Commonwealth v. Crawford

720 N.E. 2d 960 (2000)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Crawford (D) was convicted of involuntary manslaughter of his girlfriend and her unborn fetus. On July 7, 1990, D shot Kimberly in the face. She was found four hours later after rigor mortis had set in. At the time of the shooting, Kimberly was 7 months pregnant with D’s baby. At trial, a medical examiner offered uncontroverted testimony that the fetus died of oxygen deprivation but had been viable. D claims that the statutes are unconstitutionally vague as applied to a viable fetus, that the trial judge’s instruction of viability unconstitutionally lowered the burden of proof and that the instructions incorrectly permitted the jury to find D guilty of fetus homicide without proof of his knowledge of its existence and viability.