Philadelphia abortion doctor accused of murdering patient, newborns
 

Philadelphia (CNN) -- Allegedly running what the prosecutor calls "a house of horrors," a Philadelphia physician, Kermit Barron Gosnell, was charged Wednesday with murder and other offenses related to illegal, late-term abortions.

The doctor is accused of causing the death of one of his female patients and killing seven viable babies in illegal abortions, Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams said.

The babies were born alive in the sixth, seventh and eighth months of pregnancy, but their spinal cords were allegedly severed with scissors, Williams said in a statement.

Nine other people who worked in the west Philadelphia medical office, including Gosnell's wife and sister-in-law, also were charged, Williams said. The practice, called the Women's Medical Society, served mostly low-income minority women for years, he said.

Williams provided a grisly scenario of the shuttered abortion clinic: A search of the office last year by authorities found bags and bottles holding aborted fetuses scattered throughout the building. Jars containing the severed feet of babies lined a shelf. Furniture and equipment was blood-stained, dusty and broken.

In an interview with CNN, Williams described the abortion clinic as "horrific" and providing "botched and illegal abortions."

"It was a house of horrors beyond any type of definition or explanation I can humbly try to give," Williams told CNN. "And it's very sad for the women that were there, that were subjected to such horrific and barbaric -- I would say medical treatment but it wasn't medical -- treatment.

"My grasp of the English language doesn't really allow me to fully describe how horrific this clinic was -- rotting bodies, fetal remains, the smell of urine throughout, blood-stained," Williams continued.

He said women patients were often "very poor."

"The doctor gained a reputation. People far and wide knew that he performed abortions at any time," Williams said.

Williams described one of the alleged infant deaths.

"The baby had been born and was on a cold steel table and murdered by using -- there's no medical basis for snipping or taking scissors and putting them into the neck and cutting, severing the spinal cord. It's just homicide. It's just murder," Williams told CNN.

Gosnell's attorney, William J. Brennan of Philadelphia, told CNN he was surprised at the "length and breadth" of the grand jury's presentment and report against Gosnell and the nine other defendants. Gosnell is facing hundreds of counts, including charges for seven first-degree murders charges and a third-degree murder, according to Williams and the grand jury's 62-page presentment.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/CRIME/01/19/...ion=cnn_latest

SMH

I read the grand jury report last night because I just couldn't believe it. :(:(:(

My stomach turned just reading portions of it.

This is beyond disturbing and is precisely why I support pretty much anything that provides women with full access to healthcare.

This is reminiscent of how things were when abortion was illegal. Is it really a surprise that, with severe restrictions on when abortions can be performed and who can afford them, history repeats itself?

I guess part of my shock is that he was allowed to operate for so long that no one really complained.

Sheesh...and when you think about it...it's only 7 that's KNOWN.

When the clients are people there for illegal abortions, who do they complain to? You can't go to the police and say "I think the guy who did my illegal abortion has something shady going on". This wouldn't have been termed "murder" until after partial birth abortion was banned during the Bush administration.

I don't know Dee...

I mean even still how did they eventually find out about him?

*Sigh* then I hear that he possibly had a 16 year old there administering anesthesia.

It was part of the larger investigation about the woman's death. They had a warrant to investigate the practice and that's when they found what they found.

He DID have a teenager there working...he was the only licensed MD at the clinic, but there were others there doing his work...he'd show up later on during the day to "finish" the abortions. While it sickened me, I'm glad I read the report just so I knew for sure what happened.

Are you seriously saying that a VIABLE HUMAN should legally be able to be murdered?


I have two hotbutton issues. Abortion is one of them.

AF...I don't think Dee is saying that.

I am thinking that she is putting this in historical context...and it's sad that this was going on.

I interpreted her post to mean that because it's difficult for these women to get legal abortions they were going to this doctor to get illegal ones.

^^^this too

My response was more directed to the part about "severe restrictions on when they can be performed", and then her adding the comment about partial-birth...I can't even being myself to call it abortion, since you're not even TECHNICALLY aborting a pregnancy.

Ok, yeah, I had a real problem with that too especially with him aborting fetuses close to term.

That he had no conscience doing it and that some women went that long before having this done really turned my stomach.