In a court hearing on Tuesday, Patience Frazier was sentenced to 30-96 months in prison for a Category B manslaughter charge, after admitting to terminating her pregnancy last year sometime between April and May after the 24th week of gestation.
At the hearing, Frazier rescinded her previous plea of “no contest” and legal counsel submitted a newly signed plea agreement with a guilty plea, also confirmed verbally in court by Frazier.
In a plea agreement, attorneys representing the matter agree to argue for a certain outcome to the court, and in this case, the District Attorney’s office agreed to ask the court for probation in the matter once she changed her plea to guilty. When signing a plea agreement, even though the arguing attorneys both recommend probation to the court, the sentence is ultimately determined by the court.
Sixth Judicial District Court Judge Michael Montero presided over the sentencing hearing.
The potential sentence for a category B manslaughter charge includes 1-10 years in prison with a maximum $10,000 fine and eligibility for probation.
Frazier gave an emotional statement to the court, expressing regret and difficulty dealing with what she did.
“The day this all happened I regret every bit of it, I wish I could go back and change something. I was scared, I was afraid, and yes, like he (Pasquale) said my life was a mess. I had nobody, I didn’t even have my family to count on; I was alone,” said Frazier. “A couple of months ago all of that changed. I’m trying to better my life and better myself and give the kids that are with me everything they deserve. I struggle every day to be okay. There’s days that my husband has to pick me up off the floor because I’m falling apart because I hate what happened and I hate that I did it and I can’t fix it and I can’t go back and change it. I just want a chance to prove that I’m not the person that I was that day and I’m sorry.”
Deputy District Attorney Kevin Pasquale said that his initial conclusion of Frazier was that she was “a mess,” confirmed by the pre-sentence investigation report, and asked for probation with jail time and drug court in the matter.
“Looking at the pre-sentence investigation report I see that Ms. Frazier by her own admission has been a drug abuser since she was 14 years of age, abusing marijuana since she was 14, methamphetamine since she was 15 and she doesn’t think it’s a problem,” said Pasquale. “My impression of how to best serve this community, how to best serve Patience Frazier, and how to best serve justice is to put her on probation and require as a condition of probation that she serve significant time in the Humboldt County jail; 364 days is my recommendation. The second condition of probation be that she attend and complete the Sixth Judicial Drug Court program. I think if she can do these things she will serve herself, serve the community, she will pay retribution for her criminal act and she’s not going to just come back here the same mess that she is now.”
Frazier’s attorney, Public Defender Matthew Stermitz argued that taking the life of a fetus is not the same as taking the life of a human being. He cited case law, particularly Roe V. Wade, which ruled that a woman has the right to have an abortion under the Fourteenth Amendment.
Stermitz said that in 1911, the Nevada statute determined that any woman who terminated a pregnancy after she was quick with child (the point at which a child’s movement could be felt) committed manslaughter. He said in the 1970s, states started legalizing abortion procedures and allowing a doctor to do it.
“The political argument was number one that women were doing it anyway and it was endangering their lives and men were complacent too because they often paid for them and a decision was made that it needed to be brought into the medical profession,” said Stermitz. “And the debate for legalizing abortion was, one, that it was a woman’s right and two, that there were women that their situations were such that it was not just to compel them to bring another life into the world; women with many children and no support.”
Stermitz said that after Roe V. Wade in 1973, the Supreme Court changed the language to say that a woman could not terminate a pregnancy after 24 weeks of gestation, rather than just saying “quick with a child.” Stermitz said that the language still calls the crime of terminating a pregnancy after the 24th-week manslaughter, although he said that clearly due to Roe V. Wade it should be out.
“It’s not a homicide, it’s feticide, it basically says that a woman cannot terminate a pregnancy beyond 24 weeks. It refers to a child of the pregnancy. It really should refer to fetus because a child of pregnancy still confuses the issue that we’re still talking about a human life. Murder and homicide in the state of Nevada are defined as killing a human being. Roe V. Wade indicates that the fetus is not a human being,” said Stermitz. “It’s unfortunate that the legislature didn’t remove it from the homicide statute because she’s now pled guilty to something that’s called manslaughter but under Roe V. Wade and the Nevada Supreme Court case it really is not the killing of a human being; it’s feticide.”
Stermitz said that Frazier at the time of the incident decided that she was going to terminate her pregnancy and explained that she didn’t want to bring a forth child into the world with no income and the threat of homelessness. He said she had originally booked an abortion appointment in Reno for and didn’t make it to the appointment because her car broke down.
Stermitz said that Frazier has had an unbelievably difficult life that includes being in foster care, pregnant as a teenager, being kidnapped for four months in 2013 by Timothy Warrens, who was arrested twice in the county for child rape and is serving time in Montana.
“I suspect like many women, or some women, she had misfeelings about what she did and she had regret. Let me remind the court that she didn’t cast this fetus into a garbage, she lovingly wrapped the child in a blanket, she took what looks like a sock monkey and wrapped the monkey’s arm in a brace around the fetus and buried it in the back yard,” said Stermitz. “As the regret set in she went to social media and on social media, she confessed that on this particular date (the day she terminated the pregnancy) that her life ended and she asked for forgiveness from the fetus that she named Abel.”
Stermitz said that in the state of Nevada, there isn’t any precedent for this particular crime and that case law is very scarce in the other states. Parole and Probation representative Debbie Okuma pointed out to the court that in the medical report, the term “infant” was used by the medical examiner, not “fetus.”
Frazier, now 27 years old, originally pleaded not guilty to a charge of manslaughter and concealing a birth after the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Department found a deceased infant she allegedly gave birth to buried at her residence on April 26, 2018. The infant was determined to have developed between 28-32 weeks in the gestation period, according to an HCSO report.
Due to Frazier’s plea of guilty, the District Attorney dismissed the misdemeanor concealing birth charge.
Montero ordered Frazier to serve 30-96 months in the Nevada Department of Corrections, with credit for 44 days time served. She was immediately remanded to the custody of the sheriff to carry out the sentence.
Frazier was also ordered to pay $153 DNA collection and analysis fee, $25 administrative assessment fee, $1,500 public defender fee and a $2,500 fine.
