The woman saw a middle-aged couple get out of a car. They opened the back door and pulled out a teenage girl who appeared to be Filipino. The girl was crying. The sidewalk counselors called out to her, and she tried to move toward them, the picketer said, but the middle-aged white couple took the girl by the arms and led her toward the front of the building. The picketer called out to the clinic escort. "Can't you see she doesn't want to do this? I can't step on your property, but you can help her. You're pro-choice, right? Can't you help her?" According to the picketer, the escort smirked at her, then held the facility door open, to make it easier for the couple to propel the girl into the clinic.
The next time she saw that girl's face, the picketer told me, was on the news. It was October of 1992, and the news story was about the suicide of 19-year-old Arlin Della Cruz.
Arlin was a senior in high school when she learned that she was pregnant. A friend recalled that Arlin wanted to have her baby but agreed to an abortion to try to salvage her relationship with her boyfriend. She had disappeared from her home. A search found her hanging from a tree in a nearby woods on October 15. "Under her shirt, the coroner found Arlin's favorite stuffed animal -- a rabbit." Arlin's mother said that Arlin had left a suicide note saying that she wanted to go be with her baby.
One of Arlin's friends reported that Arlin wanted the baby, but chose abortion to try to salvage her relationship with her boyfriend. If the picketer's observations are correct, Arlin had serious second thoughts the day of the abortion.
The condition of Hillcrest likely did little to help Arlin cope. A later Google reviewser of the clinic, Hillcrest Women's Medical Center, said:
"This place will not give you the information you need before having an abortion. Their "counseling" consists of a doctor who can barely speak English describing what will happen. The staff is friendly but very un knowledgeable. They do not do follow up with their patients, leading to many emotional difficulties after. They even will accept clients who are pushed through the doors by a man, crying... and take her through the process. I do not recommend this place to any woman looking to have an abortion. The experience was traumatizing."
Other patients reported bad experiences:
I highly do not recommend this place . It reminded me of a animal clinic , it even smelled like one. ....The " nurses & doctors " or whatever you would like to call them were in professional . Honestly I would never call them nurses. Especially the doctor all he was after was money & hurrying so other girls could come right in & get there's done also. .... Once you are in that room it is something you will never forget. As you lay on the table.... You see all the other girls dead babies blood seeping through the blue cloth that they put them on. The doctor doesn't speak one word to you he just goes and does what he has to do. .... The doctor left after he did what he had to do and as I was laying on the table, the nurse cleaned up & the doctor came in several times asking her if she was done yet he had other patients . Nobody had any sympathy there. .... They just wanted your money. ...."
THE WORST medical experience of my LIFE. DO NOT SUPPORT this clinic! The nurses were rude and uncaring. The doctor, if that's what you even want to call him, was unprofessional and rushed for time. He showed no compassion for the patients. All he was concerned with was his turnover rate and when he was getting out. "Quickly! Quickly I have places to be after this, I don't have time for this" he shouted to the nurses to get the girls in and out as fast as possible. .... The whole staff seamed so unorganized and out of the loop. No one knew what was going on. .... The facility is dirty and beyond it's time. It felt like I was sitting in an old dusty school. The sink in the ultra sound room looked like there had been blood or fluids splattered on it and then barely wiped clean. The equipment and instruments look old and outdated. The moment you walk in it looks and feels unprofessional. I felt uneasy the whole time I was in there but I kept telling myself it will be okay this must be how all abortion clinics are(since this was my first experience ever in one). .... "
"This place is awful. Absolutely no compassion for the patients. Staff was rude and was talking about each and every woman that was there after they went back. Absolutely nasty old women. During counseling they rolled their eyes at every question I had asked. Doctor didn't speak English well and just an overall terrible place. I saw everything. The doctor laid out what was removed on a table In front of my poking at it... I am mortified and I will never get the images out oft head."
Hillcrest is also the abortion clinic where Kelly Morse died of an allergic reaction to a local anesthetic.
Sources:
- Christian Broadcasting Network, "Pennsylvania Abortion / Suicide," Air date November 6, 1992
- "Officials seek cause of woman's death," (Harrisburg, PA) Patriot, October 19, 1992
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