Last month, the city of Edmonton was the scene of two events which have brought the ever-simmering abortion controversy back to a boil.
On March 4, doctors told a 28-year-old woman that she was “lucky to be alive” following an abortion performed on her at Henry Morgentaler’s Edmonton facility.
Nearly ten minutes after her abortion, the woman developed severe stomach pains and was rushed to the hospital from the clinic. Doctors had to remove her uterus, fallopian tubes and ovaries. The hospital also said she suffered severe internal bleeding and “could have died.” Officials wouldn’t comment on the incident until after the pathology report were completed.
The woman has withheld her name from the press claiming that she doesn’t want to be used as a pro-life symbol. However, Brenda McTavish, a family friend, has commented that the family will file a complaint with the Alberta College of Physicians and Surgeons against the Morgentaler facility. She is also considering a lawsuit.
On March 13, an Alberta judge committed a man to stand trial in a charge of attempted murder on a eight-and-a-half-month-old unborn baby. The charge is a result of an Oct. 13, 1992 incident in which Sidney Severeight stabbed Colleen Marsden in the abdomen. The woman later delivered a still-born baby.
Provincial Court Justice P. G. Ketchum, noting the 1991 Supreme Court ruling that the fetus is not a person until it leaves the mother’s body alive (Sullivan vs. Lemay), asked whether this means that the “child (in the womb) is a nothing?”
Severeight’s lawyer will argue that, since the Canadian Criminal Code states that a baby is not considered human until it is born, his client couldn’t possibly murder something that wasn’t human.
Pro-life legal experts do not expect that this case will reap many positive results pr set a landmark precedent. However, they are happy that the spotlight will be on the Sullivan vs. Lemay decision and that the public will be able to view a decision which angers many pro-lifers. Also, they are hoping that the victim of the abortion in Edmonton will sue the clinic and expose the abortion industry’s soiled reputation.
