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Sunday, January 30, 2011

Am I missing anybody?

UPDATE: I found the CDC's most recent Abortion Surveillance Report, and will note for each year how many abortion deaths the CDC noticed. I'm missing some they noted; but then, they're also missing some that I noticed.

I'm Wikifying the Cemetery of Choice, and also listing the most recent 100 safe and legal abortion deaths in preparation for making signs for next year's March for Life.

I get the feeling I'm missing somebody. Here's what I have:

Moving backward chronologically:

2011: None noted yet.

2010: Alexandra Nunez

2009: Ying Chen
Karnamaya Mongar

2008: None listed

2007: Edrica Goode
Laura Hope Smith

2006: Laura Grunas
"Wanda" Roe

2005 (CDC reported 7): Oriane Shevin
Christin Gilbert
"Cherish" Roe
"Tara" Roe

2004: (CDC reported 7) Tamiaa Russell
Chanelle Bryant

2003: (CDC reported 10) Leigh Ann Alford
Regina Johnson
Holly Patterson
Vivian Tran

2002: (CDC reported 9) Diana Lopez
"Adelle" Roe
Brenda Vise
Stacy Zallie

2001: (CDC reported 6) "Haley Mason"

2000: (CDC reported 11) L'Echelle Head
Kimberly Neil
Nicey Washington

That's 25 from 2000 on.

Saturday, January 29, 2011

Reality versus Rhetoric

HT: Jill Stanek

CBR’s shocking, graphic video juxtaposed a soothing video produced by the Northland Family Planning Centers, a late-term abortion chain of 3 mills in Michigan, with the reality of abortion.

CBR’s video got such a huge initial response, CEO Gregg Cunningham decided to take some time to remaster it to grotesque perfection. CBR is calling this video “the most shocking 4-minute abortion debate you will ever see.” CBR may be right…

This video is posted at Pro-Life Tube, where it will never be removed.
Read about Northland's malpractice history here.

Northland's sales strategy seems to be to just repeat, "We think you're NIC E and GOOD!" over and over again to try to drown out the woman's own conscience:
When a woman becomes pregnant, she is posed with a question. She must decide whether or not she is ready to bring new life into the world.
Note how they are taking as a given an unproven point -- that every positive pregnancy test does (and should) lead to actively pondering whether or not to let the baby live. A presumption of abortion is made.
Ultimately, the choice should come from a loving heart and a clear head.
A loving heart and clear head combination will never result in a decision to abort. A woman who has a loving heart might, for misguided reasons, feel trapped into aborting her baby because she doesn't realize she has other options. A woman with a clear head will realize full well that she's choosing to kill her baby because she's not loving enough to pursue the other options. But you can't love your baby and clear-headedly choose a horrific death for that baby. This is a transparent attempt to reassure women who don't want to abort -- who feel awful about it -- that it really is necessary and therefore loving.
[T]here are many helpful tools available to help you work through the decision-making process, including Northland’s Head and Heart Counseling, an unbiased, free pregnancy counseling service offered exclusively by Northland Family Planning.
Isn't that convenient? They offer a free service to reassure you that the abortion you're feeling trapped into really is not only necessary, but loving and good! And the fact that the abortion puts money in their pockets is just a coincidence.
Making a choice about your pregnancy can be a gift of learning and growth. It is an invitation for you to develop a larger vision of yourself. It’s a way to practice compassion and loving kindness toward yourself.”
This is wrong on so many levels. They're trying to convince the reluctant woman that putting herself through this needless anguish will be GOOD FOR HER. Studies have shown that one of the reasons women end up choosing abortion is that they're unable to develop a larger vision of themselves -- one that includes motherhood. Northland wants the woman to expand her vision of herself to include killer of her own child. Note how they try to convince the woman to be "normal" by choosing to abort:

You can take comfort in knowing your feelings about abortion are not unique; everyday women are faced with the same choice.

Did you know?

  • Over 1/3 of American women will have an abortion by the age of 45.
  • Women of all ages, races, economic backgrounds and religious beliefs have abortions.
  • Over 1 million abortions occur in the United States each year
Come on, honey! EVERYBODY'S doing it!
Women who are willing to explore how they feel and what they think can come to a peaceful resolution about their pregnancy. To get there, you must be willing to work at it. The exercises offered by the counselors at Northland Family Centers or in the workbook, mean you must do some soul searching and do some “homework.” It may be the most important assignment you ever do.
But notice that aside from a single passing mention of choosing birth because you're certain you're ready, everything very quietly assumes that of course, the ultimate answer will be to abort -- that it's your job to just find a way to convince yourself to do it and then feel good about it afterward.

Taking Abby Johnson's lead -- Let the abortion docs speak for themselves

HT: Big Blue Wave

A randomized pilot study on the effectiveness and side-effect profiles of two doses of digoxin as fetocide when administered intraamniotically or intrafetally prior to second-trimester surgical abortion., Nucatola D, Roth N, Gatter M., Planned Parenthood, Los Angeles

This study is about the digoxin injection technique Kermit Gosnell tried to use before he gave up due to lack of skill and went back to just "snipping" the live-born babies' spines.

BACKGROUND: Digoxin is commonly used to facilitate second-trimester surgical abortion despite limited data regarding its safety and effectiveness for this indication.


1. Isn't it interesting that they've been using it all these years, until it's common practice, "despite limited data regarding its safety and effectiveness"?

2. The way it facilitates the abortions is ... well, I'll take the words directly from Martin Haskell of the National Abortion Federation: "Fetal death and ensuing autolysis soften the tissues." And why does the noble physician need to do this? "Classic D&E is accomplished by dismembering the fetus inside the uterus with instruments and removing the pieces through an adequately dilated cervix. However, most surgeons find dismemberment at twenty weeks and beyond to be difficult due to the toughness of fetal tissues at this stage of development."

STUDY DESIGN: Fifty-two women presenting for elective termination of pregnancy between 18 and 24 weeks' gestation were randomized to one of four digoxin treatment groups:


"Elective" between 18 and 24 weeks. Not serious maternal health concerns. Not babies with congenital problems. Elective abortions for social reasons.

They divided the women into four groups. Two groups got injections of different doses of digoxin into the amniotic fluid. Two got different doses of digoxin injected directly into their unborn babies' hearts.

Ultrasound was used to assess for the presence of fetal cardiac activity prior to the abortion procedure. Data on the presence and severity of pain, nausea and other potential side effects were collected before digoxin injection, immediately following digoxin injection and on the day after digoxin injection.


So they used an ultrasound to make sure the babies' hearts had stopped. The "pain, nausea, and other potential side effects" were measured in the mother, since nobody cared if the babies suffered any pain as they were either bathed in a digoxin solution or had cardiac syringes full of digoxin poked into their hearts.

Digoxin toxicity, which of course can be fatal, was being deliberately induced in the babies, and they were trying to avoid inflicting on the mother.

RESULTS: Digoxin effectively induced fetal death in 87% of women. The failure rate did not vary by route of administration (IA or IF) and was not lowered by increasing the dose from 1.0 to 1.5 mg. IF injections induced fetal death more rapidly than IA injections. Digoxin administration did not result in increased pain or nausea.

CONCLUSIONS: IA or IF injection of digoxin is safe and effective for inducing fetal death prior to second-trimester surgical abortion. Doses greater than 1.0 mg may not be necessary.


Translation: Injecting the digoxin directly into the baby kills him faster, but not any more effectively. Thirteen percent will survive the overdose.

The abstract doesn't say what they do to fetuses who survive the injections, but I'm assuming that they're just dismembered alive.

Could they have survived if they'd just been delivered and not attacked with malice aforethought?

I found preemie survival rates here:

  • 22 weeks: 0-10% survival rate
  • 23 weeks: 10-35% survival rate
  • 24 weeks: 40-70% survival rate
  • 25 weeks: 50-80% survival rate
  • 26 weeks: 80-90% survival rate
  • 27 weeks: greater than 90% survival rate

    This page addresses errors in estimating gestational age: "The accuracy of ultrasound in predicting gestational age gets worse as the pregnancy advances. By 20 weeks, ultrasound is accurate only to within plus or minus two weeks, and by the third trimester, its accuracy falls to plus or minus 3 weeks." Which means that some of those fetuses could have actually been as old as 27 weeks.
  • Today's anniversaries

    Today we have three criminal abortion anniversaries -- two of which were revealed after authorities were alerted and ordered the women's bodies exhumed for autopsy. So much for the theory that nobody was paying attention because doctors weren't keeping medical records of the abortions they perpetrated.

  • On January 29, 1883, a widow named Adeline Savroch died on the scene from a criminal abortion. Midwife Bertha Twachaus was held without bail for murder in Adeline's death. A saloon keeper named Julius Grosse, and his housekeeper, Celia Arlep, were held as accessories. The most likely scenario is that the saloon keeper and the housekeeper arranged the abortion for Adeline, and perhaps helped Twachaus to try to cover up the real cause of death.

  • Rose Lipner, age 32, mother of 2, died at Riverdale Hospital on January 29, 1936. Dr. Maxwell C. Katz, who lived at Riverdale (maternity) Hospital, which he operated, signed a death certificate indicating that Rose had been operated on for a tumor. After the funeral, an anonymous caller notified police that the death was suspicious, and Rose was exhumed for an autopsy. The medical examiner determined that Rose had died from an abortion. Katz was arraigned for second-degree manslaughter. Contrary to popular belief, it wasn't an easy thing to hide abortion deaths back when complicity in the cover-up could land you in prison as an accessory. Rose's abortion was typical in that it was performed by a doctor, as was the case with perhaps 90% of criminal abortions.

  • On December 28, 1857, Olive Ash and her twin sister, Olivia, left their home and went by rail to the home of their cousin, Levi M. Aldrich, in Bradford, ostensibly to visit his widowed mother. During the visit, Olive seemed to her family to be in normal health. The sisters remained at Aldrich's home about two weeks, then said that they were going to meet some friends at the Fairlee depot for an excursion into New York or Massachusetts. Instead, when they arrived at Fairlee depot they took a wagon to the home and office of Dr. William Howard, about six miles north of the depot and three miles south of Bradford.

    On Friday, January 29, 1858, Olive's mother got a telegram telling her to come to Howard's home. She quickly complied, and was there when her daughter died at about 6 in the evening. Dr. Howard got a coffin for Olive, and the twins' mother took her daughter's body by train to Sutton.
    On February 3, Olive's body was exhumed for an autopsy, which revealed what Olivia had already known: Olive had died from complications of an abortion. Dr. Howard was convicted of murder in Olive's death.

    See Olive's memorial at Find a Grave.




    For more on pre-legalization abortion, see The Bad Old Days of Abortion

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  • Friday, January 28, 2011

    Gosnell's NAF connection to be investigated!

    Attorney General to Probe Second Gosnell Abortion Center

    The National Abortion Federation facility that employed Kermit Gosnell, and let him start at least six of his illegal late abortions there, isn't getting glossed over. It's getting investigated:

    Late Thursday, Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden said his office will launch a “wide-ranging” investigation of Gosnell and probe his work at the Delaware abortion facility given the vast problems at his Pennsylvania abortion center.

    “Like most of us, I’m disturbed by the allegations that were handed up by the grand jury in Philadelphia,” said Biden, according to the News Journal newspaper. He said the probe will focus on “a range of issues and we want to get to the bottom of it.”

    “It is under way and has been under way,” Biden said of the probe, and he indicated staff from his office and Delaware investigators have already met with officials from Pennsylvania to determine if any criminal acts of violations of state health and safety standards occurred in Delaware or by those associated with Gosnell in the state.

    The announcement of the probe come on the same day members of Delaware Right to Life and national pro-life groups called for investigations into whether Atlantic and the two other abortion clinics that operate in Delaware are following state laws.


    I love the way the reporter, Sean O'Sullivan, has been on the case:

    Calls to Atlantic Women's Medical Services -- which appeared closed Thursday because of the snow -- have been referred to Philadelphia attorney Nino V. Tinari, who has been unavailable for comment since last week.


    O'Sullivan has also identified the Delaware group that funded many of the Gosnell abortions, Delaware Pro-Choice Medical Fund, and has been trying to contact them to no avail.

    Anniversary: Another Black woman on the altar of Choice

    On January 28, 1974, after twelve days on life support, 38-year-old Evangeline McKenna was pronounced dead in Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles.

    She had checked in for a safe, legal abortion two weeks earlier, and had opted to have a tubal ligation at the same time. Two days later, she had a seizure, stopped breathing, and went into cardiac arrest. Doctors told the family that Evanegline was brain dead, but they held out hope and asked that she be put on life support, where she remained until her death twelve days later.

    Evangeline's death, in addition to being a tragedy for her family and loved ones, also highlights the disproportionate damage that legal abortion causes among Blacks in the United States. Though black women are only 13% of the female population in the US, and though they are more likely than white women to oppose abortion, they account for a full 35% of legal abortions reported. Black women, like Evangeline, also account for fully 50% of reported legal abortion deaths.

    Evangeline's story in a minute:

    For more abortion deaths, visit the Cemetery of Choice:



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    Thursday, January 27, 2011

    Calls for national review of abortion oversight

    Pro-life Groups Ask For Federal Inspections, Congressional Hearings In Wake of Gosnell, Brigham Abortion Scandals:

    Philadelphia, PA – Operation Rescue joins with the Christian Defense Coalition, Generation Life, and other groups in calling for federal inspections of every abortion clinic in America and for Congressional hearings into the political corruption that has covered up for squalid mills and dangerous abortion practices in the wake of recent abortion scandals that have claimed the lives of women and newborn infants.

    “The illegal and dangerous practices discovered at Gosnell’s ‘house of horrors’ are not isolated incidents,” said Operation Rescue President Troy Newman. ....

    This story of abortion horrors come at the same time that other abortion abuses are making news, adding urgency to the call for inspections and a Congressional investigation. Here is a partial listing.

  • New Jersey abortionist Steven Chase Brigham’s medical license was suspended last September after an investigation into a botched abortion uncovered that he was operating an illegal late-term abortion ring that spanned two states. Police raided his Maryland clinic and discovered the bodies of 35 late-term babies that were illegally aborted.
  • Utah abortionist Nicola Riley, Brigham’s associate, was formally charged last week by the Maryland Board of Physicians for her part in the criminal abortion scheme and for lying about a felony conviction and incarceration in order to fraudulently obtain a medical license. Complaints have been filed in Utah demanding her suspension there as well.
  • Massachusetts abortionist Rapin Osathanondh was convicted and jailed last September for manslaughter in the abortion death of Laura Hope Smith. Osathanondh lacked trained staff and emergency equipment to save Laura’s life after she suffered a reaction to anesthesia.
  • California abortionist Andrew Rutland, who was accused by the state medical board of homicide in the botched abortion death of Ying Chen, has agreed to surrender his medical license on February 11, 2011. Rutland continues to be under criminal investigation and could face murder charges.
  • Kentucky abortionist Hamid Sheikh, whose medical license was revoked amid revelations that he was running a “hellish abortion operation,” is scheduled to go to trial February 8, 2011, on four counts of fraud for bilking Medicaid out of fees for services he did not render.
  • Nebraska late-term abortionist LeRoy Carhart remains under criminal investigation after former employees blew the whistle on his illegal and shoddy abortion practices in 2009. His Nebraska medical license could be at stake. A complaint has also been filed in Maryland, where he misrepresented the true nature of his practice to authorities there in order to gain licensure.
  • I'd not known about Hamid Sheikh. In some ways he parallels Gosnell in that his filthy, unsafe abortion mill was also discovered during an investigation into other issues, in Sheikh's' case, Medicaid fraud. There was also the issue of a failure by the medical board to address the problems when they were first reported. Here's a video news report:



    According to this medical board document, dated April 26, 2009:

    The Board had a consultant review twenty-two of Sheikh's patient charts, and that Complaint noted that the consultant's overall opinion of Sheikh's medical practice was that it was "clearly below minimum standards" and that Sheikh had committed gross negligence. The consultant stated the Sheikh "constitutes a danger to health, welfare, and safety of the physician's practice.


    Sheikh was being investigated by the Mecaid Fraud and Abuse Control Division in the Attorney General's Office, which found "additional issues of concern" which were "numerous and relate to quality of care, health and safety standards, and regulartoy compliance." Specifically, they found "expired medications, un-sterile equipment, unsanitary conditions, missing or inoperable equipment necessary for either general medical and/or emergency situations, concerns with proper counseling/instruction standards prior to the performance of certain medical procedures, etc."

    "Inspection of Dr. Iskh's office by investigation found it to be dirty and disorganized. No stethoscopes, thermometers, biohazard containers, or sharp containers were found in either exam room. Many of the medications in the office were grossly outdated. The lone log of I.V. fluids expired in 1998. Oxygen cylinders located in the exam rooms had no regulator. Counter tops were dirty and rusty."

    "The maintenance of medical records were abysmal." Sheikh, as his patients had asserted, did not record pre-op, intra-op, or post-op vitals. There were no operative records for the abortions. Medications were inadequately documented if they were documented at all.

    The documents relate the stories patients reporting unbearable pain, being scolded for crying out in pain because they were scaring the other patients, lack of informed consent, lack of pre-abortion physical examinations, being given dirty towels or sheets to cover themselves, and having their insurance billed for procedures they'd already paid for. In addition to the extreme physical pain, the patients reported being highly emotionally wounded by their ordeals.

    One patient, there for a non-abortion procedure, was troubled by the bloody covers and instruments, and the fact that Sheikh and his assistants didn't wear gloves when examining and treating her. She said she had to tell Sheikh to put a cover on the ultrasound probe before inserting it in her vagina. As this patient went into another room to await the results of her ultrasound, another patient was taken into the exam room. The non-abortion patient heard this patient screaming, and when she emerged from the exam room, she was wrapped in the blood-stained "metallic blue blanket" that the ultrasound patient had refused to wrap herself in. This patient, in obvious pain, had blood running down her legs. Sheikh, with a large blood stain on his knee, informed the ultrasound patient that she had a retroverted uterus and should have sex with her husband "doggie style" 4-5 times daily to "fix it." This patient went to another doctor who confirmed the diagnosis of retroverted uterus but had never encountered any medical literature recommending Shheikh's recommended treatment.

    Another patient, seeking treatment in November of 2007 for spotting after a miscarriage, was given paperwork that asked very few questions about her medical history but referred to abortions. This patient questioned that, and "was reassured no abortions were performed." Sheikh gave her no pain medication and performed a D&C that caused her so much pain that her sister, who had accompanied her, feared she would pass out. After being sent home the patient expelled blood and clots and had to seek follow up care from other medical professionals. Sheikh, who charged $400 for early abortions, charged this uninsured patient $1000 for the D&C that had only made her symptoms worse.

    An abortion patient was asked for no medical history other than the date of her last period. There was no protective cover on the vaginal ultrasound probe; the patient later developed an infection. The patient "had to be held down and she passed out during the procedure. Dr. Sheikh must have encountered some type of difficulties during the procedure due to the fact that he left the room and returned with other instruments, which appeared to be like a knitting needle. Dr. Sheikh instructed her not to scream during the procedure and requested that she leave via the back door in order not to upset the other patients." She was told not to go to any other medical facility for follow-up because "the would be judgmental due to her having an abortion." This patient paid $400 cash, and learned that Sheikh billed her insurance company for services he had not provided. But, this medical board investigation notes, a prior medical board review of this patient's case by another medical board investigator found no violations of standards in Sheikh's treatment of this patient. This led the board to question that first consultant's judgment.

    The board investigated Sheikh's questionable billing practices. He claimed that he provided his patients with Lidocaine prior to their abortions, but this wasn't documented on patient charts and there was no Lidocaine on the premises. When pressed about this, he retrieved a large amount of grossly expired Lidocaine from is vehicle. What medications he did have on site were several years out of date. The only medications on site that were not past their expiration date were birth control pills. The only bag of IV fluids on the premises had expired in 1998.

    Sheikh also had no transfer agreements with a hospital or ambulance service to provide care should a patient experience a medical emergency. He had none of the state-mandated informed-consent material on site.

    Gosnell-like California quack surrenders license over patient death

    Practitioner Loses License, Killed Woman in Failed Abortion

    The abortionist who killed Ying Chen -- a death ruled a homicide by the LA County Coroner -- has surrendered his license. Again.

    There are many parallels to the current outrage over seedy abortionist Kermit Gosnell:

  • Both operated in facilities that were not abortion-focused. Rutland performed Ying's abortion in an acupuncture clinic; Gosnell performed the fatal abortion on Karnamaya Mongar in a multipurpose facility that was also a local pill mill.

  • Both facilities were described as filthy and ill-equipped.

  • Both Ying and Karnamaya were overdosed on anesthesia.

  • Both Rutland and Gosnell delayed unnecessarily before calling 911.

  • Both doctors had patient deaths that were ruled homicide by the Medical Examiner (in Gosnell's case, the dead patient was Semika Shaw)

  • Both doctors severed babies' spinal columns, though Rutland did this by accident with forceps during a delivery, while Gosnell did it on purpose after delivery.

  • In both cases, failures by the medical board allowed the patient deaths -- in Rutland's case, by giving him back his license; in Gosnell's case, by failing to take his license in the first place.

    Rutland has voluntarily surrendered his license, a la Steven Chase Brigham, in order to halt the investigation against him. I'm guessing he figures he can wait for the outrage to blow over, then get his license back.
  • 1987: Rushed abortion leaves woman in fatal coma

    On January 27, 1987, 37-year-old Belinda Byrd breathed her last in a Los Angeles hospital. On January 24, she had been one of 74 women processed through safe and legal abortions at Inglewood Women's Hospital in Los Angeles, California. Her abortion, one of 24 rushed through in the last two hours of the day, was performed by Steven Pine.

    Belinda was left unattended for three hours after the abortion, and was found unresponsive. Staff at Inglewood delayed an additional two hours before transferring her to a hospital with appropriate emergency services. She remained comatose until her death.

    Belinda's mother wrote to a Los Angeles district attorney:
    I am the mother of Belinda Byrd, victim of abortionists at [Inglewood]. I am also the grandmother of her three young children who are left behind and motherless.

    I cry every day when I think how horrible her death was. She was slashed by them and then she bled to death ... and nobody cares. I know that other young black women are now dead after abortion at that address. ... Where is [the abortionist] now? Has he been stopped? Has anything happened to him because of what he did to my Belinda? Has he served jail time for any of these cruel deaths? People tell me nothing has happened, that nothing ever happens to white abortionists who leave young black women dead. I'm hurting real bad and want some justice for Belinda and all other women who go like sheep to slaughter.


    In the wake of the series of abortion deaths at Inglewood, the authorities inspected the place. Among other things, they caught an abortionist writing post-operative examination notes without even examining the patients. When the state closed Inglewood for numerous violations, the facility simply re-opened as Inglewood Women's Clinic; as a clinic rather than a hospital they were no longer subject to the same intense scrutiny and were able to remain in business.

    Other women known to have died after abortions at the Inglewood facility include Kathy Murphy, Cora Lewis, Lynette Wallace, and Elizabeth Tsuji.

    Belinda's story in a minute:

    For more abortion deaths, visit the Cemetery of Choice:



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    Wednesday, January 26, 2011

    Niche markets take different angles on Gosnell case

  • Mt. Lebanon man arrested for murder in abortion case, in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, focuses on their local boy, Steven Massof. The arrest surprised everybody, who said he was a really nice guy. Other than the snipping live-born babies' spines, I guess. This paper also noted that six of their local abortion clinics were told in the wake of recent inspections to clean up their acts.

  • The Post-Gazette likewise took an interest in the local angle. Mt. Lebanon man held on murder charges in abortion clinic probe:

    An online resume of Mr. Massof's posted on LinkedIn lists his most recent job as a team leader for the Dial America telemarketing company in Pittsburgh, where he had worked from April of last year until the present.

    A woman who answered the phone at Dial America said that the company had no comment on Mr. Massof's status there.


    It's gotta gross them out, if nothing else.

    They also note that Massof's resume paints a different picture of his work for Gosnell than what he told the Grand Jury:

    Mr. Massof described his duties at the clinic in his LinkedIn resume as surveillance and treatment of sexually transmitted diseases and as identifying infectious diseases in children that are preventable by vaccines.


  • blAck America Web takes the angle, Black Abortion Doctor Accused of Killing Newborns, but only in the headline. They otherwise just pass along the AP article.

  • Delaware Online took a local angle, Grisly abortions linked to Del., and focused a bit more on Atlantic Women’s Medical Services and Gosnell workers Lynda Williams and Sherry West. Another article, Doctor's license swiftly suspended, also zeroes in on the pair, noting: that they 'were "by all accounts the least competent and most careless of Gosnell's ... unqualified crew," according to the report. Williams and Gosnell could face the death penalty.'

  • A local reporter interviewed Gosnell, who either has a downright psychotic break with reality, or is the most glib liar that ever walked the earth. That same newspaper also allowed former Gosnell patients to speak their minds.

  • This local story asks Gosnell's neighbors about him:

    Kermit Gosnell was known in the West Philadelphia neighborhood where he grew up and worked all his life as the go-to person for services other doctors wouldn't provide: a loosely justified prescription or a late-night illegal abortion.

    Still, neighbors reacted with shock Thursday to news of a grand jury report that described Gosnell's severing the spinal cords of babies delivered in the third trimester of pregnancy, spreading disease with infected instruments, and perforating patients' wombs and bowels.

    ....

    For years, Gosnell's medical practice had been growing increasingly reckless, with unlicensed, unsupervised workers as young as 15 administering intravenous sedation and assisting women in labor, according to the grand jury report.

    But his practice continued to draw from his community, where he was once a "respected man," according to a 1972 Inquirer article. He was a finalist for the Junior Chamber of Commerce's "Young Philadelphian of the Year" because of his work directing the Mantua Halfway House, a rehab clinic for drug addicts.

    Khloe Robinson, 22, said Gosnell's Mantua roots were one reason she went to him in September 2007 for an abortion nearly six months into a pregnancy.

    "I trusted him because he lived in the neighborhood, and I grew up in the neighborhood," said Robinson, whose family lives a block from Gosnell.

    But Robinson was alarmed when she learned a girl from her high school would assist on the procedure. Afterward, Robinson was hospitalized for more than a week with a kidney infection, she said.

    Brittnye Drew, 20, said she still felt unsettled about the abortion Gosnell performed for her two years ago. Drew, who lives down the street from Gosnell, was three months pregnant when she paid him about $600 in cash for the procedure.

    The exam room was filthy, she said, and "pickle jars" lined the walls. Investigators later found jars containing the feet of aborted fetuses.

    "When I found out that he got locked up," Drew said, "I was speechless."

    ....

    A 21-year-old neighbor who declined to give her name said she was 61/2 months pregnant when she visited Gosnell, paying him $1,300 in cash for an abortion completed in the middle of the night. She was 16, naive, and was never told that her abortion was illegal under Pennsylvania law, she said.

    At 24 weeks - about 51/2 months - the fetus can usually survive outside the womb, so many states, including Pennsylvania, outlaw abortion except to save the woman's life or health.

    The 21-year-old remembers nothing of what happened during the procedure.

    "Did they snap that baby - my baby's - neck?" she wondered Thursday.

    ....

    Renee Anderson, 57, who grew up in Mantua and lived six blocks from Gosnell's home for many years, said she worked at his Lancaster Avenue clinic briefly in 1986.

    At that time, she said, his facilities and services were respectable. Although she left after less than a year, it was because she got tired of working "ungodly hours" and found the doctor "arrogant" - not because of deplorable conditions.

    "When I worked there, it was a clean facility," said Anderson, who now lives in Darby. "And the medical waste was always picked up. I was surprised to read about the bags of waste and fetal parts."

    ....

    Another question Smalley and his firm are delving into: Where is Gosnell's money?

    The grand jury estimated that Gosnell "took in as much as $10,000 to $15,000 a night, mostly in cash" - generating $1.8 million a year. (The jury said this was not including the money from Gosnell's alleged illegal narcotics trafficking, which is still under investigation by federal authorities.)

    Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams said $250,000 was found at Gosnell's home when authorities raided it.

    But Gosnell's other obvious assets - his house, a beach home in Brigantine bought in 1992, and a multiunit rental property - belie his estimated income.
  • Best of the web on Gosnell

    Kermit Gosnell continues to be a hot topic in some circles. Here are some of the best of what's out there at this time:

  • ‘Scores’ of victims of ‘House of Horrors’ abortionist tell of forced abortions, lifelong injuries: "“Scores” of Philadelphia abortionist Kermit Gosnell’s victims are coming forward after his arrest last week, says Pennsylvania’s District Attorney. Many women are detailing the horrid atrocities in the media, with some alleging that he even forced them to abort their child."

  • The secular source is for this report is here: Alleged Victim Calls Philadelphia Abortion Doc Kermit Gosnell a 'Monster': "Since the arraignment of Gosnell and members of his staff, they've received several calls from women claiming to be victims, District Attorney Christine Wechsler said. "Phones are ringing off the hook. There are scores of women," Wechsler said. Wechsler said that the claims of Reid and Gaither sound very similar to the behavior documented in the grand jury report and in the phone calls they've received since late last week."

  • Elmer Smith: This monster wasn't the kid I once knew: "KERMIT GOSNELL was that kid that your mother always said you should be like. He represented the best and brightest in our neighborhood, the kind of boy we all knew was going to make something of himself someday. So, I'm struggling to reconcile that child of promise with the ghoulish fiend whose horrific acts were described in the grand-jury report that led to eight murder charges on Wednesday."

    The article goes on to reflect on the Grand Jury Report:

    A grand jury that sat through months of testimony might never be able to erase those images.

    "We had witnesses who broke down and grand jurors who begged us, 'Please, don't show us that picture,' " said Assistant District Attorney Joanne Pescatore, who presented the case with Assistant District Attorney Christine Wechsler.

    ....

    Wechsler and Pescatore said they had no idea how heinous the crimes were when they got started.

    "It was a total shock and it continued to shock as we uncovered it," Wechsler said.

    "Every witness taught us something else. It snowballed. We didn't know about how he induced labor or how he killed them until we got the remains of the babies with snips in their spinal cords."


    Then he goes back to musing about the man he used to know: "I'm still trying to figure out what happened in the years since I've seen Kermit Gosnell that may have turned one of our best and brightest into a man who murdered babies for profit."

    It makes me think of Theodore Roosevelt Mason Howard, who went from stalwart defender of the poor to seedy abortionist who couldn't see his own deteriorated condition.

  • Report: Abortion Doctor Charged In Woodbridge Woman's Death is an AP story that does something shocking for a MSM article. It actually describes how late abortions are performed: "In a typical late-term abortion, the fetus is dismembered in the uterus and then removed in pieces. That is more common than the procedure opponents call "partial-birth abortion," in which the fetus is partially extracted before being destroyed."
  • 1990: Clinic later linked to Gosnell lets patient die

    Ingar Lee Whittington Weber died January 26, 1990, in a Louisiana hospital. She had been treated for acute kidney failure after a safe and legal abortion performed at Delta Women's Clinic in Baton Rouge on January 20. This is, from what I can tell, the same Delta clinic where one of Kermit Gosnell's unlicensed staffers used to work.

    Ingar's family sued the clinic and its doctors, Richardson P. Glidden and Thomas Booker. They faulted the doctors with failing to diagnose Ingar's kidney problems, or her deteriorating physical condition, before, during, or after the abortion.

    Delta had also been sued following the death of another abortion patient. This woman was most likely 27-year-old Sheila Hebert, who died after an abortion on June 6, 1984.

    Delta was sued for an abortion performed in 1984 which left the patient with a uterine laceration and a retained fetal leg. She had to be hospitalizcd. Delta was sued after an abortion in 1974 that so badly damaged the patient's uterus that she needed a hysterectomy. Another patient reported that after surgery at Delta in 1998, she had to have a colostomy.

    Delta shut down in 2001 after an electrical problem caused a fire which gutted the facility, but later reopened in another building.

    Ingar's story in a minute:

    1956: Roommates seek abortions together; one dies

    Lois Brown was tried in the Superior Court of Santa Barbara County of second degree murder and abortion in the January 26, 1956 death of Lucy Sanchez.

    Statements by Lucy before her death were corroborated by the testimony of her friends. Lucy's sister testified that three or four months before her death, Lucy had told her that she was pregnant and planning an abortion. A man named Ira Gin testified that about two months prior to the abortion, Lucy had told him she was pregnant and planning to go to Tijuana for an abortion. Some time in November or December of 1955, Gin had brought Lois Brown to the cafe where Lucy worked and introduced them, telling Lucy, "This is the lady you want to see." Brown had told Lucy, "I know a lady who can help you." They made an appointment to meet in front of the post office at 6:00 the following day. Brown also gave Lucy her phone number.

    Lucy and her roommate, Clara Thornton, were both pregnant. They went to Brown, who said that her name was Vi, on January 18, 1956.

    Clara testified that she and Lucy met Brown on the street and got into a car with her. Brown asked "how far along I was and I told her that I was three months along. She said I didn't have anything to worry about. Lois said that Lucy was a bit further ahead of me [six months pregnant] and it was a little more dangerous for her to go through with it, but said she would be all right, if Lucy would be in the care of Vi and present to tie the baby's navel cord and watch her from hemorrhaging."

    Then, Clara testified, Lucy got out of the car and went back home, while Brown drove Lucy to her practice. Clara, who had been in good health, paid $100. Brown used a syringe to inject Clara with a solution which looked and smelled like Lifebouy soap. Clara said that Brown told her that she needed money "and she wished she could take us both. She said she was doing it to us for $100 and she usually did it for $200 in Los Angeles." A syringe was entered into evidence, not as the actual syringe used in the abortion, but identified by Clara as similar to the one used by Brown.

    Brown then took Clara to the cafe where Lucy worked and "told Lucy that I was going to be all right and told her that she would see her later and see if she could get any money to go through with hers."

    Clara and Lucy went home, accompanied by their friend Beatrice Duran. Clara had "kind of a watery discharge," and the next morning "I started getting bad pains and then I started flowing blood, and then I was in terrible pain and then I went to the bathroom and passed a clot or something after quite a while, and the pain was relieved a little bit then." Brown came by at about 11:00. Clara was still cramping, and passed what she took for another clot. Brown examined it and "called Beatrice and Lucy to look at it and told them that it was the afterbirth and that I was going to be all right."

    Brown massaged showed Clara's friends how to massage her abdomen, telling them to do it periodically, "so everything that was left in there would come out." Brown then pressured Lucy to come up with the money to have an abortion as well, even suggesting that she ask Ira Gin for a loan. She left, taking Lucy with her. Gin testified that Lucy and Brown had come to his home, and Lucy had asked to borrow money. Gin said he'd refused but had told Brown that she could trust Lucy to pay her because Lucy was honest.

    Beatrice Duran testified in corroboration of what Clara had said, adding that Brown told Clara to go to a doctor and tell the doctor she had a cold so she could get a penicillin shot. Brown then drove Beatrice to work.

    Evidently Clara dallied about following this advice, not going to Dr. Randall until January 30. He testified that he figured she had been pregnant and had undergone an abortion about ten days earlier. Clara described the abortion to Randall, who found it consistent with what he saw when he examined her.

    In the mean time, Brown had evidently come to some agreement with Lucy Sanchez. Brown came to the young women's home on January 26 and left with Lucy at about 3 p.m. Clara had repaid Lucy the $100 she'd lent her, money Lucy evidently was going to use to pay Brown. Lucy had been in good health when she'd left her home.

    At about 7:30 that evening, Brown went to the cafe where Clara worked, asking her to come to take Lucy home. Brown also wanted to know if anybody would disturb them at the house. Clara said that Brown told her "they had gotten through about 5 o'clock and that she started flowing pretty heavily at the time and she started getting dizzy, then went out into a coma, and she was moaning pretty bad and she was afraid that somebody in the neighborhood would hear her and that she'd stay over at our house with her overnight and take care of her."

    Clara went to Brown's practice with her. Brown's mother was there as well. Lucy was lying on a couch, with her raincoat and some newspapers under her, and covered with a blanket and a bedspread. There was blood on the bedspread, newspapers, raincoat, and on Lucy. Clara also saw Lucy's clothing there. Brown was acting nervous and excited. Clara helped Brown carry Lucy down to the car, and accompanied by Brown's mother they drove Lucy to a hospital. Brown instructed Clara to tell staff there that Lucy had been in this condition at home, and that Clara had called Brown for help.

    As Clara sat outside the emergency room with Brown and Brown's mother, Brown told clara "she knew she shouldn't have done it, and took out her wallet, took out $30 and gave it to me and said those $30 were to help me in case Lucy needed anything."

    But Lucy was beyond needing any help. A doctor came out and informed the three women that Lucy had been dead on arrival.

    Clara said that Brown then told her "that she didn't know what to do whether to tell the truth or deny it." She asked Clara "whether she should run away or stick it out and then she took out her wallet again from her purse and told me, 'Here's the rest of Lucy's money so you can use it for the funeral.'"

    Though Clara said that the doctor in the emergency room had told her that Lucy had been dead on arrival, a doctor testified that Lucy had spoke to him before her death and told him she'd gone to "a residence south of the city" for the abortion, but also that Lucy didn't describe the instruments used. Other doctors who had treated Lucy conjectured as to what instruments would have been used.

    The doctor who performed the autopsy said that Lucy had bled to death from large blood vessels in the uterus, and that the membranes had been forcibly separated, likely "by some blunt object which produced dilation of the cervix." The uterine membranes were a dark brown color with a granular appearance, which the physician testified could have been caused by the introduction of chemicals.

    Brown testified in her trial that she had been introduced to Lucy, who had asked her for help arranging for an abortion. But, she insisted, she had only told Lucy that she would look for somebody to "help her", perhaps to arrange for her to go to Tijuana. Brown said that she had actually gone to Tijuana to research abortion options for Lucy. Brown also testified that it had been Lucy who had quoted $100 as the amount she could budget for an abortion. Brown also said that she'd told Lucy that she herself would not be able to accompany her to Tijuana.

    Brown's attorney tried to use quotes from medical textbooks to counter the autopsy surgeon's testimony as to whether or not Lucy's injuries were indeed consistent with an induced abortion.

    The defense also asked that instead of a reporter's notes of her statement being read, a recording be played that would show the jury that she had been questioned improperly. Brown complained that the Deputy District Attorney "would ask me three or four questions at a time, sort of shouting and yelling at me without letting me answer at least one of them before he got all the other ones in." When the judge ruled against this, the defense argued that this would cause the jury to believe there had been no impropriety in questioning. But when in rebuttal the prosecutors later wanted to enter the recording as evidence, the defense had countered that this would subject the jury to the same evidence twice and thus give it excessive weight. Thus, in the appeal, Brown's defense argued that the jury had been unduly prejudiced against the defendant both because the recording they'd wanted played hadn't been played, and because the prosecution, in offering to play it, had then made the jury wonder why the defense hadn't wanted it to be played. So they'd appealed both because they'd not been allowed to play the recording, and because the prosecution had offered to play it.

    The defense also protested the admission into evidence of the syringe that was only similar to the one allegedly used on Clara, but the court ruled that there was nothing improper in the admission of the syringe, since it was clearly and accurately identified as only a similar syringe for purposes of illustration. The defense had even, during the trial, elicited a bit of testimony from Clara about how the syringe in evidence had differed from the syringe used on her.

    A lawyer testified that he'd been meeting with Brown about a business matter shortly before noon on the 19th, and that Brown had returned "between 1:30 and 2:00," contrary to Beatrice Duran's testimony that Brown had been attending to Clara from about 11 a.m. to about 12:30. Brown's lawyer argued that "It is certainly more probably that an attorney at law would be speaking the truth than Mrs. Duran, Clara's girl friend." But both Beatrice and the lawyer had been speaking from memory, and Brown herself had testified that she'd visited Clara and Lucy's home at about noon on the 19th, and that she had driven Beatrice Duran to work at about 1:00 or 1:30. The judge instructed the jury to weigh for themselves how irreconcilable the time issue was. I'd add personally that if Brown really had been consulting with an attorney at the time, he'd have the appointment on his books -- otherwise how could he bill his client for his time?

    The jury had found no trouble reconciling the testimony, and found Brown guilty of both abortions -- Lucy's and Clara's -- and of the murder of Lucy. Brown appealed on the grounds that she couldn't be convicted of two crimes -- murder and abortion -- for the same act. The court agreed with her, letting the murder conviction stand and throwing out the abortion conviction.

    A dissenting judge opined, "The act of committing an abortion and the act of killing a person while attempting to do this are not merely the same act made punishable in different ways. Not only are these two offenses separate and distinct in a legal sense and each dependent upon evidence not required in the other, but as a practical matter it cannot be said that the two charges involve but one act. The act of committing an abortion may be done without causing the death of the party operated upon. The act which causes the death of the same person is usually another act, careless or otherwise, which, while it may be committed in connection with the first and about the same time, involves a further and additional element." In other words, he argued, the abortion was one crime; performing it so carelessly as to kill Lucy Sanchez was another.

    Brown appeared to be a professional lay abortionist; I have been unable to determine if she had any medical training.



    For more on pre-legalization abortion, see The Bad Old Days of Abortion

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    This sucks.

    Imagine you're a German who has seen the death camps. You know about it. The "medical experiments" on twins. The starvation. The gas chambers. And you're trying to get the world to understand what's going on. And you're talking to a world that gets its knickers in a twist that Jews aren't allowed to ride the bus anymore.

    They tsk tsk about the fact that Jews aren't allowed to ride the bus. You try to tell them that lack of public transportation is the least of the Jews' woes.

    But nobody listens. They tell you to tone down the rhetoric and stop trying to paint the Germans as monsters.

    That's what it feels like to be a prolifer.

    People are all in a tizzy about Kermit Gosnell. (Some of them are, anyway.) Oh, he was SO BAD!

    And my friends are advising me, "Do NOT tell people about other abortionists doing similar things!"

    Because telling the truth shuts them down.

    You have to let them digest whatever it is that bugs them, then gently feed them another very small, very well-vetted and substantiated tidbit, and give them plenty of time to digest it.

    Meanwhile, the carnage goes on.

    This sucks.

    But it's bringing me back to Diane Sawyer and the Non-Story of Lawson Akpolonu.

    Ms. Sawyer was ready to be thoroughly disgusted and outraged that some abortion clinics were selling abortions to women who only thought they were pregnant. And we dutifully gave her an abundance of substantiating documentation that this sort of stuff goes on all the time.

    But instead of shutting up and letting her digest what was to us the LEAST of the problems, we collected the worst. We substantiated them all, handed over the information.

    And then we got the call from Akpolonu's brand-new ex-nurse. And we made the mistake, I guess, of handing Diane Sawyer WAY more than she was ready for.

    So she dropped the whole thing.

    And whose fault was that? Hers, for choosing to put her head in the sand? Or ours for not using psychology? Let Ms. Sawyer do her shocked and outraged story about how shocking and outrageous some tiny piece of the problem is. So we've established ourselves as trustworthy. Then feed her something just a tiny bit more outrageous -- say, no proper pathology reports after the abortions. And let her digest that.

    If somebody's not ready to digest a hamburger, don't try to feed her the entire cow.

    Tuesday, January 25, 2011

    Catch-up inspections find problems in 14 of22 PA abortion clinics

    HT: Jivin' J

    Checks of Pa. abortion clinics find some problems:

    In a September visit to the Hillcrest Women's Medical Center in Harrisburg, equipment was found well past expiration date. Also found was an unlabeled bag of blue pills and practices that raised patient confidentiality concerns.


    Hillcrest is the National Abortion Federation member where Kelly Morse died after being given medication she'd told staff she was allergic to.

    Even after Kelly had trouble breathing and started turning blue, abortionist Delhi Thweatt continued with the abortion, then spent some time providing ineffectual care to Kelly before having an ambulance summoned.

    The suit filed by Kelly's husband noted, "As Mrs. Morse's dyspnea (difficulty breathing) and cyanosis [turning blue due to lack of oxygen] continued to worsen, Defendant Thweatt improperly administered Epinephrine subcutaneously instead of intravenously...." This measure would do nothing to assist a patient in Kelly's condition.

    "No one started an IV. No respiration rate was recorded, no pulse was checked and no blood pressure was measured. No EKG was applied. No cardiac monitoring was conducted. No pulse oximeter was applied. No intubation or emergency tracheotomy was performed. No oxygen was administered. Kelly continued to agitate in fear, desperately gasping for air, and remained blue in color. Defendant Thweatt just stood there with a stethoscope in hand and listened to Kelly's breathing and wheezing progressively worsen."

    "As Plaintiff choked and gasped for air, none of the Defendants, took steps to immediately dispatch an ambulance. In fact, the ambulance was not summoned until 11:24 a.m., or 10 minutes after Plaintiff violently choked, gasped, wheezed, and discolored to a blue-black appearance from respiratory arrest and hypoxia."

    Paramedics arrived within five minutes of the call, just as a staff member was running outside to summon Kelly's husband. Kelly's husband reported that he went in with the ambulance crew to find his wife, naked and blue-black from lack of oxygen, lying on a table that was halfway out of the examination room into the hallway.

    The paramedics put a breathing tube into Kelly, properly administered medications, and performed CPR as they transported Kelly to nearby Polyclinic Medical Center, where she was admitted to the Intensive Care Unit. Her condition continued to deteriorate, and she was pronounced dead on June 22.

    Kermit Gosnell's Pro-Choice Enablers

    Kermit Gosnell's Pro-Choice Enablers (Is This What an Industry That Self-Regulates Looks Like?)

    (Embedded links are mine.)

    The ultimate non-partisan body – a criminal grand jury – has supplied us with the graphic, 261-page horror story of Kermit Gosnell, M.D., who stands accused of butchering seven babies – yes, after they were born alive -- and fatally doping a refugee from Nepal with Demerol in a clinic that smelled of cat urine, where the furniture was stained with blood and the doctor kept a collection of severed baby feet.


    This is a very important thing to keep in mind when reading the Grand Jury Report. This isn't a report by prolife activists. It's a report written by a group of citizens pulled from an eligible juror pool. As the Grand Jurors themselves said: We ourselves cover a spectrum of personal beliefs about the morality of abortion. For us as a criminal grand jury, however, the case is not about that controversy; it is about disregard of the law and disdain for the lives and health of mothers and infants. We find common ground in exposing what happened here, and in recommending measures to prevent anything like this from ever happening again.

    Over the years, many people came to know that something was going on here. But no one put a stop to it.


    Not even, I might note, prolifers who should have known better than to trust government agencies and prochoice organizations to look out for the well-being of abortion-vulnerable women.

    So too with the National Abortion Federation. NAF is an association of abortion providers that upholds the strictest health and legal standards for its members.


    Or at least they say they do. More on that as I address the next paragraph:

    Despite his various efforts to fool her, the evaluator from NAF readily noted that records were not properly kept, that risks were not explained, that patients were not monitored, that equipment was not available, that anesthesia was misused.


  • Records not properly kept:

    *When NAF member Center for Reproductive and Sexual Health was inspected after the death of patient K.B., her chart listed her post-operative condition as "pink, responsive, alert," even though she had gone into full cardio-respiratory arrest by the time indicated on the assessment. Inspectors learned that the note had been entered into the chart before the abortion was even performed.

    *After Christi Stile was left in a vegetative state during an abortion at the Mayfair NAF member in Aurora, Colorado, an inspection found the clinic had no record of Christi's vital signs being recorded during the abortion.

  • Risks were not explained:

    *Multiple patients who underwent abortions at NAF member Eastern Women's Center reported that the were not given informed consent. J.R., age 30, alleged lack of informed consent, lack of information about alternatives, and injury from abortion and IUD removal performed on March 23, 1984 by Dr. Jeng at Eastern in Manhatten. Jeng failed to diagnose J.R.'s ectopic pregnancy even though her pathology report indicated no products of conception and a subsequent pregnancy test was positive. The ectopic ruptured, causing shock, leading to hospital admission and removal of J.R.'s right tube. Settled for $ 190,000.

    *The family of Deanna Bell, who died of a Brivitol overdose at a NAF member clinic, alleged lack of informed consent.

    *The parents of Denise Montoya, who died after an abortion at a NAF clinic, said that the risks had never been explained to the, and they had never been asked to sign a consent form.

  • Patients not monitored:

    *CRASH, where K.B. died, "did not employ proper monitoring equipment or procedures".

    *The family of Kimberly Neil, who died after an abortion at NAF flagship Family Planning Associates, noted that she was not properly monitored.

    *Shytaura G., age 14, alleged that she underwent an abortion at Albany Medical Surgical Center by Steve Lichtenberg on February 23, 1989. Her attorney faulted Lichtenberg for using "incompetent and unskilled personnel", and failure to take an adequate medical history and determine an accurate gestational age. She suffered a lacerated uterus and cervix. Then Lichtenberg failed to to monitor her condition and stop her extreme bleeding. Shytaura wound up needing a hysterectomy. (Cook County Circuit Court Case No. 94L06529)

  • Equipment was not available:

    *After Dawn Mack's death, NAF member Eastern Women's Center was found to be lacking in necessary equpiment.

    *After Regina Johnson died at member Abraham Alberto Hodari's clinic, an inspection found that though Hodari's recovery room was equipped with a stethescope, oxygen bag/valve mask, and digital blood pressure cuff, it was not equipped with an EKG monitor, pulse oximeter, or automatic blood pressure/pulse monitor with alarm for monitoring patients, or with oxygen, a defibrillator, or other resuscitation equipment.

  • Anesthesia misused:

    *Deanna Bell died of a massive Brevitol overdose while undergoing an abortion by frequent NAF presenter Steve Lichtenberg.

    *After the death of Catherine Pierce at a NAF facility, inspectors cited Atlanta Surgi-Center for administering "the same anesthesia dosages" to patients whose weights ranges from 107 to 167 pounds, inadequate record keeping, and inadequate supervision of patients.

    Those are just some examples.

    [Gosnell's clinic] was the worst abortion clinic [the NAF inspector] had ever inspected. Of course, she rejected Gosnell's application. She just never told anyone in authority about all the horrible, dangerous things she had seen.


    Not only did she fail to report it, a NAF clinic in Delaware still had Gosnell working there -- and apparently taking their patients to Philadelphia -- after the inspection, up until the time his Pennsylvania license was suspended.

    "...[t]he Pennsylvania Department of Health abruptly decided, for political reasons, to stop inspecting abortion clinics at all. The politics in question were not anti-abortion, but pro. With the change of administration from Governor Casey to Governor Ridge, officials concluded that inspections would be "putting a barrier up to women" seeking abortions.


  • In the wake of an espose of a horrible Miami abortion mill, prochoice activist Janis Compton-Carr told The Miami Herald: "In my gut, I am completely aghast at what goes on at that place [Dadeland]. But I staunchly oppose anything that would correct this situation in law."

  • When 60 Minutes was investigating an abortion mill where one woman had been allowed to die and another left incapacitated, reporters asked pro-choice Maryland State Senator Mary Boergers why nothing was being done to address dangerous abortion clinics. Boergers said, "There's only so much of a willingness to try to push a group like the pro-choice movement to do what I think is the responsible thing to do because they then treat you as if you're the enemy."

    Barbara Radford, then-president of the National Abortion Federation, defended the head-in-the-sand attitude the organization took toward safety issues by saying, "We want to make sure that women have choices when it comes to abortion services, and if you regulate it too strictly, you then deny women access to the service."



    And, lo!

    And a case that made the news 20 years ago now involved New York's Abu Hayat, whom the tabloids dubbed "The Butcher of Avenue A." As it happened, I knew Hayat by sight – and talk about the banality of evil -- because he lived in my building, where I frequently wound up sharing a lap lane with him in the pool.


    Neighbor Hayat was a member of NAF.

    In 2002, a piece of legislation called the "Born-Alive Infant Protection Act'' began requiring doctors to treat children born alive during abortions the same way they treat other newborns. Initially, advocates for choice adamantly opposed that legislation, too, as an assault on Roe v. Wade.


    Gosnell has expressed bewilderment that he's being charged with murder for doing what he was paid to do -- "ensure fetal demise". Would he have felt this great confidence in the rightness of killing live-born infants if there hadn't been so much high-profile prochoice opposition (including that of Barack Obama) to the BAIPA?

    On Saturday, President Obama affirmed his support for Roe v. Wade by saying that "government should not intrude on private family matters." But it's a hands-off lack of oversight that allowed Kermit Gosnell to do so much damage before he was finally stopped – by accident, by authorities investigating him for over-prescribing OxyContin.

    Perhaps Gosnell himself best summed up the underlying problem at his arraignment, where he reportedly seemed confused by the proceedings: "I understand the one count, because a patient died,'' he told the court, "but I didn't understand the seven counts.'' It apparently never occurred to him that the dead infants – one of them photographed in a plastic shoe box, another kept frozen in a gallon of spring water – were people, too.



    Click here to follow Melinda Henneberger on Twitter.
  • Kermit Gosnell: Where Prolifers Dropped the Ball

    There's a lot of finger-pointing regarding Kermit Gosnell and his house of horrors.

    The Grand Jury pointed the finger at:

  • The Pennsylvania Department of Health, for making the political decision to turn a blind eye to wrongdoing by abortionists
  • The Pennsylvania Medical Board, for repeatedly blowing off complaints about Gosnell
  • The Philadelphia Health Department for not following through when one of their employees uncovered what a sordid dump Gosnell's clinic was
  • Doctors and hospitals that failed to report Gosnell's victims to the appropriate authorities

    Among the more knowledgeable, there's also finger-pointing at the National Abortion Federation for not only failing to report this guy after an inspector saw his hell house firsthand, but also for working in a partnership to provide him with at lesast six illegal third-trimester abortion patients, including the mother of Baby Boy A.

    Abortion advocates, of course, have been pointing fingers at prolifers. If only we had given abortionists (who would, after all, have included Kermit Gosnell) tax money, and held them less accountable, somehow the nice, clean guys would have totally crowded Gosnell out.

    Well, we do deserve some blame. Just not the blame abortion advocates are trying to lay at our feet.

    Where we dropped the ball is that we weren't watching this guy.

    As both Abby Johnson and Lila Rose said at ProLifeCon, we need to be doing research. And part of that research is knowing who the local abortionists are and watching them like a hawk.

    Kermit Gosnell's House of Horrors would not have flourished had prolifers been on top of him.

  • Digging for dirt on him would have revealed the malpractice suits against him.
  • Copies of those malpractice suits could have been made available outside the facility (the "Chicago Method"), warning vulnerable women
  • Copies of those lawsuits could have been provided to prochoice organizations that refer women for abortions
  • We could have been pestering the media about the fact that despite all of these malpractice suits, the Medical Board wasn't investigating him.
  • The connection between Kermit Gosnell and the National Abortion Federation could have been exposed, and that Delaware mill held accountable for sending patients to his mill in Philadelphia
  • Prolife spies could have posed as prospective patients and photographed / videotaped his disgusting facility, a la Lila Rose, and posted these materials on internet sites such as YouTube

    We've known since Lime 5 came out in 1996 that public officials and prochoice groups were willing to look the other way when abortionists were endangering women. We knew that this was a case of the fox guarding the henhouse.

    Prochoicers can be excused for this. They really believe that the government and prochoice groups can be trusted. But we know better.

    We need to stop being just an echo chamber. We need to be listening to Lila and Abby. We need to make sure every abortionist in America has somebody who's watching him, doing docket searches, checking medical board and health department records, visiting his facility, and just making it plain that even though prochoice leaders are willing to let the Kermit Gosnells of the world thrive at the expense of women and children, we're not.
  • One year later, Alexandra is forgotten in her grave

    Mother of four bled to death after artery was severed during abortion

    Here was the coverage a year ago today:

  • Queens clinic A1 Medicine probed after Alexandra Nunez is fatally injured while undergoing abortion
  • Alexandra Nuñez Dies After Artery Inadvertently Severed During Abortion in Queens, NY Medical Facility
  • Death at NYC abortion clinic investigated
  • Details Emerge on Hispanic New York Woman Killed in Botched Legal Abortion
  • ‘Nothing Happened Here’ – Except Fatally Botched Abortion

    A year ago today, police and health officials were investigating the death of 37-year-old Alexandra Nunez after an abortion performed at A1 Medicine in Jackson Heights, Queens on Monday. Operation Rescue described the facility as "located in a run-down building in a predominately Hispanic neighborhood," and says it was operated by Salomon Epstein.

    I've seen zilch in the follow-up department. Anexandra Nunez is dead and, but for her family and friends, forgotten.

    The abortion was performed at 3:30 p.m. on January 25, 2010. Alexandra began bleeding heavily and was transported by ambulance to Elmhurst Hospital Center, where she died. The source of the fatal bleeding was traced to a severed artery.

    Alexandra was a single mom from New Jersey. She had told her family that she was going to a doctor's office in Newark for a procedure to remove a cyst. Her 19-year-old daughter, Daisy Davila, told the New York Daily News, "I'm upset because I never got a chance to say goodbye. She didn't want anyone to go with her. I made dinner and lunch ,,, hoping she would come back."

    An employee at A1 insisted that all had gone well at their facility. "The patient was transferred to the hospital, she didn't die at the clinic. Nothing happened here."

    Nothing happened. Except that a woman was fatally injured. It's like the thank you note that Steve Lichtenberg sent for the referral after Deanna Bell's death: "Uneventful D&E". A dead patient. "Uneventful." "Nothing happened."

    A1 was an ambulatory surgical facility doing abortions and plastic surgery.

    Alexandra's family indicated that she opposed abortion, which is likely the reason for her secrecy.