H.B. 4500 – Rep. Pamela Hornburger
Current Status
H. B. 4500 is currently in the Senate Judiciary Committee awaiting a hearing. It was passed by the House on November 9, 2017 along party lines with one endorsed Democrat voting in favor of the bill. On Sept. 19, 2017 testimony was heard in the House Judiciary Committee. RLM provided testimony. The bill was reported out of committee along party lines. H.B. 4500 was introduced on April 20, 2017 and referred to the House Judiciary Committee.
Description
H. B. 4500 is a technical bill that will codify that an embryo or a fetus will be considered a victim for the purposes of determining sentencing for a crime which involved a pregnant woman.
Background
The Prenatal Protection Act has been in place since 1998. It states that it is a crime to intentionally or unintentionally harm an unborn embryo or fetus except by actions taken by the mother or her doctor. It includes charges for the death of a pregnant woman which results in the death of her unborn child as well as causing a stillbirth or miscarriage of an unborn child through criminal or negligent actions. H.B. 4500 simply places into statute the ruling found in the case of People vs. Ambrose (Mich COA 2016) by declaring that for sentencing purposes, and embryo or fetus may be considered a person when determining the number of victims of a crime.
History
There have been a number of egregious cases that have lead to the need to place legal protections over the unborn child when they are the victims of crimes. Those crimes can range from involuntary vehicular manslaughter when a drunk driver hits a pregnant woman and causes a miscarriage to assault with a deadly weapon in an attempt to cause a pregnant woman to miscarry. In some states, there is no legal protection for unborn victims of crimes.