A Florida court has rejected a petition by a pregnant woman imprisoned for murder, asking for her release, arguing that her fetus is a person with a right to liberty.
This Court of Appeal declined to express any position on the content of the case, justifying its decision dated February 24 that “the application was submitted without any factual elements,” reports Al-Rai daily.
“We do not think we will be able to properly determine whether the child to be born has the right to petition before us given the incompleteness of the file in this case,” she said.
And in July 2022, Natalia Harel (24 years old) was arrested when she was in her sixth week of pregnancy, according to the request filed before the court, and accused of involvement in murder after shooting a woman who was traveling with her in an Uber taxi.
In her complaint, Natalia Harel said that “the fetus was not accused of any crime by the public prosecutor” and was “illegally imprisoned,” noting that she “did not receive the necessary care in her situation as a pregnant woman in prison.”
William Norris, the lawyer who used the services of the fetus’s father to defend the “expected child”, told AFP that “the child did not have any say when the decision to imprison his mother was made.”
Norris requested that Natalia Harrell be released under a legal mechanism that allows for challenges to any detention deemed arbitrary.
In a separate legal opinion, Appeal Court Judge Monica Gordo strongly criticized the “unreasonable” argument in the release request.
“The argument presented is nothing but an attempt by the mother to use her fetus to push for an end to her legal detention,” she wrote.
Read Today's News TODAY... on our Telegram Channel click here to join and receive all the latest updates t.me/thetimeskuwait
