Pennsylvania Teen Pleads Guilty to Spiking Girlfriend’s Drink to Cause Abortion
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
September 23, 2009
Hollidaysburg, PA (LifeNews.com) — A teenager in Pennsylvania has entered a guilty plea in a case where he is accused of an attempted forced abortion where is tried to spike his girlfriend’s drink. The unnamed teen laced the drink with a drug normally used to abort pregnancies in cows that appears to have been stolen.
He tainted the girls’ drink on March 31 at Williamsburg High School and authorities considered the crime an aggravated assault against both the girl and her unborn child
The teen entered the guilty plea yesterday in juvenile court to charges of attempted third-degree murder and aggravated assault.
District Attorney Richard A. Consiglio told the court he wants the 17-year-old boy to be kept under court supervision until he reaches the age of 21.
We consider this a terrible, terrible crime," Assistant District Attorney Derek Elensky said, according to the Altoona Mirror.
Theodore Krol, the boy’s attorney, said he opposed the stiff punishment because juvenile court is meant to rehabilitate rather than punish young criminals.
He admitted that the teenager was unsure what to do when he found out his girlfriend was pregnant and his friends gave him the idea of stealing the bovine drug to use in an attempt to force the young woman to have an abortion.
The newspaper said Blair County President Judge Jolene G. Kopriva wants to determine whether this was a one-time mistake of the teenage boy has other problems.
"The question is why, and what can we do so these things don’t happen again," Kopriva said during the hearing.
The boy’s friend also entered a guilty plea to charges of aggravated assault and will spend 45 days in a home for boys.
The victim wrote a statement that was read during the hearing and she said she was worried for her baby when she found out she drank a poisoned drink.
"How could someone do something so cruel against an unborn baby?" she asked, according to the newspaper.
The girl said her baby is now 1 and healthy.
The crime brings to mind the increasing phenomenon of attacks on pregnant women and their unborn children that first captured the nation’s attention with the deaths of Laci and Conner Peterson.
Pennsylvania is one of 36 states with an unborn victims law promoted by pro-life groups that provides both protection and justice for unborn children. The laws allow prosecutors to bring forth charges for the death of or injury to both mother and unborn baby.
Some 25 states, including Pennsylvania, offer that protection and justice throughout pregnancy.
A 1997 Pennsylvania law indicates a criminal commits criminal homicide in the first, second, or third-degree, or voluntary manslaughter of an "unborn child" if the individual intentionally, knowingly, recklessly or negligently causes the death of an unborn child.
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