Robbery inspires push for new feticide law

INDIANAPOLIS, April 30 (UPI) -- A bank robbery that resulted in the death of a teller's unborn twins has inspired an effort to create stiffer penalties in Indiana for killing fetuses.

Marion County Prosecutor Carl Brizzi said Wednesday the state Legislature should change the state fetal homicide law requiring fetuses to be viable, The Indianapolis Star reported. He appeared at a news conference with two Republican state legislators from Indianapolis.

"This is a sad and tragic catalyst for change in the law," Sen. James W. Merritt Jr. said.

Katherin Shuffield, who was five months pregnant, was shot April 22 during a robbery at a Huntington Bank branch. She survived with serious injuries but suffered a double miscarriage.

Police had made no arrests as of Wednesday.

Brizzi pointed out that anyone convicted in the case might face as much as a century behind bars for the robbery and for shooting Shuffield but as little as two years for killing the fetuses. In Indiana, feticide or killing a fetus not yet viable carries a penalty of two to eight years.