Woman Who Stole Mother’s Unborn Baby Can’t Use Abortion as Defense

State   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Sep 12, 2007   |   9:00AM   |   WASHINGTON, DC

Woman Who Stole Mother’s Unborn Baby Can’t Use Abortion as Defense Email this article
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
September 12,
2007

Kansas City, MO (LifeNews.com) — A woman who cut open a pregnant mother’s stomach and stole her unborn child can’t use the landmark Roe v. Wade abortion case as a defense, a judge has ruled. Lawyers for Lisa Montgomery argued the baby was not a person under law and, therefore, she can’t be charged with kidnapping.

Montgomery made national headlines in December 2004 when she strangled Bobbie Jo Stinnett to death and cut open her stomach to steal her unborn child.

Stinnett apparently met and befriended Montgomery through dog shows and Montgomery told her she wanted to buy a dog. But when Montgomery was at Stinnett’s home she strangled the woman with a rope and used a knife to perform a crude Caesarian section.

Once she had the baby, she paraded the infant around as her own.

Judge John Maughmer determined on Monday that Montgomery’s lawyers can’t use the abortion case as a defense to get her kidnapping charges removed.

Chief U.S. District Judge Fernando Gaitan will rule on Maughmer’s decision before Montgomery’s trial begins in October.

Before the alleged murder, Montgomery was married and had children of her own.

Her family discussed the case with ABC’s "Good Morning America" in June 2006 and said their mother brandished a sonogram of an unborn child she claimed was her own. Later they found out the image was printed from the Internet.

"She had a picture of the ultrasound. I thought it was hers, of course. They told me she had just gotten it off the Internet," Carl James Boman, Montgomery’s son, told ABC News.

Kayla Boman, Montgomery’s daughter, told the television program her mother completely deceived her.

"I guess you could say I never had doubt. My mom is the one who did it, but it’s hard to believe, you know? There I was the whole day at school looking at my little sister, and the next thing I know I’m hearing she’s not really my little sister," she said.

Montgomery’s children saw the newborn baby for the first time when she showed the child off at a store parking lot, just hours after Stinnett was killed.

"She was definitely glowing, happy right then. I think she was proud of ‘her’ baby," Carl James Boman told ABC News.

The next day, Montgomery was charged with murder. The baby now lives with her father and is in healthy condition.