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For Immediate Release (Ottawa) – MP Ken Epp released today a report refuting claims made by opponents of Bill C-484 that his Private Members Bill would result in pregnant women being prosecuted for engaging in behaviours that harm their unborn children. (See full report here) “Opponents of Bill C-484 cannot find any legitimate reason to oppose this Bill, so they are attempting to discredit the Bill by making alarmist and misleading claims about supposedly similar laws in the US being used against pregnant women,” Mr. Epp said. Mr. Epp was referring to research conducted by the US-based National Advocates for Pregnant Women, and cited by the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada and others, which attempts to portray “unborn victims of violence” laws in the US as being responsible for the “policing” and “punishing” of hundreds of pregnant women for behaviours that harm their fetuses. “I have studied the research from the National Advocates for Pregnant Women and its relevance to C-484 and have discovered that the alarmist claims are without foundation and do not apply to the proposed amendment of the Criminal Code contained in Bill C-484,” said Mr. Epp. A vast majority of the cases cited by NAPW do not involve “fetal homicide”/ “unborn victims of violence” laws, but rather child abuse and endangerment laws. In all cases, except in South Carolina, the charges were eventually dropped. Only South Carolina has upheld convictions of women under child abuse and endangerment laws, citing South Carolina’s unique judicially enacted “fetal homicide” law of 1984 as a precedent. But C-484 is very different from South Carolina’s judge-made fetal homicide law and the child abuse/endangerment laws. “Comparing the US cases referenced by NAPW to C-484 in the Canadian context is to compare apples and oranges,” said Mr. Epp. “C-484 creates an offence only in the commission of an offence against the pregnant woman, and for greater certainty, it explicitly excludes acts or omissions by the woman. This is unlike most of the laws referenced in NAPW’s legal research.” Mr. Epp added, “Such alarmist claims provide only a smoke-screen in an effort to take the focus off of what Bill C-484 is really about—protecting pregnant women and their unborn children from third-party attacks and to hold accountable anyone who would harm or kill her baby against her will. By painting an alarming picture of the US situation and analogizing it to Canada, these organizations seek to instill an irrational fear that C-484 will be used against pregnant women in Canada, when C-484 goes to clear and stated effort to ensure that the choice of pregnant women will be respected,” he said. “The onus is on those who claim that C-484 will be used to ‘police’ and ‘punish’ pregnant women to prove how. Given they are unable to do this, then intellectual honesty and integrity demand that they put an immediate end to their campaign of fear,” Mr. Epp concluded. -30- Bill C-484 can be viewed here. |
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