A Non-Fatal Carhart-Associated Lawsuit

Background on Carhart

Leroy Carhart, who has since gone to meet his Maker, was an absolute hero among abortion-rights activists due to his willingness to do abortions at any stage of pregnancy as long as there was some semblance of a justification. 

Two of those late abortions left the patients dead under what I consider totally inexcusable circumstances:

Christin Gilbert

Christin Gilbert was an intellectually-disabled teenager whose third-trimester abortion was justified on "health" grounds, though aside from having Down syndrome Christin was perfectly healthy. Carhart was aborting Christin's baby at the supposedly saintly George Tiller's clinic. Per Tiller's practice, Christin -- whose health and life were supposedly in such danger that her viable unborn baby had to die to save her -- was spending nights at a nearby motel that Tiller used as a sort of annex. When she collapsed and lost consciousness, her parents used a luggage cart to take her out to the minivan so they could drive her to the clinic, where she went into cardio-respiratory arrest. Carhart's grasp of how to perform CPR was so rudimentary that the medics thought he was a bystander and had to chase him away from his patient so that they could make appropriate attempts to save his patient. To no avail. Christin went into a coma and her parents withdrew life support.

Jennifer McKenna-Morbelli

Jennifer McKenna-Morbelli went to Carhart's Germantown Reproductive Health Services in Maryland to abort their 33-week loved and wanted baby due to a prenatal diagnosis. At this stage of pregnancy, the baby is killed with an overdose of digoxin, a cardiac drug, that is injected directly into the baby's heart. Once Carhart confirms that the baby is dead he induces labor. Prolifers outside the facility reported seeing Jennifer enter the facility on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. On that last day she appeared pale and weak and was at the facility for over nine hours. After Jennifer left, Carhart and his wife left the state to go work at another abortion facility. At the hotel that Carhart used as an annex, like his mentor George Tiller, Jennifer suffered chest pain. She was unsuccessful in her attempts to reach Carhart, per instructions that in the event of complications she was to call clinic staff rather than go to the emergency room. In fact, an emergency number Carhart provided actually rang to the answering machine for his wife's equestrian supply business. Jennifer died of her complications.

Another young woman, whose aunt gave her the pseudonym "Haley Mason," described a dismal experience when, under pressure from the baby's father, she went to Carhart's Nebraska clinic for an abortion. Unable to cope afterward, she took her own life.

So this is the kind of "care" a "hero" provides.

So let's look at a case where a woman was fortunate enough to escape wiAnh-Chi Dang Do – AbortionDocsth her life. Hat tip to Operation Rescue.

Haimanot Aragaw went to Carhart's facility in Bethesda, Maryland on May 20, 2020, accompanied by her husband, Abel Woldemedhen. The couple had decided to abort their 23-week unborn baby because the child had been diagnosed prenatally with Down syndrome. 

On that day, clinic staff performed an ultrasound, noting that the placenta was in a "posterior position." Staff gave Haimanot oral medications then inserted laminaria to dilate her cervix. 

Haimanot then went to a nearby motel. She experienced pelvic pain and vaginal discharge during the night. She reported this when she returned to the clinic the next day and was reassured that this was normal. 

Anh-Chi Dang Do

Haimanot was given additional medications that was supposed to help further dilate her cervix. Then Dr. Anh-Chi Dang Do removed the laminaria. Haimanot began to blead heavily.

As Do suctioned out amniotic fluid and began dismembering Haimanot's unborn baby, the patient began to bleed so heavily, that according to the lawsuit the couple later filed, both Do and other staff were spattered with blood.

Carhart was called in to assist. In spite of their efforts, they were unable to remove the entire fetus or to stop the blood loss, so they called Montgomery County Fire and Rescue to take Haimanot to Shady Grove Adventist Hospital.

Haimanot was in critical condition and taken immediately to the operating room. Her cervix had nearly been torn off, with only about 1/3 of it still intact. Her mangled unborn baby was in her abdominal cavity behind her uterus. The baby was missing its arms and most of its right leg, and its head was torn nearly off. 

Do had also managed to damage Haimanot's appendix.

The only way to get the bleeding under control was to remove the entire uterus. 

Haimanot and Abel sued the doctors and the facility, alleging not just injury but lack of informed consent. They asserted that had she known of the risk of the damage to her uterus and appendix, and the loss of her ability to ever have another baby, Haimanot would never have consented to the abortion.

Sadly, the lawsuit doesn't mention that she never would have consented to the abortion had she known that her baby would be torn limb from limb.

March 31, 1930: Two Nearly-Simultaneous Abortion Deaths Linked to Dr. Thomas Eade

SUMMARY: During an inquest into the March 31, 1930 death of Gladys Louise Anderson, word came that 24-year-old Cleo Hinton had also died from a botched abortion. Both deaths were attributed to the work of Dr. Thomas M. Eade. 

Gladys Anderson

Gladys Louise Anderson was an 18-year-old freshman at the University of Illinois. She was studying liberal arts and sciences and was a member of the Alpha Omicron Pi sorority as well as Alpha Lambda Delta, a women's honorary freshman scholastic society.

Gladys had been seeing R. C. Catheart for about two years, and the couple had become engaged in the late fall of 1929. Over the weekend of March 8 and 9 of 1930, Gladys traveled to Chicago to tell R. C. that she was pregnant. The couple discussed the situation and decided that they were still too young to marry. They agreed that Gladys should abort the baby.

R. C. said that he had heard of Dr. Thomas M. Eade in Champaign, Illinois, and recommended that Gladys go to him.

Gladys wrote to R. C. to tell him that she underwent the abortion on Monday, March 24 and returned to classes and her sorority house after spending the night at Eade's practice. Her letters to R. C. stopped, so he went to Campaign on Thursday to check on his betrothed.

Dr. Thomas Eade

By Friday night, March 28, Gladys was seriously ill. Somehow word reached Dr. Eade that his patient was ill, and he sent his secretary, Ruth Brown, to the sorority house with medication. Gladys's condition continued to deteriorate. The sorority house mother called Dr. J. R. Powell to check on her at 3:30 on Saturday morning, March 29, and found her to be so ill that he admitted her to Mercy Hospital in Urbana. Somebody contacted her mother, Mrs. LeRoy Anderson, who hurried to her side.

Gladys's condition continued to deteriorate, so at 7:00 on Saturday evening Dr. J. M. Christle came in as a consultant. 

In spite of the best efforts of the doctors, Gladys died of peritonitis at 3:00 on the morning of Monday, March 31, with her mother at her side. An autopsy confirmed that she had died from peritonitis due to an abortion. 

Cleo Hinton

Just an hour before the start of the inquest on the evening that Gladys died, word came to the coroner that 23-year-old stenographer Cleo Hinton had also died at Mercy Hospital on March 31 after giving a statement that Eade had perpetrated an abortion on her. 

Unlike Gladys, Cleo indicated in her deathbed statement that her baby's father had not been involved in the abortion. However, the man in question, J. F. Campbell, testified to the contrary. "I have known Miss Hinton possibly five years, and since November 29 I have been in her company many times, although we did not go together steady, nor were we engaged. Six weeks ago she came to me and told me of her trouble and stated that it was necessary for her to do some thing at once. She told me she was going to see Dr. T. M. Eade and that she would let me know how much it would cost."

"Later, possibly two days later, she called me and told me that the doctor had consented to perform the operation for $40. For several days she took treatments and pills, but two weeks ago she told me at her home ... that the treatments were not benefiting her as they should and that she was to go and stay two days at the doctor's office."

The abortion had been perpetrated at Eade's office on Saturday, March 22, two days prior to Glady's abortion. Cleo remained, ailing, at Eade's practice while J. F. visited her regularly.

Cleo's sister, LaVonne Hinton, indicated that Cleo had said she was going to St. Louis and would return on Monday the 24th. When she didn't return as expected, LaVonne said, "I started an investigation and on Tuesday, March 25, I found her at Dr. Eade's office in bed and very very sick."

"I saw that her condition was bad," LaVonne said, "and ordered her removed to a hospital, but Dr. Eade refused. Later in the day I called him by telephone to tell him I was sending up two doctors to see my sister. Eade said he would not let them in and it was at this time that I went to the state's attorney."

Sheriff Shouf went to Eade's office on March 25 as part of the investigation into Gladys's abortion. Eade told the sheriff that Cleo was ill from intestinal influenza. The sheriff had her transferred to Mercy Hospital, where she died on March 31 at 7:15 pm.

Eade was arrested later that day. However, before police had a chance to seize his records, his secretary reported finding the office ransacked and the records stolen. 

Eade had previously been implicated in two other abortions, one in which the patient died an another in which the patient "went insane." 

Watch 1 Day, 2 Dead on YouTube.
Watch 1 Day, 2 Dead on Rumble.

Sources:

• "Dr. Eade Held by Coroner's Jury as 2 Die," The (Champaign-Urbana IL) Daily Illini, April 1, 1930
• "Jury Again Holds Dr. T. M. Eade," The Urbana (IL) Daily Courier, April 2, 1930
• "Dr. Thos. Eade Bound Over to Grand Jury," Paxton (IL) Record, April 3, 1930
• "Cline Busy Making Case Against Eade," The Urbana (IL) Daily Courier, April 3, 1930
• "Blame Eade for Second Death," The Urbana (IL) Daily Courier, April 4, 1930
• "Interesting Items from Around Home," The Fairbury (IL) Blade, April 4, 1930

March 30, 1988: Habitual Quack Lets Teen Choke During Abortion

Dennis W. Miller

Eighteen-year-old Erna Mae Fisher was fearful and nervous when she went to 39-year-old Dr. Dennis W. Miller for an abortion at his practice in Kansas City, KS on March 30, 1988. Miller asked Erna's mother, Ocie, to come into the room and hold her hand to calm her.

According to Ocie, Miller gave Erna an anesthetic injection, then started a suction machine. Erna jerked upright and went rigid. She then coughed, vomited, choked, went into spasms, and collapsed, apparently lifeless.

An assistant ran for smelling salts while Miller continued with the abortion for ten minutes. Erna's color deteriorated and her pulse faded, then stopped. He then delayed another 10 minutes before calling an ambulance. 

When EMS arrived less than two minutes later, they found Erna's airway still full of vomit. Miller was making no attempt at resuscitation, but was holding Erna in his arms. He justified failing to check her airway or provide her with oxygen by saying, "Since I didn't realize what was going on, I didn't think it would have made any difference."

The young mother of an 11-month old daughter was beyond saving. She was declared dead on arrival at Bethany Medical Center.

Miller later admitted that he hadn't asked when Erna had last eaten before giving her pain medications that he knew could cause vomiting. He settled out-of-court with Erna's family for $475,000.

Even after Erna's death, Adele Hughey, director of Comprehensive Health for Women in Overland Park, KS, said that Miller had been performing abortions there since the early 1980s. "We have a lot of confidence in him. He knows how to provide excellent abortion services and is very good." 

Miller had failed the Missouri state medical exam three times before finally giving up. It took nine tries for him to pass the exam to be licensed in Kansas.

Miller had already settled six malpractice cases in the Kansas City area for a total of nearly $2 million. Another suit, settled for $2.2 million, involved botched obstetric care that caused a little boy to be born prematurely and suffer intellectual and physical disabilities as a result. 

Miller was able to keep his medical license and continued to practice, botching a delivery in 2006 which resulted in the death of the baby.  Once again he did not lose his license, but was only censured and fined. He was later censured for botching a C-section in 2009, nearly killing the mother; botching the care of a diabetic obstetric patient so badly in 2011 that she nearly died and her baby was injured during delivery; and botching a tumor removal so badly in 2012 that the woman died. This time they finally permanently suspended his license.

Watch Cuddles Can't Clear Dying Teen's Airway on YouTube.
Watch Cuddles Can't Clear Dying Teen's Airway on Rumble.

Sources: 

• "Mother sues doctor for daughter's death," The Parsons (KS) Sun, May 10, 1988
• "Doctor is sued in death," The Kansas City Times, May 10, 1988
• "Mother sues over death of daughter," Kansas City Times, May 10, 1988
• "Mother sues doctor for daughter's death," The Parsons Sun, May 10, 1988
• "A Kansas doctor's medical mishaps," The Kansas City Star, June 3, 1990
• "Doctor has high number of settlements," Manhattan (KS) Mercury, June 4, 1990
• "Report shows series of medical mishaps by Kansas doctor," Iola (KS) Register, June 4, 1990

Exploring AbortionDocs: Joseph Henry Kennedy III

I've often said that if the abortion-rights movement care about women as much as they say they do, it would be prochoicers, not prolifers, running the AbortionDocs website, where information of any kind -- good, bad or neutral -- is gathered about abortion practitioners and facilities. 

I decided to scroll through and see some of the offerings and found a doozy -- Joseph Henry Kennedy III.

Let's take a look, shall we?

Start with documents from the New York medical board:

Patient A, age 21, had been admitted to Lincoln Hospital for acute pelvic inflammatory disease. At around 1:00 am on November 25, 1987, Patient A was asleep in her hospital room, and her roommate was in the TV room. Kennedy told Patient A to lift her pajamas so he could examine her. "He examined her stomach, grabbed her under her arms, lifted her as though he were hugging her, put her head on his shoulder and kissed her on the lips." Patient A pushed him away in disgust and told a nurse. The nurse summoned Kennedy to Patient A's room, where he apologized and told her not to "do this to him." Patient A also reported the incident to the police.

Patient B, a 24-year-old woman, had been admitted to Lincoln Hospital for severe morning sickness (hyperemesis gravidarum). At around 3:00 on the morning of November 24, 1987, Kennedy came into her room while her roommate was asleep. He kissed her on the cheek and rubbed her hands in a way she found disturbing, "as if he were making a pass at her." He came by in the early morning hours the following day, again while Patient B's roommate was asleep. He grabbed her hands and rubbed them, left the room, then returned and rubbed her feet in a manner that she found very disturbing. Patient B reported these creepy nocturnal visits to both the hospital and the police. 

Patient C was 21 years old as well. Kennedy had admitted her to Lincoln Hospital for acute pelvic inflammatory disease and asthma. During her admission examination on November 23, 1987, Kennedy asked her "about her sex life and whether her husband made love to her in a normal fashion." Patient C found the questioning inappropriate and refused to answer. At around 3:00 on the morning of November 25, Patient C awoke to find Kennedy kissing her, with his hand in her underwear touching her genitals. When he saw that Patient C had awakened, Kennedy told her he'd come to put in an IV, though he didn't have any equipment with him. He left the room and returned with the IV equipment, and as he put in the IV he asked her how she made love, then sat on her bed and played with her toes while asking her to show him how to properly make love. He asked her for her name and address so he could see her outside the hospital. Patient C refused and called for a nurse. Patient C reported this creepy encounter to both the hospital and the police.

The medical board found all three women credible and revoked Kennedy's license.

Let's move on to how the Alabama Medical Board responded when they learned what had transpired in Kentucky:

Aside from his "unexplained absences from the hospital emergency room," superficial and inadequate patient assessments, and administering an inappropriate dosage of Actifed to a toddler, "Dr. Kennedy propositioned a female patient, followed her to her car and attempted to hold her hand, hug her, kiss her, and sexually fondle her."

Finally, let's look at Tennessee:

AbortionDocs mentions this but doesn't provide the source, so I found it in newspaper archives: "N.Y. fugitive faces illegal abortion charges here," The Tennessean, April 16, 1988. Kennedy was caught "performing a felonious abortion" after he was caught practicing illegally at a Nashville clinic and four hospitals. Evidently Kennedy had fled the state and was wanted on the charges related to the sexual abuse of the three patients at Lincoln Hospital.

Kennedy was caught performing abortions without a medial license at Family Planning Center for Reproductive Health at 210 19th Ave. N. in Nashville. Kennedy had also been working for Pri-Med, an agency based in Memphis that provided hospitals with emergency room physicians. It was Pri-Med that had placed Kennedy in the four different hospitals even though his license had expired in Tennessee and had been revoked in New York. 

Abortionist Removes Less than Half of Unborn Baby: The Woman is Lucky She Survived

 HT LifeNews, "Baby Left Inside Mother After Botched Abortion Had Legs and Feet Ripped Off"

This is the nightmarish story of abortion quackery. Fortunately, unlike other women sent home with huge parts of their babies left inside them, this one ended with only one fatality -- the baby.

None of the sources give the woman's name in order to respect her privacy. I hate the dehumanizing feel of just referring to her as "the woman," so unless or until she reveals her own name I will call her "Davida," in honor of one of the women abused by abortionist Kermit Gosnell and featured in the excellent documentary, 3801 Lancaster.

The information below is from an expert review of the case provided by Secular Pro-Life.

First Steps at the Facility

Equity Clinic

Davida underwent an ultrasound on March 7, 2023 and was found to be 18 weeks and 5 days into her pregnancy. A little under a month later, on April 1, she went to Equity Clinic at 2111 West Park Court in Champaign, Illinois. Based on that ultrasound, evidently without having the facility do their own ultrasound, Dr. Keith Reisinger-Kindle estimated the baby's gestational age to be 22 weeks and 2 days.

She was given whatever that particular facility considers to be counseling and signed the consent form. Among the possible complications listed were hemorrhage, infections, and injury to her own internal organs. (View their "patient information video" yourself to determine if you think Davida was fully informed about what might happen during or after her abortion.)

Reisinger-Kindle then numbed Davida's cervix and inserted four Dilapan-S synthetic cervical dilators. Everything seemed to have gone well, so Davida was told to return the following day for her safe, legal abortion.

The Abortion

Davida returned to the clinic at 9:00 the following morning and reported having had no problems overnight. 

Davida wasn't taken back to the procedure room until 10:18 am. There, she was given conscious sedation. Reisinger-Kindle then suctioned out the amniotic fluid and used Sopher forceps to dismember Davida's unborn baby under ultrasound guidance. 

According to prochoice hero Dr. Leroy Carhart, in his testimony about the "partial-birth abortion" ban, when using ultrasound guidance on these abortions, the doctor can observe not just what parts of the baby he is grasping and pulling off, but the beating heart of the unborn child as it is being dismembered alive. 

If he had even marginal skill, Reisinger-Kindle could see what he was doing to the baby and how much of the baby was still left to be removed.

Reisinger-Kindle completed his use of the forceps, finished up with a suction curette, and concluded that the uterus was empty. He noted "Produces of conception were visually inspected and  confirmed to be complete."

Davida was given medications and uterine massage to control bleeding and was sent home.

Signs of Trouble

Reisinger-Kindle

Davida called Equity Clinic the next day at 11:27 am to report heavy cramping. She was told that this was normal and was told to take over-the-counter pain medications. 

Five hours later Davida called again to report that though the ibuprofen was helping somewhat "her bottom has a lot of pressure and it was hard to breathe." 

Staff transferred Davida's call do Reisinger-Kindle but he did not document his conversation with her.

The following day, April 4, Davida called to say that she had taken two doses of a laxative and was experiencing increased abdominal cramping but had still not had a bowel movement. The clinic suggested trying an enema and then seeking an urgent care clinic or emergency room if there was no improvement. (Moris Helen Herron was also told to take a laxative when she had complications after her abortion; she ended up dead.)

Later that day, Davida's mother called to say her daughter was at the hospital and being brought to surgery. 

What They Found at the Hospital

Davida had arrived at the Community Hospital emergency room in Indianapolis reporting lower abdominal pain. A CT scan of her abdomen and pelvis found a partial fetal skeleton atop the uterus and free air in her abdomen, indicating an infection. Two doctors took her into surgery.

Operative notes describe what they found: "The patient was found to have half of a deceased pre-born human being in the right pelvis of the patient with evidence of severe and intentional trauma. The baby's body was transected at the pelvis with no legs or feet present. Stumps of both femurs extended from the soft tissue of the torso. The upper extremities were missing from elbow distally on both sides. The skull was crushed and no brain was present. The face was non-recognizable. There were small bony fragments in the mother's pelvis."

There was a hole in Davida's uterus about the size of a quarter or half-dollar, and the baby's skull was stuck to the upper part of Davida's hip bone. 

The surgeons removed the mangled remains of Davida's baby and repaired the hole in her uterus. 

Davida remained hospitalized for five days and was discharged on April 9.

What's His Excuse?

At 22 weeks of gestation, a baby is about 11 inches long crown-to-rump. We're not talking about microscopic fragments here, or even tiny pieces like grains of rice. 

If we look at a 22-week preemie, we can see how big a baby Reisinger-Kindle was dealing with, pulling some of the child out and shoving even more through a hole.

So how did this doctor manage to get only half of each arm, about 2/3 of each leg, and maybe some intestines and other internal organs and not notice that he had shoved the rest of the baby through a hole?

If he doesn't settle out-of-court, we're likely to hear his excuse. 

He's Not Alone

This seemingly inexplicable inability to distinguish between an entire aborted baby and just a bunch of chunks is not unique to Reisinger-Kindle. Some of the abortion deaths involving this slovenliness in accounting for fetal part include:

• 

  Linda Padfield

  Erstwhile criminal abortionist H. Benjamin Munson removed only the left leg, right arm, part of the skull, and part of the front of the torso of Linda Padfield's unborn baby. A typical five month fetus weighs about 360 grams. Munson left 240 grams behind -- roughly 2/3 of the baby. Linda died from sepsis. Munson went on to send teenage abortion patient Yvonne Mesteth home to die of sepsis as well.
• Hector Zavalos at Hope Clinic for Women diagnosed Barbaralee Davis as 11 weeks pregnant and performed a suction abortion. After Zavalos sent her home to die, an autopsy found the face and spine of Barbarlee's fetus embedded in a tear in her uterus. She had actually been 16 weeks pregnant. Barbaralee is the first confirmed death I know of in a National Abortion Federation facility after the trade group's founding in 1977.
• Dr. John Blodgett sent Maria Gomez home with the severed head of her unborn baby embedded in a gash in her uterus. She quickly bled to death.
• Dr. Andre Nehorayoff sent "Patient E" home with a caveat that she might expel some tissue. The lab report from the abortion indicated that he had only removed placental tissue. An autopsy found a portion of her unborn baby's left leg protruding from the uterus. 
• "Linda Hoffman" travelled from her home in Indiana to New York to take advantage of the "safe and legal" abortions. The doctor who had performed her "safe and legal" abortion had poked a hole in her uterus but didn't remove the dead fetus. 
• Dr. Armida Zepeta pushed Maria Ortega's fetus through a hole in the back of her uterus, concluded that her patient hadn't actually been pregnant, and sent her home to die.
• Janet Foster was only 18 years old when she had an abortion performed by Richard Neal at Valley Doctor's Hospital in North Hollywood. After she was sent home she collapsed, went into convulsions, and died. During autopsy the medical examiner found "a macerated, lacerated and purulent male fetus of about 19 weeks gestation. This fetus measures 14.5 cm [nearly 6 inches] in crown-rump length, shows lacerations in the shoulder area, evisceration of the bowl through an abdominal laceration, and destruction of the skill and facial structures."
• A witness at Dorothy Muzorewa's apartment after her abortion death found her fetus in a waste basket. She had been assured that her post-abortion bleeding was just her period, but in fact the doctor at Women's Aid Clinic hadn't removed the fetus. 
• Maria Lira was sent home with her entire decomposing fetus still in her uterus.

And then there are the doctors who knowingly performed incomplete abortions, resulting in their patient's deaths: 

• After 16-year-old Rita McDowell was sent home to die with her macerated fetus still in her uterus, an investigation found that Dr. Robert Sherman actually performed incomplete abortions on purpose so he could bill for aftercare.
• According to Betty Damato's family, James Franklin at Abortion Clinic of Denver knew that he hadn't removed all of the fetus. He sent her home with a trash bag, telling her to collect whatever she expelled. On autopsy the medical examiner found "a partially truncated and macerated fetus" protruding head-first through Betty's cervix.

Of course, there are scores of cases I know of where the woman had "retained tissue," but I didn't confirm that there were actual identifiable fetal parts that the doctor should have know he'd left behind.

March 29, 2015: It Took Her Over 21 Years to Die

It took her 21 years, 8 months, and 28 days to die.

Christina "Christi" Stile was only 17 when she came home from roller skating with a friend. She looked shaken and distressed, but when her parents asked her what was wrong, she said that she had just had harsh words with somebody and didn't want to talk about it. Kay and Fred Stile gave the incident no more thought for a long, long time.

Four months later, Christi came to her mother and said that she was pregnant. She was crying, saying that she just couldn't have this baby; it would kill her. In retrospect, Kay said that this is what one should expect from a 17-year-old girl. But at the time, although Fred and Kay disapproved of abortion, Kay agreed to drive Christi to her abortion appointment at Aurora's Mayfair Women's Center.

To make a sad situation even sadder, the abortion was scheduled for the day after Christi's 18th birthday, July 1, 1993. 

Even though they'd been referred to Mayfair by a Planned Parenthood, Kay and Christi were nervous. Was abortion really safe? Kay went with Christi for the informed consent session and asked about safety. She was reassured that the only risk was of heavy bleeding, and that the clinic had everything on hand to deal with that situation should it arise. Kay felt reassured.

Mayfair Women's Center

Kay stayed in the waiting area as Christi went back for her abortion. Suddenly, the demeanor of the staff changed. There was something wrong, Kay was sure. She was also sure that Christi was the patient who was in some sort of trouble. Kay questioned a staffer, who told her that Christi had experienced a minor complication and that she was being taken to the hospital for observation. Purely routine -- she would be discharged tomorrow. There was no cause for alarm, Kay was assured. Christi was fine; they were just being cautious.

Kay rushed to the hospital in a near panic. When she was arrived, staff told her that she couldn't see Christi until she calmed herself. Steeling her nerve, Kay steadied herself and was led to a patient's bedside.

The girl in the bed was unconscious, stuck full of tubes. Her face was swollen and distorted.

"That's not my daughter," Kay told them. But a nurse handed her a plastic bag containing Christi's jewelry. The girl in the bed was Christi.

Kay had to do the hardest thing she'd ever done in her life: call her husband and tell him he didn't have his daughter any more. She was alive, but she was no longer the same Christi.

Fred and Kay later learned what had happened at Mayfair. Abortionist Ronald Kuseski, not an anesthesiologist, had administered sedatives to Christi through her IV. After the abortion, he looked up to find Christi pale, with bluish lips, and no pulse or respiration. Her heart had stopped. Paramedics were summoned, who managed to restore Christi's pulse and respiration before rushing her to the hospital.

Fred and Kay provided care for 22 years

The clinic had no record of Christi's vital signs being recorded during the abortion. Although Kuseski's attorney insisted that the clinic had a "crash cart" to deal with cardiorespiratory arrest, Kay says that Kuseski had told her that the clinic had no "crash cart." The medical board investigation found that Kuseski didn't have pulse oximetery equipment in place for Christi's abortion. 

Kuseski denied any misconduct during Christi's abortion. The Medical Board sent him a "Letter of Admonition" telling him to adhere to "Anesthesia Monitoring Guidelines" in the future, and to attend CPR and Advanced Cardiac Life Support training.

Perhaps out of concern that Fred and Kay might blame Christi's boyfriend for what had happened to her, Christi's friend told them what had really happened the night she and Christi had gone skating. Christi had been so upset not because she'd had a tiff with a friend, but because an acquaintance had raped her behind the rink.

Standing at Christi's bedside during the filming of Christi's Choice, a documentary video about the family's ordeal, Fred Stile commented that had Christi had her baby instead of having the abortion, he'd be changing diapers on his grandchild instead of on his incapacitated daughter. The baby, of course, would have long since been out of diapers by the time the video was released.

Christi finally died of her lingering complications on March 29, 2015, at the age of 39. Her baby would have been 21 years old.  

Watch It Took Her Nearly 22 Years to Die on YouTube.

March 29, 1943: No Word on Investigation

On March 29, 1943, 32-year-old Katherine Murz Behl died at Westchester Square Hospital in the Bronx, New York. Her death was due to generalized peritonitis after her uterus and sigmoid colon were perforated during a criminal abortion.

According to 1940 census records, Catherine, a New York native, worked as a statistical clerk. Her husband, William was an elevator operator. The couple had a daughter who was 10 years old at the time of the census. 

I've not been able to find any evidence that there was a serious investigation of Katherine's death.

Watch Mystery Abortion in the Bronx on YouTube.
Watch Mystery Abortion in the Bronx on Rumble.

Sources:

• New York Death Index

March 28, 1942: Teen Blames Fatal Abortion on Popular Doctor

SUMMARY: On March 28, 1942, 19-year-old Cleo Florence Moore died at New Rochelle Hospital in New York from peritonitis from an illegal abortion she said had been perpetrated by Dr. Frank F. Marino.

Who Was Cleo Moore?

Cleo Florence Moore was the only daughter of Floyd and Margaret Moore, whose four other children were all sons. The family operated a thriving, prosperous onion farm in Middleville, Michigan. 

Farming wasn't the life that Cleo wanted, though. She left the family farm and moved to New Rochelle, New York in July of 1941. 

Cleo moved into a rooming house at 15 Church Street in New Rochelle. There she met another young woman, a waitress named Mrs. Alice Olga Petersen, in early 1942. The two became friends, and  Cleo suggested that they share a room and split expenses, so they moved to a one-room apartment at 208 Center Avenue. 

Cleo worked as a telephone jukebox operator -- an obsolete job that I had to look up.

Cleo and other women would work from a central location. Patrons at restaurants and diners could chose from a selection of songs listed on a tabletop jukebox, put a coin in the slot, and talk to the operator by a telephone linkup inside the machine. The patron would select the song by number and the operator would put the record on a turntable hooked to speakers in the jukebox. This enabled a larger musical selection than playing the music from an on-site turntable. 

What Happened to Cleo?

Cleo's roommate, Alice, told authorities that Cleo had met a man through her work, and discovered that she was pregnant in January. On March 5, Alice said, Cleo visited 42-year-old Dr. Frank F. Marino  at his office on 208 Center Avenue to arrange an abortion. The specific choice of Dr. Marino was described in the news as "arbitrary."

On March 9, Alice said, Cleo left the apartment at 2pm, and asked Alice to meet her at around 4pm at Marino's office to help her get home after the abortion. Cleo arrived about 5 minutes early and saw Cleo leaving in a taxi. Alice waved the cab down. She testified that Cleo was very pale and looked "terrible." They rode home together and Cleo, already feeling unwell, went to bed. Cleo got up briefly at around 7:30 to get something to eat and then went back to bed. Alice attributed the sleepiness to the effects of the morphine administered for the abortion.

By March 11, Cleo was so ill that Alice summoned Marino. He examined Cleo then sent her to the hospital. "When you get there," Alice said Marino warned Cleo, "don't tell them who did the job." Alice also said that Dr. Marino's wife told her to protect her husband, lest "you and Miss Moore...go to prison."

Somehow the abortion was reported to the authorities. At first Cleo told them that she had taken some pills to induce the abortion, but later she changed her story and said that Merino had performed the fatal abortion.

Cleo languished in the hospital until her death at 1:45 on the morning of March 28. An autopsy showed that she had died from peritonitis caused by an abortion.

Merino's Side of the Story

Between his indictment and the start of the trial, Marino became a captain in the Army Medical Corps. He was stationed in Atlantic City but was placed on inactive leave to attend the trial. Originally he denied ever having seen Cleo before admitting her to the hospital.

He later testified that he had examined Cleo on March 5, confirmed the pregnancy, and charged her $2 for the consultation. He testified that Cleo had indeed requested an abortion but he had refused, recommending that she marry the baby's father. Merino said that Cleo said she couldn't do that because the baby's father was already married. Cleo, he said, had told him that she would find somebody else to do the abortion before she left his office. Merino admitted that he'd lied earlier about having seen Cleo before March 11, but had done so because "I didn't want to get mixed up in this mess."

Merino said that he didn't hear from Cleo again until the 11th, when he was summoned to her home and sent her to the hospital without reporting the abortion. 

Neither of these consultations was documented in Merino's records.

He produced alibi witnesses who said that from 1pm to 3 pm on the day of the abortion he had been treating patients in his office and was doing house calls from 3pm to 4 pm.

Marino's defense also asserted that Cleo's abortion was so badly botched that it was clearly "the work of a bungling amateur." This was a common defense among abortionists, but considering the catastrophic injuries I've seen documented in safe and legal abortion deaths, doctors are just as capable of mangling their patients as non-physicians.

A doctor testifying for the prosecution admitted on cross-examination that it would have been possible for Cleo to have done the abortion herself. 

Marino, who had been a member of the County Board of Supervisors, the New Rochelle Board of Education, and the New Rochelle Zoning Board of Appeals, was also a golfing buddy of the prosecutor of the case. It should come as no surprise, then, that Marino was acquitted.

Cleo's abortion was typical of pre-legalization abortions in that it was performed by a physician.

During the 1940s, while abortion was still illegal, there was a massive drop in maternal mortality from abortion. The death toll fell from 1,407 in 1940, to 744 in 1945, to 263 in 1950. Most researches attribute this plunge to the development of blood transfusion techniques and the introduction of antibiotics. Learn more here.

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

Watch Alas, No Legalization Fairy on YouTube.

Watch Alas, No Legalization Fairy on Rumble.

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Sources:

• "Squire Investigating Operation Death," The (Mount Vernon, NY) Daily Argus, March 28, 1942
• "Death of Girl, 23, is Investigated," The (New Rochelle, NY) Standard-Star, March 28, 1942
• "Doctor Arrested In Girl's Death," The (New Rochelle, NY) Standard-Star, March 30, 1942
• "New Rochelle Doctor Held In Woman's Death," The (Port Chester, NY) Daily Item, March 30, 1942
• "New York Doctor Held in Barry Girl's Death," The Battle Creek (MI) Enquirer and News, March 31, 1942
• "Doctor to Face Inquiry in Death of Barry Girl," The Battle Creek (MI) Enquirer and News, April 2, 1942
• "Hunt Hidden Deaths as Abortion Mill Roundup is Started,"  (New York) Daily News, April 12, 1942
• "Dr. Marino Trial Set for October," The (New Rochelle, NY) Standard-Star, September 9, 1942
• "M.D. on Trial for Death of Juke Hostess," (New York) Daily News," October 15, 1942
• "Attorneys Selecting Marino Case Jurors," The (New Rochelle, NY) Standard-Star, October 15, 1942
• "Doctor Charged With Michigan Girl's Death," Jackson (MI) Citizen Patriot, October 16, 1942
• "Blames an 'Amateur' In Death of Hostess," (New York) Daily News, October 19, 1942
• "Dead Girl's Friend Accuses Dr. Marino," The (Mamaroneck, NY) Daily Times, October 20, 1942
• "Testimony Starts in Marino Trial," The (New Rochelle, NY) Standard-Star, October 20, 1942
• "Defense Rests In Marino Case," The (Mount Vernon, NY) Daily Argus, October 22, 1942
• "Lawyers Sum Up in Marino Trial," The (New Rochelle, NY) Standard-Star, October 22, 1942
• "Marino Denise He Performed Fatal Operation," The (Port Chester, NY) Daily Item, October 22, 1942
• "Acquit Marino," Wilkes-Barre (PA) Evening News, Oct. 23, 1942
• "Report Army Discharged Doctor in Abortion Case," Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Oct. 24, 1942

March 28, 1929: Another Chicago Doctor Implicated

Mrs. Anna Reba Calvin of 8005 Eberhart Avenue, Chicago, died at the age of 30 on March 28, 1929. 

Dr. Emmett Casey of 459 West 79th Street, was arraigned on a charge of perpetrating an abortion, resulting in her death. 

Sources: 

• "Doctor Held After Woman Dies," Chicago Tribune, March 31, 1929

March 28, 2014: Would "TRAP" Have Saved Lakisha?

Abortion-rights groups have been fighting to halt laws that would treat abortion clinics like ambulatory surgical centers. The abortion lobby insists that regulations such as size of doorways and hallways and elevators are just nit-picky and have nothing to do with women's well-being. What they don't want you to know is why these size requirements are included in ambulatory surgery center regulations. If a patient is having a life-threatening emergency, EMS workers need to be able to get the patient onto a gurney and perform resuscitation efforts while moving the patient from the procedure room into the ambulance.

On this date in 2014, 22-year-old Lakisha Wilsondied because a clinic was not laid out to allow easy access by an ambulance gurney.

Lakisha Wilson

Operation Rescue obtained the autopsy report. Lakisha went to Preterm Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio on March 21, 2014. She was 19.4 weeks pregnant. Further investigation by Operation Rescue reveals further details on the pathetic excuse for treatment Lakisha received at the clinic, as well as how the substandard conditions in the clinic contributed to Lakisha's death. After the safe, legal abortion, performed by Lisa Perierra, she began bleeding heavily because her uterus had become soft (atony). 

The procedure rooms at Preterm are on the third floor of the building. When emergency medical services arrived, the elevator was malfunctioning. They were delayed in getting the gurney to Lakisha due to this problem. When they entered the room, where Lakisha still lay on the abortion table with her legs in the stirrups, they found her abortionist, Dr. Lisa Perriera, trying to resuscitate her with a pediatric-sized Ambu-Bag. The IV for administering medications had been torn loose somehow by clinic staff. 

EMS began working to revive Lakisha, who had no pulse and was not breathing. The medics were able to get her heart going but were hampered in their further resuscitation efforts because the elevator was too small to properly accommodate the gurney; Lakisha had to be taken into the elevator in a seated position that did not provide adequate access to her airway. Several house later she was finally taken to Chase University Medical Center, where she was placed on life support and pronounced dead on March 28.

Here is video, with 911 audio, of an ambulance call two years before Lakisha's death. This patient, like Lakisha, was hemorrhaging due to uterine atony. In this patient's case, the elevator wasn't working at all. Fortunately, she survived.

Watch Trapped Because There Was No TRAP on YouTube.

Sources found here.