Press Room

TORONTO, Oct. 17, 2007 - Media reports indicate that the family of Toronto homicide victim, Aysun Sesen, are asking for a meeting with Prime Minister Stephen Harper to appeal for Sesen's daughter, who was killed in utero in her seventh month, to be declared a human being. They are calling for changes to the laws that prevent her boyfriend Turan Cocelli from being charged with two murders.
"We support the family's reasonable request for their grandchild to be recognized as the second victim in this murder," said Jim Hughes, National President of Campaign Life Coalition. "Coincidentally, today in Alberta, closing arguments are being heard in the trial of Jared Baker who is accused of murdering his pregnant girlfriend, Olivia Talbot and her unborn child in 2005. This case prompted Conservative MP Leon Benoit to bring forward a private members bill on the unborn victims of violence. If this bill had passed the murder of both of these babies would be recognized," he continued. "It appeared from media reports in the Sesen case that the father directed his aim at the mother's abdomen and in the Talbot case, Baker testified that he shot Olivia five times including deliberately at her stomach 'to get the baby'," said Mary Ellen Douglas, National Organizer of CLC. "How much more evidence is necessary for the courts, the Prime Minister and the general public to recognize two victims in both of these crimes?" Campaign Life Coalition calls on the Prime Minister to hear the request from the Sesen family and to re-evaluate the hasty removal of the unborn victims of violence bill.

For further information: Media contacts: Mary Ellen Douglas, CLC National Organizer, Kingston, ON, (613) 389-4472; Marie Christine Houle, CLC Toronto Office, (416) 204-9749