Many states already have begun to acknowledge the high incidence of murder in pregnancy-associated deaths by including a place on death certificates to indicate that the deceased was pregnant. It is meant to provide a way to more easily track the number of pregnant women murdered each year, but domestic violence experts say the paperwork is often ignored. Meanwhile, the FBI still doesn't isolate the number of pregnant women from the total number of homicide victims listed in annual crime statistics.

Besides pushing for data collection that accurately reflects the number of pregnant women murdered every year, domestic abuse organizations are asking for routine medical screening to help stem the tide of violence against pregnant women. "We find that violence represents more of a threat to pregnant women than diabetes, yet doctors screen routinely for diabetes, but not for abuse," said James.

The Centers for Disease Control and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists also are pushing for increased screening, but Whiteman said in some cases it's a battle.

"There's too often this disconnect between medicine and behavior," says Whiteman. "You have a doctor who says, 'I'm an internist, I don't do that behavioral stuff.' But it's a key aspect of health."

Domestic abuse organizations are scrupulously avoiding any tactic that would establish or increase penalties for intentional harm to a fetus. Such a law played a role in the case of former NFL player Rae Carruth, who was convicted of hiring a hit man to kill his pregnant girlfriend in 1999 so he wouldn't have to pay child support. Cherica Adams, 24, was shot four times and died a month later. Her baby boy, Chancellor, survived the attack and is being raised by Adams' mother, who testified at Carruth's trial that Chancellor is developmentally disabled because of the shooting. Carruth was sentenced to 19 years in prison. A 10-month portion of the sentence was attributed to a finding that Carruth used "an instrument in attempting to harm an unborn child."

Such laws, domestic violence experts worry, can too easily be turned against the women they're supposed to protect, shifting focus from a mother to a fetus, and creating precedent for antiabortion laws in other areas.

"These laws tend to be promulgated by anti-abortionists that can easily do more harm than good," says Fulcher. Edelson calls the laws "cynical."

"The problem is we aren't doing enough adult to adult," he says. "The woman alone apparently isn't reason enough to prosecute. But if we protect the woman, the baby she's carrying is protected."

Ultimately, and sadly, the link between pregnancy and homicide is just one aspect -- perhaps the most frightening -- of domestic abuse in this country. An estimated 1,500 to 2,400 young women are killed each year by their intimate partners. Every 15 seconds in this country a woman is physically assaulted by her husband, boyfriend, or live-in partner, according to statistics from the U.S. Department of Justice. The agency also estimates that approximately 2.5 million women are abused annually, with as many as 50 percent of all women experiencing at least one episode of battering during their lifetime.

"There's all this talk about terrorism," says Whiteman of the Family Violence Protection Fund in San Francisco. "What people don't know or want to forget about is the violence in our own neighborhoods, in our homes."

This story has been corrected.

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