In the first application of its unborn victims law, the state of New Hampshire has filed double murder charges against a man who killed a pregnant mom and her unborn baby.
William Kelly, 28, appeared in Carroll County Superior Court in Ossipee with his lawyer, Caroline Smith. He did not address the judge. Smith said she planned to file paperwork that Kelly was waiving his arraignment and pleading not guilty. An email seeking comment was left for Smith.
Deputy Chief Medical Examiner Mitchell Weinberg determined that Christine Falzone, 33, was about 35 to 37 weeks pregnant at the time of her death in December.
The Legislature passed a bill in 2017 that defines a fetus at 20 weeks of development and beyond as a person for purposes of criminal prosecution of murder. Republican Gov. Chris Sununu signed the bill into law. It took effect in 2018.
Kelly’s case is the first time the state had charged someone with murder in the death of a fetus, said Michael Garrity, a spokesperson for the attorney general’s office.
Kelly was indicted by a Carroll County grand jury on Friday on two counts of second-degree murder. He recklessly caused the deaths of Falzone and her fetus, according to the indictment.
REACH PRO-LIFE PEOPLE WORLDWIDE! Advertise with LifeNews to reach hundreds of thousands of pro-life readers every week. Contact us today.
Even aside from abortion, violence against unborn babies and pregnant mothers is pervasive. Homicide is one of the top causes of death among pregnant women, according to a 2021 study in the journal “Obstetrics & Gynecology.” In some cases, the violence is directly related to the pregnancy. LifeNews has documented numerous crime stories in which pregnant women were abused or killed because they refused their partner’s demands to abort their unborn baby.
Sadly, many Democrat-run states provide no justice for women and unborn babies killed outside of abortion. Democrat-controlled states, including New York and Colorado, refuse to provide justice for unborn victims of crimes because such laws may interfere with their pro-abortion agenda.
New York lawmakers repealed their fetal homicide law in 2019 as part of a larger pro-abortion bill. Just a few weeks later, a pregnant woman was stabbed in Queens, killing her and her five-month unborn baby.
Police said the attacker targeted Jennifer Irigoyen’s torso, possibly in a direct attempt to kill her unborn baby. However, authorities said they were forced to drop charges related to the unborn baby’s death because of the legislature’s action.
In Colorado, where abortions are legal for any reason up to birth, state lawmakers also refused to enact protections for unborn babies – even after a brutal 2015 crime in which a woman cut a seven-month unborn baby girl out of her mother’s womb.
Illinois also repealed its fetal homicide law in 2019.
Most states do provide justice to unborn victims of violence in at least some circumstances. Now that Roe v. Wade is gone, 15 states protect unborn babies by banning or strictly limiting elective abortions, and more are fighting in court to do the same.
Other states allow the “choice” to violently end an unborn baby’s life in an abortion, but do provide legal exceptions when the violence is not a choice by the mother.
More than 30 states allow charges to be filed against defendants who injure or kill unborn babies in criminal acts, according to the National Right to Life Committee. The federal Unborn Victims of Violence Act, enacted in 2004, also provides justice to unborn victims of federal and military crimes.
The post Man Faces Two Murder Charges for Killing Pregnant Mom and Her Unborn Baby appeared first on LifeNews.com.
Click this link for the original source of this article.
Author: Steven Ertelt
This content is courtesy of, and owned and copyrighted by, https://www.lifenews.com and its author. This content is made available by use of the public RSS feed offered by the host site and is used for educational purposes only. If you are the author or represent the host site and would like this content removed now and in the future, please contact USSANews.com using the email address in the Contact page found in the website menu.