Widely-read left media site Crooks & Liars has had a bizarre but predictably dishonest response to the horrific story of a Dallas family that allegedly assaulted a teenage relative for hours in order to force an abortion, before burning the stillborn baby on a charcoal grill and throwing it away in a plastic bag.
Crooks & Liars actually blames pro-life Republicans.
This crime was profoundly disturbing. As Breitbart Texas wrote last week, after a teenage girl was raped by a relative, other family members were concerned that if police found out about the rape, it could trigger a Child Protective Services investigation:
Police said when the family members decided to force the abortion on the victim, Sharon Jones gave her a variety of drugs including birth control pills and Plan B contraceptives. Then authorities allege Cecila McDonald held the victim down while her husband sat on the victim’s abdomen while “repeatedly bouncing up and down.” Police say Sharon Jones told the agonized victim to “shut up” and that the attack didn’t stop until the girl was bleeding heavily.
After the girl gave birth to a stillborn baby, the police say the family attempted to unsuccessfully burn the baby on a charcoal grill. When that desecration failed, Sharon Jones allegedly paid her son Cedric $25 to dispose of the baby in a plastic bag.
Crooks and Liars writer Karoli wrote a piece called “We’ll See More Tragedies Like This, Thanks To The Forced-Birth Crowd.” The entire premise of her article is factually untrue: she claims that the victim couldn’t get a legal abortion in Dallas, so the family was forced to give her a forced abortion.
In fact, there are several legal options in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex for anyone wanting to pay for abortion services.
The article begins:
Thanks to those forced-birth rules the Texas legislature adopted last year, almost all of the clinics providing safe abortions in Texas have closed. That was, of course, the goal. But victories like that come with tragic (and fully intended) consequences.
Then Karoli goes into some details of the gruesome crime, before concluding that pro-life Texans should be criminally charged as well as the actual barbaric criminals.
She could have had an abortion if we lived in a civilized society where a girl who is raped by a relative had a safe haven to go and be taken care of. Instead, she was tossed to the same wolves who raped her in the first place.
Thanks for that, Texas. While you’re filing charges, perhaps you could file some on yourselves, too.
However, Karoli’s claim that the Dallas victim didn’t live in a “civilized society” and didn’t have a “safe haven” to get an abortion is quickly proven false by basic fact-checking.
Even after the controversial recent court ruling that will shutter many abortion clinics, right now there are three abortion clinics in Dallas-Fort Worth, according to an article this week in the Dallas Morning-News.
Aside from Planned Parenthood in Dallas and Fort Worth, there is the Southwestern Women’s Surgery Center, which bills itself as “The Only Licensed Ambulatory Surgical Care Facility In North Texas Providing Abortion Services To 22 Weeks.”
The clinic describes its service this way:
Abortion and pregnancy options services are an integral part of total healthcare. We take pride in offering the best quality abortion care, accompanied by an attitude of warmth and respect. (…) We are here to serve you. Southwestern Women’s Surgery Center (SWSC), opened as a licensed ambulatory surgical center in October of 2009. Formerly the Fairmount Center, the clinic was founded in 1973 by Dr. Curtis Boyd as the first facility in Texas to provide high quality, low cost outpatient abortions. The center’s new licensure allows us to provide abortion services through 24 weeks of pregnancy. We are the only clinic in North Texas providing abortion care after 16 gestational weeks.
The Dallas clinic accepts Master Card, Visa, Amex, and Discover.
The Dallas clinic boasts about being able to perform abortions up to 24 weeks, which evidently is not late enough for some. Although third-trimester abortions aren’t available in Dallas, Southwestern has a sister facility in Albuquerque, New Mexico that will accommodate abortions past 28 weeks:
For women over the 28th menstrual week, BPD 7.0 and greater, we provide services on a case-by-case basis. The process is the same as above. Because each case is unique, we ask that women with fetal or maternal indications call our office for a phone evaluation. We will help if we can.
To put that in context, this article for expectant mothers by Dr. Adam Shoman on Pregnany Corner explains a baby’s development at 28 weeks:
At 16 inches long and weighing close to four pounds, your baby is continuing to grow at a steady pace. For the last few weeks, the growth has seemed to slow down, but from this week on your baby’s growth will start to pick up speed again. You may notice in the ultrasound images that he or she is looking plump. This is due to the fat that continues to build under the skin. The eyes have opened, and the eyebrows and eyelids are fully formed, and even the eyelashes are now visible.
The inabilty to legally end human life at that stage of development in the state of Texas is infuriating to liberal abortion advocates.
Whatever one’s opinion on abortion, it’s telling that the defenders of abortion feel the need to evade basic facts. The victim could have gotten a legal abortion in Dallas. Instead of that option, or letting the baby be born, a group of alleged criminals tortured a girl and killed a viable baby.
That’s not the fault of people who are trying to protect human life.