Today I sit and reflect on the time that has gone by. To comprehend that it has been just over 10 years that such a nightmare could have occurred to our family is unfathomable. Every moment since that of the morning the two detectives came to our house to inform us of our beloved child and her baby had been murdered. Shot to death in the breezeway of their new little house.
The home was being prepared for the joyous occasion of rearing a delightful baby boy. Everything was going so well. That very day my lovable daughter and I had spent arranging the baby’s room. A crib to build, blue curtains to hang, and that’s barely the beginning. We’d had a long day and since the baby’s dad was out of town working I invited Olivia to dinner and even for a sleep over at my house.
“No Mom,” she said “I think I need to get used to being alone while Lane is at work and I still have a few things I want to accomplish”.
I gave her and baby Lane big hugs and told her she could change her mind. Those are the last words – the last fun times – the last precious invaluable minutes that I had with her.
There is no turning back from this – certainly not for Olivia and not for baby Lane. We proceeded to walk around like zombies for the next couple of weeks. There were arrangements to make. Family flying in from out of town, consoling for Olivia’s siblings, nephews, cousins, aunties and uncles, and on and on the ripples spread. To add to it there were reporters to deal with.
Imagine my astonishment and disgust when I heard their murderer was only going to be charged with the death of my daughter, and that there was no law to protect her unborn dearly wanted baby?
I can pull for you from the transcripts of the trial that the man who killed my daughter said, “I intentionally aimed the gun and shot her three times in the stomach to kill the baby.”
Then he shot my daughter twice in the head.
This is in fact the most concrete testament to a double murder that I can imagine. Baby Lane did not have but a nick on his left leg. I saw it myself when I held him in my arms for the one and only time I would ever be able to.
No one can tell me that it wasn’t a tiny human being that I cradled that day. Yet he had not taken even the smallest of breaths in this cruel new world.
For these reasons I fought for almost three years to see a law like Bill C-484 come to fruition in our country. The Bill passed two readings before it was set on the back burner of nowhere when Steven Harper called for an election.
Now with the courage of Jeff Durham and his family, the possibility of justice for our family is seeing the light again. Bravo Jeff I stand behind you 100 percent. Pregnant women are too often the victims of abuse, and the fact is, they are even more susceptible to abuse because they are pregnant.
Stop the insanity please! A women’s right to have her child should not be taken away by anyone without consequence that represents exactly what was taken. Those who dare need to feel the strongest penalties of the law. Bill C-225 would finally make it possible.
Please consider this carefully and put yourselves in our shoes. Even after so long I grieve and have a heavy heart. The loss of a child is like no other. But without justice it is doubly hard.
Sincerely.
Mary L. Talbot
God Bless Mary! I couldn’t imagine such a loss. I pray this bill passes.Lane and Molly Matter!!!!