Was the baby alive when he died?

Earlier in March, CTV News published an article about a decision by a judge regarding a man stabbing his wife, who was eight months pregnant. Her baby boy was delivered via emergency C-section, but died shortly after being born. Sofiane Ghazi is being charged with attempted murder for stabbing his wife and first-degree murder in the death of his son. 

Cases shouldn’t get much more clear cut than this. An innocent child died because of Ghazi’s horrific actions, therefore, Ghazi is guilty of murder. Ghazi’s defence, however, claims that it isn’t that simple. According to CTV, they’re arguing that the murder charge should be dropped “because the baby wasn’t legally alive when he died.”

Wait, what? The baby wasn’t alive when he died? How is that even a sentence? Unfortunately, it is 2018, and the all-important word that’s easy to miss is legally. Because the baby may not have been legally alive, he may not be considered a person. This is our normal. People claim to worship at the shrine of science, and yet turn their back on it as soon as it becomes inconvenient. Science tells us that this little boy was a human being. It tells us that he was living, growing, and developing until his life was violently ended by one of the people most responsible for protecting him. These are scientific facts, but in this case, they don’t seem to matter.

This debate is truly sickening. A judge has decided that the charge of murder should be followed through with, to be decided on by a jury. Subsequently, in the fall or early next year prosecution and defence will quibble about semantics: Did the boy take a breath? Did he truly proceed in a living state from the body of his mother? Or did his father successfully kill him before seeing the light of day, thus being absolved of any significant guilt? We’re not talking days or months here. Mere seconds will decide whether this child is worthy of being grieved, worthy of being valued, worthy of justice.

It is incredible that this is the type of discussion that we as a country are having. It’s ludicrous that our tax dollars are going towards a lengthy trial to decide something that is painfully obvious to anyone who bothers to think twice. This little boy—who was an irreplaceable, precious human being—deserves justice in the same way that any child does. We can only hope that he’ll receive it, because, after all, this is Canada and it’s 2018.