Arkansas Supreme Court Declares Unborn Babies "Persons".(Brief Article)

Unborn babies in Arkansas can now be treated as legal "persons" in wrongful-death lawsuits, the state Supreme Court ruled May 10.

The decision came in a case in which a mother and her full-term unborn baby died during delivery, but lower courts refused to allow the baby to be considered as the second victim of alleged malpractice.

"It's the best decision we've had from this court on a pro-life issue," Rose Mimms, executive director of Arkansas Right to Life, told NRL News.

"The court acknowledged that the unborn are persons and can be considered in civil lawsuits." Arkansas Right to Life filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the case.

The Supreme Court's 4-3 ruling was based in part on a 1999 state fetal homicide law that allowed prosecutors to charge those responsible for the death of an unborn child with criminal homicide. The court also cited a bill passed by the Arkansas legislature April 4, 2001, that extends "personhood" to unborn babies in civil cases. The new law is scheduled to go into effect August 14.

"The legislature plainly afforded protection to unborn viable fetuses," wrote Chief Justice W. H. Arnold, "assuming that injury or death occurred without the mother's consent to a lawful abortion or outside the `usual and customary standards of medical practice' or beyond `acts deemed necessary to save' the mother's life."

The 1999 Arkansas law extended criminal law protection to unborn children after 12 weeks of pregnancy.