Every child is held
in law to be born dead until it has been shown to have been born alive.
Killing a child in the act of birth and before it is fully born is not
infanticide, but if before birth injuries are inflicted which result in
death after birth, it is murder. Medical evidence will be called to show
that the child was born alive.
The methods of death usually employed are--(1) Suffocation by the hand
or a cloth. (2) Strangulation with the hands, by a tape or ribbon, or by
the umbilical cord itself. (3) Blows on the head, or dashing the child
against the wall. (4) Drowning by putting it in the privy or in a bucket
of water. (5) Omission: by neglecting to do what is absolutely necessary
for the newly-born child--_e.g._, not separating the cord; allowing it
to lie under the bed-clothes and be suffocated.
With regard to the question of the maturity of a child, the differences
between a child of six or seven months and one at full term may be
stated as follows:
Between the sixth and seventh month, length of child 10 to 14
inches--that is, the length of the child after the fifth month is about
double the lunar months--weight 1 to 3 pounds; skin, dusky red, covered
with downy hair (lanugo) and sebaceous matter; membrana pupillaris
disappearing; nails not reaching to ends of fingers; meconium at upper
part of large intestine; testes near kidneys; no appearance of
convolutions in brain; points of ossification in four divisions of
sternum.
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