Pregnant women bear an untold burden of violence

Thousands of miles separated Tasha Nowlin, Dawna Wright, Jennifer Nielsen and Jessie Davis. Nothing seemed likely to link them together.

Then came the killings.

A bullet tore through Nowlin's throat as she stood on a Virginia sidewalk June 9. Three days later, Wright slumped in her California office after being shot in the head. On June 14, a knife dropped Nielsen outside a North Carolina convenience store; Davis died the same day in her home in Ohio.

Four pregnant women, four murder cases -- all in just six days.

And that's not unusual.

Homicide is a leading cause of death in America among pregnant and postpartum women, according to studies conducted in recent years. Statistics show that more pregnant women or mothers of newborns die at someone's hands than of any individual medical cause.

How many of these women lose their lives violently every year?

The toll is difficult to calculate given the lack of a uniform reporting system on pregnant murder victims, researchers said.

A national study published two years ago identified 617 homicides involving pregnancy between 1991 and 1999. A Washington Post analysis a year earlier uncovered 1,367 killings of pregnant woman and new mothers between 1990 and 2004. In both cases, the authors deemed the totals underestimates.

A sad reality

Those who deal with the issue of domestic violence say the numbers reflect a sad reality. About one out of every 20 pregnant women endures physical abuse, according to Debbie Lee, managing director of the Family Violence Prevention Fund.

Lee's group estimates that 324,000 pregnant American women a year are punched, kicked, pushed down or worse. Each year there are about 960,000 incidents of violence against women by their former and current spouses or partners, according to its website.

The 47-bed shelter run by Cleveland's Domestic Violence Center regularly sees pregnant visitors, said Cathleen Alexander, the agency's executive director. She said women in relationships with a history of abuse often report escalating violence during their pregnancy; other women said the pregnancy itself launches attacks.

"People look at pregnancy as a miracle of the human condition," Alexander said. "To have it also be the occasion of terrible violence and death ... it's incomprehensible. But it happens."

Men they knew and loved

Most of the killings are carried out by men the women knew and loved, according to the Washington Post examination. A more in-depth review of a single year's cases concluded that two-thirds "had a strong connection to the pregnancy or involved a domestic-violence clash."

In three of the killings between June 9 and June 14, police targeted the victim's boyfriend and father-to-be. Two are under arrest, including police officer Bobby Cutts Jr., who is accused of killing Davis in her Canton, Ohio, home. The third remains on the lam.

In the fourth case, involving the North Carolina woman, police report no suspects.

Violence during pregnancy needs to be talked about more openly, said Jeani Chang, an epidemiologist with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who led the 2005 national study. She said obstetricians need to discuss the issue with their patients.

source : www.startribune.com