A Colorado woman could face a prison sentence of more than a century after she was convicted of half-a-dozen felony counts for attacking a pregnant woman and cutting the unborn baby from her womb.
The baby later died.
Dynel Lane of Longmont, Colorado, on Tuesday was found guilty, among other charges, of attempted first-degree murder and unlawful termination of a pregnancy by a jury in Boulder County, according to KDVR-TV in Denver,
The case has highlighted the fight over the rights of the unborn, especially in Colorado, where the law states that personhood begins at birth.
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WND reported several years ago on a case in which a man caused a fatal car crash but had charges against him dismissed because the victim was unborn. Lileigh Lehnen was born during an emergency C-section after the accident, lived several hours and then died of asphyxia. But the judge ruled Colorado law didn't allow Lehnen to be considered either a "person" or a "child" at the time of the crash.
Judge Richard Gurley wrote at the time that for the purposes of homicide law, a "person" means "a human being who had been born and was alive at the time of the homicidal act."
The KDVR report said the 12-person jury in Boulder got the case against Lane Monday and finished deliberations early Tuesday, convicting her of six felonies.
Lane showed no emotion as the verdicts were read.
She had pleaded innocent to charges from the March 18, 2015, attack that killed the unborn daughter, named Aurora, of Michelle Wilkins.
Wilkins had gone to Lane's home in response to a Craigslist ad for baby clothes.
Lane initially had claimed it was Wilkins who had a knife and tried to stab her, but the evidence showed Lane was the attacker.
District Attorney Stan Garnett said the maximum sentence for the charges would be 140 years, but he expects high-end sentencing of 110-120 years when the sentencing hearing is held April 29.
AP reported Lane had tried to convince her friends she was pregnant. She posted social media photos of herself with a distended belly and sent her husband ultrasound pictures.
Wilkins testified she chatted with Lane for about an hour before Lane attacked her. Wilkins hit, pushed and tried to choke her, Lane claimed, then used two kitchen knives to cut the baby from her womb.
The violence of the attack left the Colorado community stunned. But Garnett reported he could not file counts over the death of Aurora since a coroner failed to find evidence she lived outside the womb. The charges were for the injuries to Wilkins, the mother.
As the details emerged, Republicans in the state legislature tried to change state law to allow the filing of murder charges for killing an unborn baby but were turned back by Democrats.
AP reported it was the third time such a proposal failed in Colorado. However, 38 states have made the killing of a fetus a homicide.
Lane's lawyers argued that the attack was impulsive and sought a conviction on attempted manslaughter.
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