Upon their son's death, Rick and Karen Santorum opted not to bring his body to a funeral home. Instead, they bundled him in a blanket and drove him to Karen's parents' home in Pittsburgh. There, they spent several hours kissing and cuddling Gabriel with his three siblings, ages 6, 4 and 1 1/2. They took photos, sang lullabies in his ear and held a private Mass.
Interestingly enough Bill Hill and his group of prosecutors at the Dallas County District Attorney's Office would quite probably prosecute Rick Santorum for doing this with the child.
As many know, I was in a criminal clinic, so I was able to defend many people in court. One of the clients of the clinic (not my personal client) was being prosecuted for abuse of corpse. She was a 22 year old single female who gave birth in her bathtub to a stillborn child.
After giving birth to the child she wrapped it in a blanket, placed in a box on her counter, and mourned the traumatic events that had occurred and the loss of her child she had hidden from her abusive mother. It took her a little while, but she took the stillborn child to the hospital and left.
It took a little while longer before the Dallas County DA's office decided they should prosecute this girl under abuse of corpse for not reporting the death of the child and taking it to the proper place (e.g. funeral home, hospital, police, etc) after it's death. The DA's got their conviction of his girl who was already dealing with depression and remorse for the death of her child.
While the facts can be distinguished to some degree, I wonder if the Dallas County DA's office would go after a Republican Senator who wraps his dead child in a blanket and sings it songs instead of taking it to the proper place. Is this not also abuse of corpse in their eyes?
The Dallas County DA's office used the abuse of corpse statute in an appalling and unbelievable way by going after a young girl who was only dealing with the situation in the only way her emotions could muster. Of course I don't believe Santorum should be prosecuted for what was described; just because behavior that some find odd does not mean it's criminal. Just because the behavior might not be what you would do does not mean you should be sent to jail for it. Unfortunately, the Dallas County DA's disagree.
