Planned Parenthood

Traditional Values Coalition ^ | July 10, 2002 | Rev. Louis P. Sheldon

[simicyber]

Traditional Values Coalition
Opinion Editorial

For Publication On Or After
Wednesday, July 10, 2002

Planned Parenthood Refuses 
To Release Files In Baby Shredding Death

By Rev. Louis P. Sheldon
Chairman, Traditional Values Coalition

Washington, DC - Jill June, the director of Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa is facing contempt of court charges and possible arrest for refusing to allow the Sheriff’s Department to gain access to records of women who have received pregnancy tests at Planned Parenthood clinics during the past year.

The Sheriff’s Department is seeking the mother who gave birth to a baby boy and then dropped the infant off at a county recycling center where his body went through a shredding machine. The tattered remains of this boy were found on May 30. According to news reports, the baby’s internal organs were missing and some of the pieces of his body were less than three inches long. 

Planned Parenthood is standing in the way of a murder investigation. It claims that it’s protecting the confidentiality of its medical records, but the county attorney disagrees. According to county attorney Phil Havens, these records do not fall under doctor/patient confidentiality agreements because the pregnancy tests were administered by non-physicians. 

Planned Parenthood and its ally the American Civil Liberties Union are fighting to keep these records private-and thus are obstructing the Sheriff’s Department in its attempt to find the mother who allowed her newborn son to be shredded. Post-mortem tests are being conducted to see if the baby was alive when he was chopped to pieces. 

Planned Parenthood, of course, will find any excuse it can to protect the abortion industry and the routine killing of babies. The shredding of a baby boy is apparently of little concern when “privacy” is at issue. Mothers can legally kill their babies in Planned Parenthood clinics-including late-term partial-birth abortions where the baby’s brains are sucked out by the abortionist. 

Yet, common decency would tell us that after an infant is born alive, it is still considered “murder” to shred a baby. Planned Parenthood, however, prefers to protect its pregnancy test files-files which may contain the name of the woman who killed her infant at the recycling center. Gloria Feldt, head of the national Planned Parenthood Federation of America calls the Sheriff’s request “an inquisition.” 

I would imagine even the most hardened liberal would see the necessity of the Sheriff’s office being given access to files in a murder case, but I might be wrong. “Privacy” is such a sacred cow in the abortion industry that even the shredding of a baby is met with a yawn by the mainstream media. Is there any depth to which the abortionists will not go to protect the unrestricted “right” of a mother to kill her child? This kind of moral depravity apparently is a bottomless pit. In the meantime, a baby killer is loose in Des Moines-and Planned Parenthood continues to stonewall the investigation. 

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Traditional Values Coalition is an interdenominational public policy organization representing more than 43,000 churches across the United States. For more information, contact Stephanie Farina at 202-547-8570. TVC's Web site is: www.traditionalvalues.org <http://www.traditionalvalues.org/>.

[detsaoT]

...I cannot find any words to describe the absolute horror I feel towards this case. Just thinking about the details of this case makes me want to weep profusely. I am mortified to think that ANY person is so sick to do this. I hope that the Sheriff finds this woman and puts HER through the shredder for this terrible crime.

:( ttt

[Truthsayer20]

I support PP on this question. The case is about the privacy of medical records not about abortion.

[drjimmy]

I wonder why the Traditional Values Coalition didn't note in its press release that the pro-life organization Birthright would also refuse to release the names of women who took pregnancy tests at their local facility?

Exactly what is the sheriff doing with the names of the women that have been gathered from the other clinics? Is he calling them up and asking to see their babies for proof the women didn't kill them? Why doesn't the sheriff subpeona records from stores that sell home pregnancy tests (he could match up names from credit card/debit card/affinity card purchases)? Why doesn't he subpeona the nearest sperm bank for a list of men who have "donated," and do some DNA testing to see if there is a match?

There is no question that a horrific crime was committed. But the fishing expedition being carried out by the sheriff is too many steps away from reasonably trying to identify this baby's killer.

[GovernmentShrinker]

Thank you. If this case were about finding the owner of a gun used in a murder and found at a dump, would the "Traditional Values Coalition" argue that all local gun dealers and gunsmiths turn over all their information about all their clients because some of that information MIGHT lead to finding the owner of the gun and presumed murderer? Obviously police have no idea who the mother is and thus no idea whether she ever went anywhere near PP (and if she had, most likely PP would have convinced her to have an abortion, since she obviously didn't want the baby and didn't want to put it up for adoption). Maybe the police should also demand to see all the patient records of every OB/GYN in the area. And of every general practice doctor, since they also provide pregnancy tests. And of every hospital which delivers babies, because for all police know, she had the baby at the hospital, was discharged a few hours later, and went straight to the dump. What a crock! These "pro-life" activists who can't think about ANYTHING but abortion have a serious mental disorder.

[hellinahandcart]

Planned Parenthood is standing in the way of a murder investigation.

No, Planned Parenthood is standing in the way of a giant fishing expedition.

According to county attorney Phil Havens, these records do not fall under doctor/patient confidentiality agreements because the pregnancy tests were administered by non-physicians.

I have yet to have my blood drawn, urine collected, or X-ray administered by a *physician*, so I suppose those aren't medical records either according to Phil Havens. That's preposterous.

And I guess the Rev. Sheldon didn't see fit to mention that other clinics in the area haven't complied with the order either, submitting instead only public birth records.

I assume Rev. Sheldon also thought that the order, which requested pregnancy test results from August of 2001 until May of 2002(the month when the baby boy was delevered, dumped in the trash, and shredded)was perfectly reasonable in its scope too. Surely the test results of a woman who might have just missed her first period would help them find the mother of a NEWBORN abandoned a week or two later, right? After all some woman might have brought a baby to term in two months instead of the usual nine. Musta been a miracle, eh, Reverend?

[hellinahandcart]

It's baaack...

[hellinahandcart]

Exactly what is the sheriff doing with the names of the women that have been gathered from the other clinics? Is he calling them up and asking to see their babies for proof the women didn't kill them?

Pretty much.

Sheriff: "Did you abort, miscarry, or give birth? If the first, can you produce receipts? If the second, will your doctor confirm this? If the third, where's the kid? Can you prove this is your child and not some neighbors' baby you borrowed in order to look kosher for this interview? Now, open your mouth for this DNA swab"...

[Catspaw]

drjimmy, this article really needs to be posted.  It's not just PP that is not turning over the records.  It's also a pro-life group that has joined PP in its refusal.

 

Crime & Courts   Opposing advocates share views on records   By FRANK SANTIAGO Register Staff Writer 07/06/2002 Abortion-rights advocates who run Planned Parenthood and abortion opponents who run Birthright usually find little in common, but a flap in Iowa over medical records has put both groups on the same side.   Like Planned Parenthood, which has resisted a judge's order to turn over pregnancy-test records, Birthright won't reveal details about pregnant women who come to the nonprofit organization for help, a spokeswoman said Friday. In fact, about 10 years ago two police officers showed up on Birthright's doorstep in Burlington and were refused information about a woman, said Margie Blindt, a Birthright state director. The police were called by a boyfriend who wanted to know the woman's whereabouts, and Birthright officials feared she would be harmed by the boyfriend, Blindt said. "If you're going to be a real friend, a real helpmate, you're not going to tell somebody else what they spoke to you about," she said Friday. The confidentiality at Birthright, though, isn't absolute. Blindt said that if someone is in imminent danger and the information would aid investigators, it might be released. Buena Vista County authorities have demanded records of pregnancy tests performed at a Storm Lake Planned Parenthood clinic in the hope of finding the mother of a baby boy whose body was found at a recycling center in May. Blindt declined to comment on Planned Parenthood's battle with authorities in Storm Lake. "We're not worried about what anybody else is doing," Blindt said. "We just try to do well what we do." District Judge Frank Nelson on June 24 ordered Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa to hand over the records. He narrowed the information to names, addresses and birth dates of all women who tested positive for pregnancy from Aug. 15, 2001, to May 30. Blindt said Birthright doesn't have an office in Storm Lake but does have one in Spencer, in neighboring Clay County. She said the group had not been asked for its records in the Storm Lake case. Blindt said the group maintains only the barest of records. "That situation in Burlington 10 years ago when the police came was a wake-up call," she said. "We keep very little information. Just first names, and it doesn't even have to be their correct name." An organization of volunteers, Birthright counsels thousands of Iowa women each year about alternatives to abortion. The women often reveal private information about their pregnancies, home lives and plans, Blindt said. There are 25 centers in the state.