A Maui man recently was found guilty of murdering his pregnant ex-girlfriend after he allegedly pressured her to have an abortion.
The Daily Mail reports Steven Capobianco is charged with killing Carly “Charli” Scott, 24, in February 2014 when she was five months pregnant with their unborn child. The reports do not mention whether he also was charged in their unborn child’s death.
On Wednesday, a jury in Wailuku, Maui found Capobianco guilty of second-degree murder and arson after prosecutors say he set fire to Scott’s vehicle to attempt to cover up the murder.
Scott’s family said she vanished in early February 2014. Later, authorities discovered her burned-out vehicle, bloody clothes and remains in a wooded area off a local highway, according to the report. Prosecutors said the marks on her remains indicated she was attacked with a sharp object.
Authorities believed Scott’s pregnancy may have been related to her death. She and Capobianco had recently broken up, and Capobianco had another girlfriend when he found out Scott was pregnant, the report states.
Here’s more from the Daily Mail:
Scott decided to continue with the pregnancy even though Capobianco insisted on an abortion, [Prosecuting Attorney Robert] Rivera said.
In an early interview with detectives, Capobianco said about the pregnancy, ‘Admittedly, I’m not thrilled about having a child. It’s not what I was planning on doing at 24 … I’m a single, 24-year-old male who has a dog and I can barely keep me and my dog… I mean like yeah, we eat pretty well, but it’s like I have a dollar in my pocket right now until my next paycheck. I don’t have any spare cash for a child.’
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But he claimed he saw how happy it made her and then was ‘all for it,’ according to KHON. He even claimed his new girlfriend, Cassie, was fine with the baby news and willing to try to make things work.
Capobianco told police he asked Scott to “consider” an abortion but did not insist, KHON reports. He claimed he warmed up to the idea and eventually was “all for” having a baby.
Capobianco was determined to have been the last person to see Scott alive on Feb. 9; and her family reported her missing the next day, Maui Now reports. Police also reported seeing burn marks on his hands when they interviewed him soon after Scott’s death.
Pregnant women face high levels of domestic violence. One in six women is first abused during pregnancy, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Sometimes the abuse occurs after the woman refuses her partner’s demands to have an abortion, as it did with a Pennsylvania case in 2015.
In June, LifeNews reported another gruesome case involving a North Carolina woman who allegedly was murdered by her boyfriend after refusing to abort their child.
And in March, a Brooklyn, New York man was sentenced to 32 years in prison for a similar case. A jury found Torey Branch, 35, guilty of abortion, burglary and assault for beating his pregnant girlfriend and causing the death of their unborn child, LifeNews reported.
