“Neanderthal Chris” Jones’ Bill Passed House

[Note: This article is cross-posted at RaisingKaine.com.]

One just can’t afford to be sick. While we weren’t looking, Neanderthal Del. Chris Jones’ (R-Suffolk) monstrous bill (HB 1126) passed the House (68 to 31) and is in Committee (Education and Health) in the Senate! Del. Jones wants to felonize women having either an abortion or miscarriage. It’s bad enough to felonize women having an abortion. But the inclusion of miscarriage, which occurs naturally in 20% of all pregnancies, is simply draconian.

The upshot would be 20% of all pregnancies would result in criminal investigation. Talk about feeding the prison industrial complex. And that’s what this punitive, unAmerican bill will do.

Miscarriages which are “caused” by the woman, or anyone else, could yield a five-year prison sentence. As the full text reveals (below), “cause” is defined very vaguely. It’s bad enough to try to felonize women for abortions. But to treat miscarriage as if it were a criminal matter is, well, downright grotesque.

And the roll call contains the usual radical wrong, who’d be considered buffoons, but for the tremendous damage they do. It really goes to show how uncompassionate conservatives (and their gutless enablers on our side of the aisle) are. These folks are right out of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.

You know the crew: Dave Albo, Terry Kilgore, Bob Marshall Bill Carrico, John Cosgrove, et al. And as for Democrats Phillips, Valentine, Armstrong, Barlow, (Algie) Howell, Johnson, Morrissey, and Lewis, get them out of office. Soon!

Here’s the text:

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. That § 18.2-71 of the Code of Virginia is amended and reenacted as follows:

§ 18.2-71. Producing abortion or miscarriage, etc.; penalty.

Except as provided in other sections of this article, any person, including the pregnant female, who administers or causes to be taken by a pregnant female any drug or other thing, or uses means, with intent to destroy her unborn child, or to produce abortion or miscarriage, and thereby destroys such child, or produces such abortion or miscarriage, is guilty of a Class 4 felony. The provisions of this section shall not apply to any medically approved contraceptive whether used before or after sexual intercourse [ or any medication legally prescribed by a physician ] [ specifically to induce or cause an abortion ] .

2. That the provisions of this act may result in a net increase in periods of imprisonment or commitment. Pursuant to § 30-19.1:4, the estimated amount of the necessary appropriation cannot be determined for periods of imprisonment in state adult correctional facilities and cannot be determined for periods of commitment to the custody of the Department of Juvenile Justice.

There you have it. This bill is more draconian than back in the days of pre-Roe, when a woman would never have been prosecuted for a loss of a pregnancy, whether by miscarriage or abortion. In 2008, the Neanderthal House of Delegates wants to bring us back to the stone age. And it needs a shakeout. And the time is 2009. Meanwhile, let’s make their lives miserable. Call their offices, often. Hound ‘em. Give em some Molly Ivins’ style hell.

~ by kathyinblacksburg on February 27, 2008.