May 8, 1981: The Fourth Death Finally Got Authorities Moving

Twenty-four-year-old Maura Morales was eight weeks pregnant when she went to Women's Care Center in Miami for a safe and legal abortion on May 8, 1981. When she was in the recovery room, her heart went into spontaneous ventricular fibrillation -- irregular heartbeats not capable of effectively pumping blood. Maura was taken to a hospital, but died that day. 

I asked Grok for additional information about this case, and learned about possible causes of the ventricular fibrillation: 

• Overdosing, inadequate monitoring, or drug interactions during anesthesia for the abortion
• Instrumentation of the cervix or uterus could  have caused a vasovagal response or fluid shifts, disrupting normal potassium or magnesium levels
• An underlying heart problem

Other factors that could have contributed to Maura's death include lack of a defibrillator or properly trained staff to respond promptly and appropriately to Maura's ventricular fibrillation. Survival rates for ventricular fibrillation drop by 10% with each minute of delayed defibrillation. 

Maura was the fourth woman to die at the same facility. The others were Shirley Payne, Myrta Baptiste, and Ruth Montero.

Hipolito Barreiro

Women's Care Center was owned and operated by Hipolito Barreiro, an Argentine-trained doctor not licensed to practice in Florida. He was charged with manslaughter, witness tampering, and practicing medicine without a license in Shirley Payne's death. He was sued by Maura's widower, but it's unclear what role Barreiro played in her abortion. He ended up shuttering the facility permanently as he faced the lawsuits and criminal charges.

The string of deaths had already captured the attention of the Florida Abortion Council, a group of abortion clinic owners who organized to fight against health and safety regulations of abortion clinics. Their success in blocking regulation in 1978 left the door open for Maura's death. Their further success in 1980 allowed the quackery that killed Ruth, Myrta, and Shirley, along with other women who died from quackery in other Florida facilities over the years, including:

• Marina DeChapell, who died after an abortion with no emergency equipment on hand in1978
• Gloria Small, who bled to death from a high-risk abortion in 1978
• Barbara Lerner, who died of blood poisoning in1981
• Ellen Williams, who was sent home with raging peritonitis in 1985
• Katrina Poole, who was sent home to bleed to death in1988
• Pamela Colson, who was sent home to bleed to death in 1994
• Carolina Gutierrez, whose limbs blackened and had to be amputated before she finally died of sepsis in 1996

Sources:

• Florida Certificate of Death # 81-043232;
• "Fourth Woman Dies After Abortion At Miami Clinic," The Miami Herald, Jan. 5, 1983, 1D;
• "Miami police tie 4th death to abortions," The Times-Picayune, Jan. 6, 1983
• "Miami Abortion Clinic Closed Down," The Ocala Star-Banner, Jan. 11, 1983
• "Abortion clinic shut for good," The Miami News, January 15, 1983
• "Cluster of Abortion Deaths at a Single Facility," Kafrissen, Grimes, Hogue, Sacks, Obstetrics & Gynecology, 68:3, September 1986, 387-389