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New Jersey Court Won't Reconsider Case of Misleading Abortion Practitioner
LifeNews.com ^ | November 28, 2007 | Steven Ertelt

Posted on 12/02/2007 8:12:36 PM PST by Coleus

The New Jersey Supreme Court has said it won't reconsider the decision it handed down in September against a woman who sued an abortion practitioner there for misleading her about the development of her unborn child. The state's high court sided with abortion practitioner Sheldon Turkish in the case of the 1996 abortion. Rosa Acuna says Turkish misled her but the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled that Turkish didn't have to tell Acuna that the abortion would kill her baby.

The 5-0 decision reversed an appeals court ruling by saying that the case didn't have to go before a jury. Acuna's attorney, Harold Cassidy, filed a motion for reconsideration and re-argument and filed legal papers with the U.S. Supreme Court as well. The Supreme Court in October decided against hearing the case and, on Wednesday, the state's high court said the same thing.

Cassidy previously called the decision "a departure from the existing law that places a premium on the need to give information to a woman that she wants to know in order to preserve her autonomy in matters so deeply personal to her." Acuna said she should have been told more information about her unborn child and about the emotional and psychological risks of having an abortion beforehand. A kidney disorder made Acuna's pregnancy difficult and Turkish advised her to have an abortion. She was about six to seven weeks pregnant at the time of the abortion.

According to the lawsuit, Acuna asked if "the baby was already there" and Turkish replied that it's "nothing but some blood." In April 2006, a three-judge panel of a state appeals court said a jury should determine if she was properly advised, but also threw out a wrongful death claim Acuna filed. "We know of no common law duty requiring a physician to instruct the woman that the embryo is an 'existing human being,' and suggesting that an abortion is tantamount to murder," Justice Barry Albin wrote for the court.

Albin claimed the statement that an abortion kills a human being "has no broad support in either the medical community or society." The New Jersey Supreme Court's decision ultimately reinstates the trial court's ruling that the case should be thrown out. In a deposition, Turkish admitted he routinely tells pregnant mothers that unborn children early on in pregnancy are "nothing but some tissue."

Acuna sued Turkish, saying the abortion caused psychological trauma including depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and psychosexual dysfunction. She was hospitalized for an incomplete abortion weeks later and a nurse told her that Turkish had left parts of the unborn child inside her.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Government
KEYWORDS:
Abortion foes set back twice
An Abortionist’s Right to Deceive Women
Depriving women of their right to know

1 posted on 12/02/2007 8:12:38 PM PST by Coleus
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To: Coleus

“the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled that Turkish didn’t have to tell Acuna that the abortion would kill her baby. “

Huh???? The doctor had to TELL her that ABORTING her baby would KILL it????

I don’t support abortion, but this woman deserved to lose her case.


2 posted on 12/02/2007 8:15:30 PM PST by ZULU (Non nobis, non nobis Domine, sed nomini tuo da gloriam. God, guts and guns made America great.)
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To: Coleus

Maybe they will appeal it? At the very least, she certainly has a medical malpractice case because she had to get a second operation to finish


3 posted on 12/02/2007 8:30:30 PM PST by Right in Wisconsin (Have a Happy Day)
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To: Coleus

Sounds to me like Rosa Acuna is as dumb as skidmark, if she didn’t know an abortion would kill the fetus.

WTF did she THINK it was going to do?

But somehow she found a lawyer so lacking in principles he’d take her case; why am I not surprised?


4 posted on 12/02/2007 8:33:06 PM PST by Redbob
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To: ZULU

My guess is no one told her that inserting tab A in slot B would produce a baby either.


5 posted on 12/02/2007 8:56:39 PM PST by festus (Fred Thompson '08)
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To: Coleus

Court ruled that Turkish didn’t have to tell Acuna that the abortion would kill her baby.

Have I got this right? Did she not know that an abortion would murder her baby?


6 posted on 12/02/2007 10:39:40 PM PST by garylmoore (Faith is the assurance of things unseen.)
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