INDIANAPOLIS, Indiana, December 17, 2015 (LifeSiteNews) – Purvi Patel tried to abort her 28-week-old baby with illegal drugs. When her baby was born alive, Patel threw the child away in a dumpster.
Patel, an Indian-American, was convicted of feticide and neglect of a dependent and sentenced to 20 years in prison. She appealed her conviction with the support of abortionists who say a woman should be able to do whatever she wants with her baby.
Last week, Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller filed his response, saying Patel was properly convicted of feticide.
“The evidence in this case allowed the jury to reasonably infer that Defendant was subjectively aware that her child was alive at birth, but in need of immediate medical care, which it is undisputed that she failed to provide, and the jury's verdict shows that it drew that inference,” the December 9 response reads.
“It was not bad luck or misfortune that caused the baby to be born without immediate access to the respiratory assistance that a hospital would provide; it was Defendant's deliberate choice,” the attorney general wrote.
The attorney general concludes that Patel's conviction is “in keeping with Indiana's well-established interest in protecting unborn human life.”
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On July 13, 2013, Patel, 32, went to the emergency room at St. Joseph Regional Medical Center in Mishawaka, with part of an umbilical chord hanging from her body. At first she said she had miscarried, and then she said she had birthed a stillborn baby.
Police discovered she had taken illegal drugs from Hong Kong to kill her 28-week-old pre-born baby and delivered the baby in her family's bathroom. A search of the dumpsters behind her family's restaurant found the baby, wrapped inside a plastic bag with the trash.
Experts who examined the baby found that the child was born alive and breathing and died by loss of blood, asphyxiation, hypothermia, or lack of medical assistance.
A jury convicted Patel of feticide on Jan. 23, 2015.
The attorney general noted that Patel had the “wherewithal in the immediate aftermath of the birth to cut the umbilical chord and place the baby in a trash bag,” in addition to lying to a friend via text message about the size and status of the baby before disposing of the child in a dumpster.
The attorney general's response explained, “The State was required to prove that Defendant: 1) was over 18; 2) had the care of a dependent who was under the age of 14; and 3) placed the dependent in a situation that endangered the dependent's life or health by failing to provide any medical care for that dependent after his birth; 4) resulting in the death of the dependent.
“The state was not required to prove that an attempt to obtain medical care would have saved the baby's life, only that Defendant placed her baby in appreciable danger by not obtaining medical care for him,” the response states.
The Indiana Court of Appeals has not yet set a date on which to decide the appeal.
