not. I can totally understand and support laws against the unsafe unprofessional attempts if the medical options are legal and available, because not wanting women to engage in those actions is one of the main reasons abortion is legal in the first place.

I agree with laws prohibiting people from offering the service of such unsafe procedures (and, in turn, with improving access to safe ones to discourage the use of unsafe practices), but I'm not altogether convinced that it's reasonable to punish people who choose to perform them on themselves. Legislating against competent personal risk-taking is generally at odds with the notion of respecting personal agency and whatnot: if they want to take that risk for themselves, they should be free to. As you say, though, that's complicated by the risk of failing to properly abort the pregnancy and causing damage to the child once it's born, since it's not just personal risk being considered.

By all means, unsafe "backyard" abortion methods should definitely be discouraged to facilitate informed decision making, and proper ones made accessible enough to give women that alternative. I agree there. I'm just not sure calling it murder to perform such a procedure on oneself is reasonable.

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adjl posted...

By all means, unsafe "backyard" abortion methods should definitely be discouraged to facilitate informed decision making, and proper ones made accessible enough to give women that alternative. I agree there. I'm just not sure calling it murder to perform such a procedure on oneself is reasonable.

Downing a shit load of meth while pregnant I would think falls into the "unsafe" / "backyard" category.
Again, I agree murder seems too harsh, but manslaughter or something for sure.

But the way duckbear sets up his post, a No vote comes across like you think she's innocent in this, and I absolutely do not think that. She deserves some jail time.

Not explicitly murder but no way she should get off scottfree for this reckless behavior

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adjl posted...

I figure the outcome's the same. If she wants to take an approach that has greater risk to her because reasons, that's her choice, but treating deliberately killing the fetus with meth as murder while deliberately killing the same fetus in a medical setting would be completely legal seems like a weird, pointless double standard to me.

And yet we have similar sanctions on other things where the steps to get to an outcome can be either legal or illegal. That's not really an excuse.

adjl posted...

That's a tricky line to draw. Doing meth is pretty clearly on the "unreasonably reckless" side of said line, wherever it does get drawn, but I'm always very wary of saying "you did something stupid, you deserved to lose your pregnancy." Taken to extremes, that can be applied to every woman that doesn't spend the whole pregnancy on bed rest while eating a diet and supplement regimen strictly dictated by an obstetrician. Do we berate a pregnant woman who chooses to take the stairs instead of the elevator when she falls down those stairs? Do we berate a pregnant woman who chooses to eat a bunch of eggs instead of taking Vitamin K supplements for losing a baby to neural tube defects?

Again, taking drugs and alcohol while pregnant are pretty clearly bad ideas and really not moral grey areas of reckless behaviour, but in general I try to avoid making myself arbiter of what would constitute appropriate caution while pregnant. It's really just not my place to dictate how upset somebody should be by a miscarriage. Given the addictive nature of drugs/alcohol, I also hesitate to criticize their use as a "reckless decision" because it's very often not a fully voluntary decision. I doubt this was a matter of "hey, I'm gonna try out meth today even though I'm pregnant" so much as it was feeling the need for a hit of meth due to an addiction that predated her pregnancy.

Again, you're falsely equivocating and slippery sloping. And while the nature of addiction certainly should factor into the punishment (which would partly or largely include rehab), do you feel that addiction excuses all behaviors resulting from the addiction? If somebody is addicted to pain pills, does their decision to rob a home get attributed to the addiction and absolve them of any personal accountability beyond that? And should alcohol-related crashes killing another motorist be treated less severely than other fatal crashes because the DUI motorist has substance abuse issues? And do you generally accept the excuse "I was drunk" or "I was high" for bad behavior? It may be a "tricky line," but clearly it has to be drawn somewhere.

And as much as I'm in favor of treating the addiction rather than simply punishing a person, we're often talking about somebody who chose to take an illegal substance which, for the most part, is illegal precisely because of problems like these.

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its her right to do meth people shouldnt be telling her what she should and shouldnt do with her body

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but her unborn child can't die it wasnt living from the start so how can it die

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Zeus posted...

And yet we have similar sanctions on other things where the steps to get to an outcome can be either legal or illegal.

Such as?

Zeus posted...

And while the nature of addiction certainly should factor into the punishment (which would partly or largely include rehab), do you feel that addiction excuses all behaviors resulting from the addiction?

Of course not. It does, however, excuse using the drug to which one is addicted, which is precisely what happened here (presuming, again, that taking meth was a matter of addiction and not a deliberate home abortion attempt).

I hope you can appreciate the irony of starting that paragraph of by accusing me of slippery sloping/false equivocation, then spending the rest of it engaging in identically fallacious behaviour yourself. That's not to say that's a wrong approach to take to discussing this matter, since neither of us are actually slippery sloping so much as we are presenting examples of similar applications of the logic that highlight the need to draw a line somewhere, but it's really quite striking how abruptly you transitioned into doing exactly what you criticized me for.

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methheads, don't feel bad for them

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She deserves jail time and rehab.

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