Colorado woman convicted of cutting fetus from stranger’s womb

A Boulder County jury has found a woman guilty of attempted first-degree murder in the shocking incident almost a year ago in which she cut an unborn baby from another woman’s womb. “He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love, ‘” said Wilkins.

Wilkins still has unanswered questions about why Lane lured her through a Craigslist ad peddling maternity clothes into an encounter that almost ended her life.

On Thursday social media messages Lane sent were also shared, and showed that she had told some people she gave birth to a baby boy and others that she was still pregnant.

“The issue of whether or not murder charges are appropriate involving a case involving the death of a fetus or a late-term pregnancy is always a hard issue”, Boulder County District Attorney Stanley L. Garnett said before Lane was charged.

Wilkins said when the verdict was read in court, she felt vulnerable. “Now her daughters don’t have a mother to lean on; to my family that doesn’t have a granddaughter and nearly didn’t have a daughter; and to me, now I don’t have my daughter and nearly lost my own life”.

Lane attacked Wilkins, beating her and stabbing her, cutting into her uterus and removing the fetus, according to prosecutors.

Ms. Wilkins survived the attack after regaining consciousness and calling 911 on her cell phone, but the baby, whom she had named Aurora, did not.

She quietly started to cry as she held her father’s hand very tightly.

Wilkins said she plans to be at the sentencing and will speak.

Jurors convicted Lane of attempted first-degree murder, assault and unlawful termination of a pregnancy in the March 2015 attack on Michelle Wilkins.

Wilkins said she can’t understand Lane’s selfishness and deceit, and hopes her attacker will address her “spiritual debt” in prison.

Lane’s weapons included a lava lamp that she used to bash Wilkins on the head and two kitchen knives that she cut the fetus from the victim’s womb, according to police and testimony in the trial last week.

She says she deals with post-traumatic stress disorder but has learned to recognize possible triggers, which helps.

“She’s not only an incredibly courageous and tenacious woman, but she’s really a delightful person”, Garnett said.

“I just remember I kept asking why she was doing that and I just kept saying why?”

“This trial has allowed me to be more in touch with some of my grittier emotions, like anger”, she said”.

Wilkins had gone to Lane’s home in response to a Craigslist ad for baby clothes.

Michelle Wilkins testifies during the trial. She will be sentenced April 29.

She also locked the door, not knowing at the time that Lane was no longer in the house but at the hospital with the baby she had just cut out of Wilkins, having told her boyfriend David Ridley that it was her child and she had suffered a miscarriage.

When Ridley came home early from work to meet her for a prenatal appointment, he said he found the infant in a bathtub.

Lane was asked by police if her DNA would match the unborn baby’s.

Wilkins says it’s too soon to think about trying to have another child, but says doctors have given her good chances of getting pregnant again despite damage to her uterus.