Fetal abduction

Fetal abduction refers to the rare crime of child abduction by murder of an at term pregnant mother and extraction of her fetus through a crude cesarean section.[1] In the small number of reported cases, few pregnant victims and about half of their fetuses survived the assault and non-medically performed cesarean.

Fetal abduction does not refer to medically induced labor or obstetrical extraction. The definition of the subject does not include compulsory cesarean sections[2] for medical reasons nor child removal from parents for court-approved child protection. However, the "Children of the Disappeared" (desaparecidos) in the Argentine Dirty War are an example of criminal fetal abduction in state institutions as detailed by testimonies on cesarean delivery on desaparecidas and child adoption in a military hospital.[3][4] Historical atrocities of cesarean extraction for fetal murder (not for child adoption) fall outside the subject definition.[5]

Abductor profile

Fetal abduction is usually perpetrated by a woman after organized planning. The abductor may befriend the pregnant victim. The abductor is so determined to impersonate a pregnant and puerperal mother that she may use weight gain and a prosthesis to fake a pregnancy and cut herself internally to make it look as if she has given birth. She may take the neonate to a hospital. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s spokesperson, Cathy Nahirny, stated in 2007, “Many times the abductor fakes a pregnancy and when it is time to deliver the baby, must abduct someone else's child”.[6] Criminal motives include delusions of fulfilling a partner relationship, child-bearing and childbirth.[7][8][9][10]

Statistics

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children recorded 18 cases of fetal abductions in the United States between 1983 and 2015, which represented 6% of the recorded 302 cases of infant abduction.[1]

"Womb raiding" and "cesarean or in utero kidnapping" are media terms for fetal abduction.[11]

List of reported cases and attempts

Of the current list of 25 reported cases (not including attempts), 4 of the mothers and 13 of their fetuses survived. (This list distinguishes an attempted fetal abduction as without either murder of the mother or extraction of the fetus. An attempt can include severe injury to the mother and fetus.)

Fetal abduction cases

1974

  • In Philadelphia in November 1974, a 36-year-old woman named Winifred Ransom hacked and shot to death 26-year-old Margaret Sweeney. Sweeney was 8 months pregnant at the time. After first knocking Sweeney unconscious, Ransom cut the fetus out of Sweeney with a butcher knife. Sweeney regained consciousness during the operation, at which point Ransom struck her with a hatchet at least 20 times and then shot her 3 times. Ransom buried Sweeney beneath the floorboards of her kitchen. Ransom's husband eventually alerted authorities roughly 3 days later. Police found the body November 16. The baby girl survived and was cared for by her grandfather. Ransom was acquitted on the grounds of insanity. She was released from Byberry State Hospital mental institution after 20 months.[12]

1987

1995

  • In Addison, Illinois Deborah Evans was murdered in her apartment. Jacqueline Williams, her boyfriend Fedell Caffey and her cousin Lavern Ward went into Evans' home and shot her in the head. She had three children and was pregnant with a fourth. Two of Evans' children were murdered along with their mother. Evans' murderers then proceeded to cut through her womb with scissors and remove the fetus. One of the children, a baby boy, survived, as did the fetus. The three murderers were caught and sentenced to life in prison.[15][16][17]

1996

  • In Tuscaloosa, Alabama, seventeen-year-old Carethia Curry was murdered by her friend, 29-year-old Felicia Scott. Curry was abducted by her friend on a night out. She was found three months later, stuffed in a garbage can at the bottom of a fifty-foot ravine with several gunshot wounds to the head, her torso sliced open. The baby girl Curry was carrying survived, and Scott was jailed for life.[18][19][20]

1998

  • In Fresno, California, Margarita Flores was eight months pregnant when she received a phone call from Josephina Saldana, who offered her gifts of baby furniture and a free one-year supply of diapers. Flores went to a warehouse to collect them and was murdered. Saldana was caught at a hospital the day afterwards carrying a dead fetus that she claimed to have just given birth to. Saldana committed suicide three days after her conviction for kidnapping and murdering Flores and her unborn child and three weeks before her sentencing to life imprisonment.[21][22]

2000

  • In Ravenna, Ohio Teresa Andrews was twenty-three years old and pregnant when she ran into Michelle Bica. Bica was thirty-nine-years-old and was pretending to be pregnant at the time, and the two exchanged addresses. Then Bica started stalking Andrews. On September 27, 2000, Bica invited the woman to her home, then killed her, extracted the fetus she was carrying, and buried the woman in her garage. The baby survived, and Bica claimed he was her son. When Bica was being investigated by the FBI, she became fearful of punishment for her crime and shot herself.[23][24]

2003

  • In Okemah, Oklahoma Carolyn Simpson was twenty-one years old and six months pregnant when she was shot and killed. She worked at a casino, where her murderer, Effie Goodson, age thirty-seven, was a regular customer. Goodson offered to give Simpson a ride home, and Simpson was later found in a ditch two miles away from her abductor. The baby, removed from the mother’s womb three months premature, did not survive. When Goodson brought the fetus to the hospital, the child was pronounced dead, and it was discovered that she was not the mother. Goodson was found unable to stand for a trial, and three years later was sentenced to life in prison.[25][26][27]

2004

  • In Girardot (Cundinamarca), Colombia in April 2004 a case was reported in which both the mother and child survived. (Aseneth Piedrahita drugged Sol Angela Cartagena Bernal and extracted her fetus. Reportedly the perpetrator had medical knowledge.)[28][29]
  • In Skidmore, Missouri Bobbie Jo Stinnett died of strangulation at the age of twenty-three at the hands of thirty-seven-year-old Lisa M. Montgomery. The two had been in contact previously; they were both rat terrier breeders in a dog show circuit. Montgomery had even e-mailed the victim, telling her that she wished to purchase one of her dogs. Montgomery faked a pregnancy, and on December 16, she drove from her Kansas home to Skidmore, Missouri. After strangling Stinnett to death, Montgomery cut open her abdomen and took her one-month-premature daughter. An hour later, the victim’s mother found her body, and less than twenty-four hours later Victoria Jo Stinnett, the victim’s stolen fetus, was found healthy in Melvern, Kansas. Lisa Montgomery was incarcerated, and a jury subsequently sentenced Montgomery, 43, to death.[30][31][32]

2006

  • In East St. Louis, Illinois on September 15, 2006, the pregnant Jimella Tunstall was murdered by her childhood friend Tiffany Hall. She was knocked unconscious and her unborn baby was cut from her abdomen with a pair of scissors. Neither survived the attack. Tunstall's body was left in a vacant lot. Hall also drowned Tunstall's three children, ages one, two, and seven, and left their bodies in the washer and dryer machines in the family’s apartment. Hall was sentenced to life in prison in June 2008.[33][34]

2008

  • In Kennewick, Washington Araceli Camacho Gomez, age twenty-seven, was stabbed to death by twenty-three-year-old Phiengchai Sisouvanh Synhavong. Gomez’s hands and feet were bound with yarn throughout the attack, and her fetus was cut from her womb with a box cutter. The child survived the vicious attack. Synhavong called the police for help and attempted to pass the fetus off as her own. It quickly became apparent to authorities that she was lying and guilty of the crime.[35] Synhavong was sentenced in 2010 to life in prison without parole.
  • In Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania pregnant eighteen-year-old Kia Johnson was murdered during a fetal abduction by Andrea Curry-Demus, who had previously spent eight years in prison for stabbing another expectant mother to obtain her unborn baby. Curry-Demus had also seized a child from a hospital. Johnson’s body was later found in Curry-Demus’s apartment. The baby survived.[36][37]

2009

  • In Worcester, Massachusetts, Julie A. Corey, 35, murdered Darlene Haynes, 23, and extracted her fetus. The baby, Sheila Marie survived.[38][39] Corey was convicted by jury and sentenced to life imprisonment in February 2014.[40]

2011

  • In Bowling Green, Kentucky, Kathy Coy cut out Jamie Stice's fetus and left Stice to bleed to death on a rural road. Coy initially claimed she'd given birth to the baby five weeks premature, but doctors determined that the baby wasn't hers. Police found that Coy was friends on Facebook with Stice and another pregnant woman. The other woman was unharmed, but police grew suspicious when they couldn't find Stice. After intense questioning, Coy led police to Stice's body.[41] Coy pleaded guilty but mentally ill to avoid the death penalty.[42] In March 2012, she was sentenced to life imprisonment.[43]
  • In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Annette Morales-Rodriguez allegedly kidnapped Martiza Ramirez-Cruz, beat her to death and cut her fetus out of the womb. The fetus was just days away from being due. According to a criminal complaint, Morales-Rodriguez called police hours later to report that she'd just given birth in her shower and the baby wasn't breathing. The fetus was pronounced dead, and an autopsy determined the baby did not belong to Morales-Rodriguez.[44][45]
  • In Oakdale, Louisiana, Pamela Causey-Fregia allegedly killed pregnant Victoria Marie Perez with blunt force trauma. Causey tried to convince her husband, who was leaving her, that she was pregnant, despite her family believing she had a hysterectomy. She reportedly burned the body and buried it on her property. Causey's young children witnessed the alleged murder and alerted police in 2015.[46]

2013

  • In Mogale City, South Africa in January 2013, Loretta Cooke extracted the fetus of Valencia Behrens. The mother was found dead, the fetus survived.[47]
  • In Johannesburg, South Africa on July 31, 2013, Zandile Makulana extracted Pretty Tsanga's fetus. Neither the mother nor her fetus survived.[47]

2015

  • In Longmont, Colorado, 34-year-old Dynel Lane posted a Craigslist ad advertising baby clothes for sale. When the seven months pregnant 26-year-old Michelle Wilkins responded to the ad, Lane beat and stabbed her before removing the fetus from her body. According to police reports, Lane's husband had come home and she had claimed to have had a miscarriage. Her husband had found the baby in the bath tub and rolled it over and saw it gasping for air; he then took both Lane and the baby to the hospital. The baby was actually dead or died within minutes. Wilkins survived the attack and while in Lane's basement she was able to lock the door, call 911, and get medical assistance.[48] On April 29, 2016 Lane was sentenced to 100 years imprisonment. According to Colorado law, no homicide charge was brought as the mother survived and the neonate was found to have been not viable.[49] The 14 September 2015 episode of the Dr. Phil (TV series) interview of Michelle details Michelle's story as of then.
  • In Bronx, New York City, Ashleigh Wade, 22, was accused of killing Angelikque Sutton, 22, and taking her baby who survived.[1]

2017

  • In Fargo, North Dakota, William Hoehn (32 years old) and Brooke Crews (38) were charged on August 28, 2017 with conspiring to kidnap and murder pregnant Savanna Greywind (22) and to kidnap her baby. Greywind's body was found in the river 8 days after she disappeared on August 19. The newborn survived. Crews pled guilty and said Greywind was still alive when she performed the cesarean on her. [50]

Fetal abduction attempts

2009

  • In Washington, DC in December 2009, Teka Adams, 29 years old, homeless and nine months pregnant, was abducted by acquaintance Veronica Deramous, aged 40. Deramous enlisted the help of her seventeen-year-old son to tie up Adams and hold her captive for four days. During those four days, Deramous unsuccessfully attempted to extract the fetus. Adams was able to escape, barely clinging to life and severely injured. A neighbor called 911, and both Adams and her fetus survived. The cesarean was completed at a hospital and the baby was named Miracle.[51] In November 2010 Veronica Deramous was sentenced to 25 years imprisonment on a plea bargain for first-degree assault.[52]

References

  1. 1 2 3 Walters, Joanna (December 2, 2015). "Fetal abduction: brutal attacks against expectant mothers on the rise in US". Guardian.
  2. ↑ Francis R (1998). "Compulsory Caesarean sections: an English perspective". J Contemp Health Law Policy. 14 (2): 365–89. PMID 9693485.
  3. ↑ Project Disappeared (2015). "La Sombra de Campo de Mayo Hospital militar – Partos de desaparecidas" (in Spanish). Dos Partos – cesárea
  4. ↑ "Report of Conadep – 1984 The Campo de Mayo Hospital". Nunca Más (Never Again). Retrieved 31 August 2017.
  5. ↑ Szabó A (2015). "Sectio caesarea criminalis [Criminal caesarean section]" (PDF). Orv Hetil (in Hungarian). 156 (22): 901–2. doi:10.1556/650.2015.HO2524. PMID 26004550.
  6. ↑ Summers, Chris (27 October 2007). "The women who kill for babies". BBC News. London: BBC. Retrieved 11 October 2011. A US jury has recommended the death penalty for a woman convicted of killing a pregnant stranger, cutting her abdomen open and stealing her unborn baby.
  7. ↑ Burgess AW, Baker T, Nahirny C, Rabun JB (2002). "Newborn kidnapping by cesarean section". J Forensic Sci. 47 (4): 827–30. PMID 12136992.
  8. ↑ Dalley, Marlene (2005). "Abductions from the womb : Caesarean section murder a new category of homicide" (PDF). Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
  9. ↑ Burgess AW, Dillon MA, Chiou KY, Hulsopple SB (2016). "Fetal Abduction: Comparison of Two Cases". J Psychosoc Nurs Ment Health Serv. 54 (11): 37–43. doi:10.3928/02793695-20161024-07. PMID 27805715.
  10. ↑ Yutzy SH, Wolfson JK, Resnick PJ (1993). "Child stealing by cesarean section: a psychiatric case report and review of the child stealing literature". J Forensic Sci. 38 (1): 192–6. doi:10.1520/JFS13392J. PMID 8426152.
  11. ↑ Thompson, Paul (July 20, 2008). "'Serial womb raider' accused of cutting baby from mother's womb 'had baby snatch history'". Mail Online.
  12. ↑ Estephe, St (17 October 2011). "The Unknown History of MISANDRY: Earliest Known Cesarean Kidnapping: Winifred Ransom, Perp / Margaret Sweeney, Victim – Pennsylvania 1974". Unknownmisandry.blogspot.com. Retrieved 31 August 2017.
  13. ↑ "Cindy Ray – The Murder of Cindy Ray". about.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  14. ↑ "10 Cases of Fetal Abduction in the US". listverse.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  15. ↑ "The Case of Deborah Evans". about.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. On November 16, 1995, in Addison, Illinois, Jacqueline Williams, 28, her boyfriend, Fedell Caffey, 22, and her cousin, Laverne Ward, 24, entered the home of Ward's ex-girlfriend, 28-year-old Deborah Evans.
  16. ↑ "Illinois Commutations". prodeathpenalty.com. 2010. Archived from the original on 7 October 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  17. ↑ Vernon J. Geberth (2009). "Homicides Involving the Theft of a Fetus from a Pregnant Victim reprinted from Law and Order, Vol. 54, No. 3, March, 2006". practicalhomicide.com. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  18. ↑ "1981604. – BURTON v. State. – AL Supreme Court". caselaw.findlaw.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. Ex parte Angela BURTON. (Re Angela Burton v. State).
  19. ↑ Usborne, David (16 December 1998). "Life sentence for ripping baby from womb – News – The Independent". The Independent. London: INM. ISSN 0951-9467. OCLC 185201487. Retrieved 11 October 2011. AN ALABAMA woman has been sentenced to life imprisonment for killing a pregnant teenager and stealing the still-living foetus from her womb so she could pretend she was the child's mother. The decision disappointed prosecutors who were seeking the death penalty.
  20. ↑ "Alabama man convicted of kidnapping fetus". findarticles.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. A jury in Tuscaloosa, AL, recently convicted a man of kidnapping a fetus from a murdered girl's body.
  21. ↑ "Margarita Flores Murder | Woman Convicted in Murder of Pregnant Mother Kills Self". Los Angeles Times. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. FRESNO — A woman convicted three days ago of killing a mother and unborn child committed suicide early Saturday in her one-person jail cell, saying the humiliation was too much to stand.
  22. ↑ "Hughes County deputy had 2 of 13 similar cases | NewsOK.com". newsok.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. Their move came shortly after a jury in Fresno, Calif., convicted Josefina Saldana of a pregnant Margarita Flores and cutting out her unborn son.
  23. ↑ "A Mother by Invention". time.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  24. ↑ Graves, Amy Beth (October 8, 2000). "Chance meeting at store led to killing, baby theft". Associated Press.
  25. ↑ "Altus Times – Missing pregnant woman found dead with abdomen cut open fetus gone". altustimes.com. 2011. Archived from the original on 31 March 2012. Retrieved 11 October 2011. A missing pregnant woman was found dead in a field with her abdomen cut open and the fetus removed, and a 37-year-old woman was in custody after bringing a dead fetus to a hospital.
  26. ↑ "Marshall Democrat-News: Obituaries: Carolyn Diane Simpson (12/30/03)". marshallnews.com. 2003. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  27. ↑ "Slain Pregnant Woman Was 'Trusting'". abcnews.go.com. ABC News. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  28. ↑ "Roban bebe del vientre de su madre" (in Spanish). El Tiempo. June 5, 2004. Retrieved 30 August 2017.
  29. ↑ Roversi, Susana P. García (July 1, 2015). "Una nueva categoría de homicidios por causas personales según el FBI. Secuestro "in utero" o rapto fetal (fetal abduction)" (PDF). Misión Jurídica. (in Spanish with English abstract). 8 (9): 177–196. Retrieved 28 August 2017.
  30. ↑ "UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff, v. LISA M. MONTGOMERY, a/k/a Darlene Fischer, a/k/a Fischer4kids" (PDF). Justice.gov. Retrieved 31 August 2017.
  31. ↑ "Fetus-Snatching Murderer, Lisa Montgomery, Sentenced To Death". digitaljournal.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. In 2004, Lisa Montgomery strangled a 23 year old pregnant woman, Bobbie Jo Stinnett, who was found in her home in Skidmore, Missouri, with her belly cut open and her unborn child missing.
  32. ↑ "Lisa Montgomery's conviction upheld". 4law.co.il. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. A federal appeals court panel today upheld Lisa Montgomery’s conviction in the 2004 slaying of Bobbie Jo Stinnett of Skidmore, Mo., and the kidnapping of Stinnett’s unborn child. A jury subsequently sentenced Montgomery, 43, to death.
  33. ↑ "Illinois Women Gets Life in Prison for Murdering Pregnant Friend, Unborn Child Cut From the Womb, and Victim's Other Three Children". foxnews.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. An Illinois woman pleaded guilty Monday to killing her pregnant friend, the unborn child and the victim's three children in a plea deal that allowed her to avoid the death penalty.
  34. ↑ "Kids of fetus-theft mom found dead". msnbc.msn.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  35. ↑ "The Murder of Araceli Camacho Gomez". about.com. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. Araceli Camacho Gomez, 27, from Pasco, Washington, was the mother of two children and just two weeks away from giving birth to her son when she met Phiengchai Sisouvanh Synhavong at a bus stop on June 27, 2008.
  36. ↑ "Woman charged in death of eviscerated pregnant teen". cnn.com. 2011. Archived from the original on 9 July 2012. Retrieved 11 October 2011. A Pennsylvania woman has been charged in the slaying of an 18-year-old woman who was found with her uterus cut open and her fetus removed, authorities said Sunday.
  37. ↑ "Andrea Curry-Demus gets life sentence for cutting baby from mother's womb". dailymail.co.uk. London. 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2011. A serial 'womb raider' will spend life in prison for killing a pregnant teenager she lured to her apartment, drugging her and cutting the child from the womb before trying to pass off the baby as her own.
  38. ↑ Scott J. Croteau. "Fetus cut from womb of woman found in closet". Telegram.com. Retrieved 31 August 2017.
  39. ↑ "Foetus cut from murdered US woman". BBC News. 29 July 2009.
  40. ↑ Schworm, Peter (February 18, 2014). "Woman gets life for killing neighbor, cutting baby from womb". Boston Globe.
  41. ↑ Glynn, Casey (20 April 2011). "Police say killer of pregnant Ky. woman lured victim with a lie". CBS News.
  42. ↑ "PKy. woman faces life for cutting baby out of womb". CBS News. 17 February 2012.
  43. ↑ "Kathy Coy sentenced". WBKO. 2 March 2012. Archived from the original on 4 March 2012.
  44. ↑ Muessig, Ben (10 October 2011). "Milwaukee Woman Rips Fetus From Mother, Killing 23-Year-Old And Unborn Child: Cops". The Huffington Post.
  45. ↑ Matovina, Laura (10 October 2011). "DA files charges in death of pregnant woman, unborn child". WDJT-TV. Archived from the original on 23 January 2012.
  46. ↑ Peck, Lee. "Charges upgraded in missing pregnant woman case after remains found". Retrieved 20 March 2015.
  47. 1 2 Botho, Molosankwe (May 30, 2014). "Pregnant moms killed, babies stolen". Press Reader.
  48. ↑ Ohlheiser, Abby (19 March 2015). "Pregnant Colorado woman stabbed, her baby 'removed,' after answering Craigslist ad". The Washington Post.
  49. ↑ Coffman, Keith (April 29, 2016). "Colorado woman sentenced to 100 years for cutting fetus from woman". Reuters.
  50. ↑ Reinan, John (August 29, 2017). "Charges detail couple's alleged motive in Fargo woman's death Fargo couple claimed Greywind's baby as their own, investigators say". Star Tribune.
  51. ↑ Mundy, Liza; Zapotosky, Matt (16 June 2010). "A pregnant woman escapes from the stranger who allegedly tried to take her baby". The Washington Post.
  52. ↑ Martinez, Edecio (November 8, 2010). "Veronica Deramous Gets 25 Years for Trying to Cut Baby from Another Woman's Womb". CBS NEWS.

Further reading

Fetal Attraction: a Descriptive Study of Patterns in Fetal Abductions

Report: Fetal abduction cases on the rise

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