THE GUILLOTINE SHOWN ABOVE IS A RECONSTRUTION

OF THE 1792 MODEL BUILT BY TOBIAS SCHMIDT WHICH

WAS USED TO CUT OFF THE HEADS OF KIND LOUIS XVI

AND MARIE ANTOINETTE AND THOUSANDS OF ORDINARY

FRENCH CITIZENS DURING THE REIGN OF TERROR OF THE FRENCH

REVOLUTION.

DECAPITATION is no longer practiced as a form of punishment by the so-called civilized nations of the west.
England which had preferred the more brutal hanging-drawing- quartering with knives and axes form or execution gave it up a hundred years or so ago.  Similarly, France, which preferred the more ‘elegant’ form of execution using the guillotine gave it up more recently.
However, decapitation is still the preferred form of execution in many of the Muslim countries and some Muslims have carried that tradition overseas with them when the immigrated to other lands.
Just last year a Muslim man in Buffalo, New York cut off the head of his wife when she informed him that she was going to seek a divorce.
But Muslims are not the only ones in the United States who look upon decapitation as desirable.  Here is the more recent story of a man in Texas who decapitated his wife:

POLICE SAY TEXAN DECAPITATED WIFE WITH CHAINSAW
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: April 28, 2010
DALLAS (AP) — Police are searching for a suburban Dallas man accused of decapitating his wife with a chainsaw.
Lewisville police have issued an arrest warrant for 49-year-old Jose Fernando Corona that charges him with the murder of his wife, Maria Corona.
The slain 44-year-old mother of six was discovered in the street near her home Monday. A bloody trail ran from her headless body to her house. Police found two chainsaws with blood and tissue matter nearby, one of them still running.
The Dallas Morning News reported Wednesday that Lewisville police Capt. Kevin Deaver said the couple had been having marital problems.
Deaver said Jose Corona has no prior criminal history. Police are asking state and federal authorities for help locating him.

THAT IS SHOCKING partly because it made the headlines in a newspaper.  But the truth is that every day throughout the United States doctors are cutting off the heads of some of the live infants in their mothers wombs as they perform a late trimester abortion.
It is welcome news that at least in one state citizens are trying to put a stop to the practice:

MINOT – A North Dakota grassroots pro-life organization is announcing that they plan to gather petitions for an initiated measure that would prohibit physicians from decapitating and crushing the skulls of live unborn children.
Daniel Woodard, head of the state-wide Stop Decapitation Network filed the paperwork to the North Dakota Secretary of State and Attorney General on Tuesday. The group aims to collect 12,844 signatures in order to place the measure on the 2010 or 2012 ballot. It would become law if a majority of North Dakotans vote for it.
According to Woodard, the initiated measure would provide a class A felony penalty to physicians participating in skull-crushing or decapitation abortions. That penalty would become a class AA felony if a skull fragment from the unborn child were to cause serious bodily injury to the mother during or following a decapitation or skull crushing abortion.
When asked about this legislation, Rep. Dan Ruby from Minot said, “I can hardly believe these crimes happen, especially when physicians can do fetal brain surgery. Any sane American knows that life-saving physicians are supposed to do no harm, most especially not crushing or removing the skulls of children who did nothing to deserve this. I wish Stop Decapitation Network every success on this inspiring endeavor.”
During a federal district court case out of New York in 2004, an abortionist, Dr. Stephen T. Chasen said that “the fetal head is extracted by placing the forceps around it and crushing it.” Dr. Chasen went on to say that he did not have “any caring or concern for the fetus whose head [he was] crushing.” Dr. Carolyn Westhoff, another abortionist, said, “For the vast majority of D&Es [it is] necessary either [to] crush or collapse the fetal skull.” She told the judge she does not use the word “crush” when speaking to her patients.

Here is some additional quotes from abortionists you can read on the stopdecapitation.com website:

Decapitationist Quotes
National Abortion Federation, et. al. v. Ashcroft
U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York
The Honorable Richard Conway Casey, Judge
Friday, April 2, 2004
DAY SEVEN: Thursday, April 8, 2004.
Excerpts from direct examination of Dr. Stephen T. Chasen:
Q. Dr. Chasen, in your experience, how is the fetal head extracted in a dismemberment D&E?
A. The fetal head is extracted by placing the forceps around it and crushing it.
Q. How readily is that — how easy is that to accomplish?
A. In some cases it is relatively easily accomplished and in other cases it is very difficult.
THE COURT: Does it hurt the baby?
THE WITNESS: I don’t know.
THE COURT: But you go ahead and do it anyway, is that right?
THE WITNESS: I am taking care of my patients, and in that process, yes, I go ahead and do it.
THE COURT: Does that mean you take care of your patient and the baby be damned, is that the approach you have?
THE WITNESS: These women who are having [abortions] at gestational ages they are legally entitled to it
THE COURT: I didn’t ask you that, Doctor. I asked you if you had any caring or concern for the fetus whose head you were crushing.
THE WITNESS: No.
DAY THREE: Wednesday, March 31, 2004
Excerpts from NAF’s direct examination of Dr. Cassing Hammond:
THE COURT: You explain what a compression of the calvarium is?
THE WITNESS: Yes, sir; that I do explain.
THE COURT: That that’s crushing the skull?
THE WITNESS: I explain that, yes.
DAY FOUR: Thursday, April 1, 2004.
Excerpts from direct examination of Dr. Cassing Hammond:
A. …a D&E that is by dismemberment … the last part of the procedure usually involves trying to get the head or calvarium out. What I am having to do in one of those procedures is to try to feel with an instrument up inside the uterus with this skull that is bobbing at the end of my instrument, and I have to get around it
~
THE COURT: Excuse me. You don’t feel any obligation whatsoever to protect the life of the fetus?
THE WITNESS: We are seeing –
THE COURT: I am asking you something.
THE WITNESS: With many of my patients, yes, particularly post-viability, your Honor.
THE COURT: You don’t find any dual responsibility, your obligation is only to the woman?
THE WITNESS: In the circumstances in which I am doing terminations, that is correct.
Excerpts from cross examination of Dr. Hammond:
Q. Doctor, don’t you make an effort when you perform D&E by dismemberment to count the fetal parts after the procedure is over?
A. No. We look for sentinel parts. … But we don’t count every single part that we’ve extracted after one of these procedures, no.
Q. Well you make an effort to count the four extremities and the head, don’t you?
A. That we do, yes.
DAY THREE: Wednesday, March 31, 2004
Excerpts from NAF’s direct examination of Dr. Timothy Johnson:
Q. Do you have an opinion, Dr. Johnson, as to which of the two D&E variations, the intact or the dismemberment variation, may best facilitate the extraction of the fetal skull during an abortion procedure?
A. I think that the intact procedure is actually developed in part to deal with the problem of the fetal skull. When one does a D&E, technically one of the challenges is to remove the fetal skull, partly because it is relatively large, partly because it is relatively calcified, and it is difficult to grasp on occasion. So one of the common technical challenges of a dismemberment D&E is what is called a free-floating head or a head that has become disattached and needs to be removed. This can lead to more passages of instruments through the cervix. And technically it is difficult to grasp the head; it is round, it slips out of the instruments that we generally use. Either those instruments or the head can be extruded outside the uterus and cause perforation.
~
THE COURT: What did they utilize to crush the head?
THE WITNESS: An instrument, a large pair of forceps that have a round, serrated edge at the end of it, so that they were able to bring them together and crush the head between the ends of the instrument.
THE COURT: Like the cracker they use to crack a lobster shell, serrated edge?
THE WITNESS: No.
THE COURT: Describe it for me.
THE WITNESS: It would be like the end of tongs that are combined that you use to pick up salad. So they would be articulated in the center and you could move one end, and there would be a branch at the center. The instruments are thick enough and heavy enough that you can actually grasp and crush with those instruments as if you were picking up salad or picking up anything with –
THE COURT: Except here you are crushing the head of a baby.
THE WITNESS: Correct.
DAY FIVE: Friday, April 2, 2004.
Excerpts from direct examination of Dr. Carolyn Westhoff:
THE COURT: I want to know whether that woman knows that you are going to take a pair of scissors and insert them into the base of the skull of her baby, of her fetus. Do you tell her?
THE WITNESS: I do not usually tell patients specific details of the operative approach. I’m completely –
THE COURT: Do you tell her that you are going to then, ultimately, suck the brain out of the skull?
THE WITNESS: In all of our D&Es the head is collapsed or crushed and the brains are definitely out of the skull but those are –
THE COURT: Do you tell them that?
THE WITNESS: Those are details that would be distressing to my patients and would not — information about that is not directly relevant to their safety.
THE COURT: Don’t — whether it’s relative to their safety or not don’t you think it’s since they’re giving authorization to you to do this act that they should know precisely what you’re going to do?
THE WITNESS: That’s actually not the practice I have of discussing surgical cases with patients.
THE COURT: I didn’t ask you that. I said don’t you think they ought to know?
THE WITNESS: No, sir, I don’t.
~
Q. How often will it be necessary to collapse the fetal skull during D&E whether the D&E proceeds by a dismemberment or more relatively intact, Doctor?
A. For the vast majority of D&Es [] be necessary it either crush or collapse the fetal skull.
THE COURT: Do you tell the woman that? Do you use the word crush?
THE WITNESS: Your Honor, I do not.
THE COURT: I didn’t think so.
~
Q. Is there a difference, Dr. Westhoff, between the way a head, fetal head may be collapsed in a D&E by dismemberment and the way it may be collapsed during a D&E performed by the intact [method]?
A. Yes. The approaches are different. In the dismemberment D&E the fetal head will be up inside the uterus. It is necessary to insert our forceps, open them as wide as possible to try to capture the head within the opening of the forceps and then crush the head using external force applied against the head. …With an intact D&E, when we have put a hole into the base of the skull we can generally do that under direct visualization because the base of the skull is, thanks to traction, held right in the cervical opening and so it is, in my experience and my opinion, less risky to put a hole in the base of the skull. Because the contents of the skull are liquid the skull contents may often drain out spontaneously as soon as there is a hole in the skull. In some cases it is necessary to use [suctioning]. …
THE COURT: Doctor, when you are doing any of these crushing procedures, whether it be to an extremity or to the body, the skull, does the baby, does the fetus ever make any noise or cry?
THE WITNESS: It absolutely does not. And in our setting it does not move. It does not withdraw, it does not move. It has very limited tone to its body.
DAY EIGHT: Wednesday, April 7, 2004
Excerpts from direct examination of Dr. Gerson Weiss:
Q. Is your ability to bring the fetus out intact affected by the fetal tissue at that gestational age that you perform D&Es?
A. The earlier the pregnancy the more fragile the fetus. So, grasping a fetus early on is more likely to tear it and less likely to allow you to bring it out whole. If the fetus were older its condition would be tougher enough that it could take, you could move it into an appropriate position easier.
Q. And you also testified that you have, when you were speaking with the Judge, that you have used suction to remove the brain of the fetus, is that right?
A. Yes.
Q. Is there another way that you have removed the head in the D&E procedures that you have performed?
A. Yes.
Q. What is that?
A. You can in a, before 18 weeks, sometimes grab the head with one instrument, with a grasping instrument in one hand and use a grasping instrument in the other hand to grab the rest of the head. Usually with a twist you can deflate the head enough to bring it through. So, it’s a crush –
THE COURT: Do you crush the head?
THE WITNESS: Yes, it could be a crushing; yes, early on.

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TRANSCRIPT HIGHLIGHTS
Leroy Carhart, M.D., et. al. v. Ashcroft
U.S. District Court, District of Nebraska
The Honorable Richard G. Kopf, Judge
DAY TWO: Tuesday, March 30, 2004s
Excerpts from direct examination of Dr. William Fitzhugh:
Q. ….what actions do you take during a D & E that would be fatal to the fetus?
A. Well, number one, I like to interrupt the umbilical cord. Number two, we are working on a young gestation, but that’s not to do it. And we break up parts in the uterus and we crush skulls.
DAY THREE: Wednesday, March 31, 2004.
Excerpts from Abortion Doctors’ direct examination of Dr. William Knorr:
Q. Dr. Knorr, before you begin to remove the fetus during a D & E procedure, is the fetus typically alive?
A. . . . . the majority of the fetuses are alive.
Q. And you don’t routinely induce fetal demise, as part of your second trimester abortion procedures, is that right?
A. That’s right. Very rarely.
Q. And why not?
A. I just don’t believe in it . I think that it’s an extra procedure and, you know, we first have to remember, don’t do any harm.
DAY FOUR: Thursday, April 1, 2004.
Excerpts from cross examination of Dr. Carhart:
Q. You recommend the use of ultrasound?
A. If — I think for second trimester D & E, it would be considered not within the standard of care to not have obtained an ultrasound. I don’t think there is a standard of care that involves the real-time, as you’re doing it, ultrasound. I know many, many doctors do not do that, [and] they do very well. I also know that I sleep better at night when I know what I’ve done.
Planned Parenthood v. Ashcroft
U.S. District Court, Northern District of California
The Honorable Phyllis J. Hamilton, Judge
DAY THREE: Thursday, April 1, 2004:
Excerpts from cross-examination of Dr. “Doe”:
Q. And let’s talk about that a little bit. Are the — can the bones of the calvarium, can they be sharp?
A. Yes.
Q. Are they in any — are they sharper say than the bones of the fetal leg or are they roughly comparable?
A. It depends on how — if it’s a disarticulation of how it went. A calvarium could be crushed and there are not sharp edges and the femur, which is a leg bone, could be broken and be sharper.
I think you can’t predict that. But I think any of the major long bones, certainly not ribs, but femur, humorous could be sharper than a calvarium that has been crushed.
Q. And when you are crushing the calvarium, there is the same risks that we talked about earlier, possible perforation or laceration of the cervix, the lower uterine segment, or the uterus; is that right?
A. Yes.
Q. And a cervical or uterine laceration, it can be relatively minor or it could be relatively severe; is that right?
A. Yes.
Q. If it’s severe enough, there are some cases where a woman might exsanguinate and die, right?
A. Yes.
Q. Can you tell us what exsanguinate means?
A. To bleed to death.
DAY FIVE: Tuesday, April 6, 2004
Excerpts from Planned Parenthood’s direct examination of Dr. Carolyn Westhoff:
Q. And in what way does it – looking at the reduction in the risk of injuring the woman with the sharp, boney fragments, if you can explain in a little more detail how that happens?
A. Well, I need to explain that by contrasting it to a D&E that involves disarticulating the fetus.
When the fetus is disarticulated, the skin and soft tissue covering the bones is disrupted, so sharp fragments of bone are exposed. And in the process of exposing them, grasping them, and removing them from the uterus there is the possibility that those boney fragments can lacerate at any level of the uterus and the cervix itself during extraction.
~
Q. Can the boney parts perforate the uterus in addition to lacerating it?
A. Yes, they can.
Q. Have you ever observed uterine perforation or laceration or cervical laceration as a result of instrument passes in a D&E with disarticulation?
A. Yes.
Q. Have you ever observed that happening as a result of sharp fetal parts?
A. Yes, I have.
~
Q. Is there an advantage to intact D&E in terms of not having retained tissue in the uterus after the procedure?
A. Yes, there is.
Q. What is the – what is that – can you explain that advantage in a little more detail?
A. Yes. When the fetus is removed in parts we attempt to account for all the parts on the operating table at the completion of the case. But it is entirely possible that small fragments of soft tissue can remain inside the uterus that we can’t be sure of. And even with, for instance, the sonographic scan, we may not be able to detect those, and that can lead to subsequent infection or hemorrhage on the part of the patient. We have, in fact, on our service had a case with a small fragment of retained skull leading to those very difficulties and requiring a second procedure subsequently to relieve those symptoms.
~
A. … In contrast, when I am retrieving a fetal skull that is floating free in the uterine cavity, I must pass instruments in an attempt to grasp it inside the uterus. And that is a blind use of instruments, which has more potential for perforation.