Abortion doctor convicted of murder avoids death sentence

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Abortion doctor convicted of murder avoids death
sentence
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A Philadelphia abortion provider found guilty of
first-degree murder has agreed give up his right
to appeal in exchange for avoiding a possible
death sentence, Philadelphia's district
attorney's office announced Tuesday. Dr. Kermit
Gosnell, 72, was convicted Monday on three counts
of murder for killing babies by cutting their
spinal cords with scissors. The next step in the
case was to have been the penalty phase, when
jurors would have weighed whether to give Gosnell
a death sentence. A jury also found Gosnell
guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the case of
41-year-old Karnamaya Mongar, who died of an
anesthetic overdose during a second-trimester
abortion at Gosnell's West Philadelphia clinic.
Additionally, Gosnell, who is not a
board-certified obstetrician or gynecologist, was
found guilty of 21 counts of abortion of the
unborn, 24 weeks or older. In Pennsylvania,
abortions past 24 weeks are illegal unless the
health of the mother is at stake.
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In Other News

• Thirteen out of 14 Boston deputy fire chiefs have
  signed a letter of "no confidence" in Fire Chief
  Steve Abraira's handling of the Boston Marathon
  bombings.
• The Justice Department on Tuesday defended its
  decision to subpoena phone records from
  Associated Press bureaus and reporters, saying
  the requests were limited and necessary to
  investigate a leak of classified information. The
  AP revealed Monday that federal agents had
  collected two months of telephone records for
  some of its reporters and editors without
  notifying it of the subpoena. In question is the
  balance between the public's right to know with
  national security.
• A Philadelphia abortion provider found guilty of
  first-degree murder has agreed to give up his
  right to appeal in exchange for avoiding a
  possible death sentence.
• According to transportation safety investigators,
  a common benchmark in the United States for
  determining when a driver is legally drunk is not
  doing enough to prevent alcohol-related crashes
  that kill about 10,000 people each year and
  should be made more restrictive. The National
  Transportation Safety Board recommended on
  Tuesday that all 50 states adopt a blood-alcohol
  content (BAC) cutoff of 0.05 compared to the 0.08
  standard on the books today and used by law
  enforcement and the courts to prosecute drunk
  driving. Under current law, a 180-pound male
  typically will hit the 0.08 threshold after four
  drinks over an hour, according to an online blood
  alcohol calculator published by the University of
  Oklahoma. That same person could reach the 0.05
  threshold after two to three drinks over the same
  period.
• A Mayan pyramid that has stood for 2,300 years in
  Belize has been reduced to rubble, apparently to
  make fill for roads. The temple at the Noh Mul
  site in northern Belize was largely torn down by
  backhoes and bulldozers last week. The pyramid
  was the center of a settlement of about 40,000
  people and 81 buildings over 12 square miles.It
  stood about 65 feet tall and was built around 250
  B.C. with hand-cut limestone bricks. The
  limestone is quality material used to upgrade
  local roads, and it's prized by contractors.