RealChoice

Another evil man, stupid woman, dead kid tale.

2009-11-18T19:58:00.002-05:00

California Man Charged With Killing Girlfriend, Her Son

First of all, women need to grasp that the number one threat to the children of unmarried women is moms' boyfriends. They're the ones who by and large do the bulk of the molesting, abusing, and murdering. So don't do the Horizontal Bop with somebody you'd not want to stick around and raise the kids with. And if he seemed like Mr. Right at the time and then morphed into a sleezebag, try waiting until your kids are grown before you start bringing strange men into their lives.

Second of all, the guy who murdered this kid HAD ALREADY DONE TIME FOR KILLING ANOTHER GIRLFRIEND'S KID. "This guy's bad news" isn't something you need a PhD to grasp in a situation like that.

In this sad case, the guy also killed the mother so she'd not narc on him for offing the kid, so she's paying the same price her child did for her bad judgment. But it was her bad judgment.

1901: Doctor's work leaves woman dead

2009-11-15T13:00:00.002-05:00

On November 15, 1901, 22-year-old Irma Brown of Garden City, Kansas, died at County Hospital from complications of an abortion performed there that day.

Dr. Robert E. Gray was arrested November 19 and held without bail by Coroner's Jury.

On March 26, 1902, Gray was acquitted by a jury.

Irma's abortion was typical of criminal abortions in that it was performed by a physician.

Note, please, that with overall public health issues such as doctors not using proper aseptic techniques, lack of access to blood transfusions and antibiotics, and overall poor health to begin with, there was likely little difference between the performance of a legal abortion and illegal practice, and the aftercare for either type of abortion was probably equally unlikely to do the woman much, if any, good. For more about abortion and abortion deaths in the first years of the 20th century, see Abortion Deaths 1900-1909.

Abortionist Gone Wild

2009-11-14T20:28:00.001-05:00

Innocence is no excuse in the Nanny State

2009-11-12T22:29:00.002-05:00

Ex-soldier faces jail for handing in gun

The man found a trash bag somebody else had tossed over his garden wall. It had a gun in it. So he took it to the police station and turned it in. Now he's facing five years in prison, minimum, for possession of a firearm.

Judge Christopher Critchlow said: "This is an unusual case, but in law there is no dispute that Mr Clarke has no defence to this charge.

"The intention of anybody possessing a firearm is irrelevant."

Be afraid. Be very afraid. Because there are people who want to bring this nonsensical attitude toward the entire freaking world.

1952: An unusual death

2009-11-12T07:25:00.001-05:00

On November 3, 1952, Isabell Cuda went to the home of Mary Murawsky in Rockford, Illinois, for an illegal abortion. Mary was neither licensed nor qualified to practice medicine. Murawsky used some sort of instrument on Isabell. Isabell became ill, and died on November 12, leaving behind a husband and a minor child.

Isabell's abortion was unusual in that it was performed by an amateur, rather than by a doctor, as was the case with perhaps 90% of criminal abortions.

During the 1950s, we see an anomaly: Though maternal mortality had been falling during the first half of the 20th Century, and abortion mortality in particular had been plummeting, the downward trend slowed, then reversed itself briefly. I have yet to figure out why. For more, see Abortion Deaths in the 1950s.

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

Two pre-Roe anniversaries

2009-11-11T09:04:00.002-05:00

On November 11, 1929, 23-year-old Mary L. Kelly died in Chicago from an abortion performed by an unidentified perpetrator.

On November 11, 1909, Marian Lang, age 29, died in Chicago home from an abortion. Dr. Pope was indicted by a grand jury. The source document does not indicate that the case went to trial.

Note, please, that with issues such as doctors not using proper aseptic techniques, lack of access to blood transfusions and antibiotics, and overall poor health to begin with, there was likely little difference between the performance of a legal abortion and illegal practice, and the aftercare for either type of abortion was probably equally unlikely to do the woman much, if any, good. And things that things we take for granted, like antibiotics and blood banks, were still in the future.

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

Obama's priorities: Too busy for Berlin & Ft. Hood

2009-11-09T07:52:00.004-05:00

Obama Draws Criticism for Sitting Out Berlin Wall Anniversary

Obama Needs to Go to Ft. Hood

Any other President -- including Clinton -- would have had the decency, the class, and the sense of proportion to hoof it down to Ft. Hood to address the soldiers, and to Berlin to celebrate the fall of the Wall. But Obama, the eternal frat boy, is simply too busy.

Every single leader of the EU, along with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev, are attending the celebrations. But not our CoC. Not the POTUS. Not BO.

He's probably have brought tacky gifts anyway.

Conversion story: Hear Abby Johnson say how she went from PP director to PL advocate

2009-11-09T07:41:00.003-05:00

MsUnderestimated brings us video of Mike Huckabe interviewing former Planned Parenthood director Abby Johnson. (HT: NewsBusters.

Here's a transcript of the interview:

MIKE HUCKABEE: Well, she helped numerous women get abortions, but she’s now a strong pro-life advocate who helps lead protests at the very clinic she once worked for. Please welcome former director for Planned Parenthood, Abby Johnson, from Bryan College Station, Texas. Abby, it’s so nice to have you here.

ABBY JOHNSON: Thank you.

HUCKABEE: We asked Planned Parenthood to issue a statement. We actually asked would they like to be on and share their side of the story. We got this statement – I want to share it. They said: "Planned Parenthood respects everyone's beliefs on this most personal of medical issues, and Planned Parenthood remains fully committed to ensuring that every woman facing an unintended pregnancy knows all of her options. Planned Parenthood’s focus is on prevention. Nationwide, more than 90 percent of the health care Planned Parenthood affiliates provides is preventative in nature."

Abby, my honest assessment of that statement is they do prevent some things. They prevent birth, not illnesses. There’s no illness involved in a pregnancy. Illness means you're sick. You're not sick when you're having a baby.

JOHNSON: No.

HUCKABEE: When you were at Planned Parenthood, did you find that the focus was on health care and prevention of illness?

JOHNSON: No, it's prevention of, I mean, a lot of it is prevention of pregnancy. And that is why I got into it.

HUCKABEE: That's why you first got involved-

JOHNSON: That’s why I first got involved.

HUCKABEE: -to keep people from getting an unintended pregnancy.

JOHNSON: That's right. That’s absolutely why I got involved in it. But I soon found that one of their goals was to make money. And the way they make money is to increase the number of abortions they do.

HUCKABEE: You were working, actually, helping and assisting in an abortion, and you saw on an ultrasound of the abortion process. Tell me what did you see when the ultrasound was running and the abortion was taking place?

JOHNSON: Well, I was called into the room to assist during a procedure. And it was actually an ultrasound-guided abortion procedure, which is not that common in Planned Parenthood health centers because it's a longer type of abortion procedure, and Planned Parenthood centers are trying to do as many procedures a day as they can, and so they’re not going to take a lot of time for each procedure. But for whatever reason, this physician did decide to do an ultrasound-guided procedure on this particular woman. And so, I was called in to help. And my job was to hold the ultrasound probe on this woman's abdomen so that the physician could actually see the uterus on the ultrasound screen. And when I looked at the screen, I saw a baby on the screen. And she was about 13 weeks pregnant at the time. And I saw a full side profile. So I saw face to feet on the ultrasound machine. And I saw the probe going into the woman's uterus. And at that moment, I saw the baby moving and trying to get away from the probe.

HUCKABEE: Moving away from it, oh, my God.

JOHNSON: Yes. And I thought, "It's fighting for its life." And I thought, "It’s life, I mean, it's alive."

HUCKABEE: Until that moment, Abby, had it appeared to you that you were able to use words like "fetus" and "tissue," it's very different than when you saw the form of a child, recognizable.

JOHNSON: That it was alive. Mm-hmm.

HUCKABEE: What did you do? Did you say anything at that moment to the doctor?

JOHNSON: No, I mean, my mind was racing, my heart was beating so fast. And I just was thinking, "Oh, my gosh, make it stop." And then, all of a sudden, I mean, it was just over, just, in the blink of an eye. And I just saw the, I just saw the baby just literally, just crumble, and it was over. And I just, I dropped the ultrasound probe. And then I realized, "Oh, my gosh, I'm not holding the ultrasound probe," so I scrambled and I put the ultrasound probe back in place. And I, so many things were going through my mind, and I was thinking about my daughter who’s three, and I was thinking about the ultrasound I had of her, and I was thinking of just how perfect that ultrasound was when she was 12 weeks in the womb. And I was just thinking, "What am I doing? What am I doing here?" And I could just, I had one hand on this woman's, on this woman's belly, and I was thinking, "There was life in here, and now there's not," and-

HUCKABEE: You literally were holding your hand on top of her, on top of her belly at that point-

JOHNSON: Mm-hmm.

HUCKABEE: -and realized that what was underneath that hand once a moment ago was life and it's gone?

JOHNSON: Mm-hmm.

HUCKABEE My gosh. When you were faced with that – by the way, did the woman see any of this? Did she have access to see the screen at all?

JOHNSON: No, she was sedated.

HUCKABEE: People never see really what’s happening to them.

JOHNSON: No.

HUCKABEE: I can't help but believe if they saw that they might be running out of those clinics.

JOHNSON: Yeah, absolutely. If clinic workers saw what was happening on that screen, they would be running out of those clinics. This is what the abortion industry does not want their workers to see. They don't want their workers to see what’s actually happening during an abortion. That's why Planned Parenthood doesn’t do, that's why so many of these large abortion industries don't do ultrasound-guided abortion procedures. They don't want people to see what’s really happening in the woman's womb.

HUCKABEE: You know, I think about what you've gone through. You must have walked away that day saying, uh-oh, this is not what I want to be spending the rest of my life doing as a career. What was the next step you took? You were the executive director of that Planned Parenthood clinic, and yet, really you didn't know what was going on back in those back rooms in that standpoint.

JOHNSON: Mm-hmm. I went home that day, and I had made the decision that day that that was it, and I went home, and I talked to my husband about it. And, I mean, my husband is a teacher. And we have a daughter, and so we're depending on two incomes, and so, we just decided that I would go back to work, and I would just be really looking for another job. And I knew that I had two weeks until we were going to be doing surgical abortions again. So I had two weeks to find another job. And so I went, the first week was pretty uneventful. And the next weekend came, and that Monday came, and I was just sitting in my office, and I was crying. I had the door closed. And I was just thinking, "Where am I going to go? What am I going to do? I don't want to be here."

HUCKABEE: What did the people at the clinic say when you finally said, "This is it, I'm leaving"?

JOHNSON: Well, nobody really knew what was happening. I couldn't talk to anybody at the clinic because they didn't know what was going on in my heart. They didn't understand what was happening. And now that they do know, Planned Parenthood has put a restraining order out on me now that they know I’m working with the pro-life movement.

HUCKABEE: I wish Planned Parenthood would put a restraining order on themselves and stop the horrible procedures that they're doing every day. Abby Johnson, thank you. You have a lot of courage to share your remarkable story. And I thank you so much, and I hope it's a great reminder that we can't necessarily just listen to words. We need to understand the actions behind them.

JOHNSON: That’s right.

HUCKABEE Thank you. God bless you. What a wonderful story.

JOHNSON: Thank you, thank you.

HUCKABEE: Abby Johnson.

Two tragic anniversaries

2009-11-09T07:38:00.002-05:00

"Yvonne" Roe is one of the women Life Dynamics notes on their "Blackmun Wall" of women killed by legalized abortion. Yvonne was a 19-year-old student who died from sepsis on November 9, 1999 in Marrero, Louisiana, after undergoing a safe and legal abortion. She had been an All-American cheerleader and a member of the National Honor Society. Life Dynamics cites the Clarion Ledger, November 11, 1999, and indicates that though they have information giving Yvonne's real name, they can not release it due to a confidentiality agreement.

Demetrice Andrews, age 22, underwent an abortion on October 17, 1988. She became progressively ill, and was finally admitted to Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta. Demetrice suffered multiple organ failure. She died on November 9, 1988. It is ironic that Demetrice was admitted to Grady to be treated for abortion complications. Another woman, Jacqueline Reynolds, died just two years earlier, from complications of anesthesia administered for an abortion performed at Grady.

Newborn cries influenced by womb sounds

2009-11-07T09:53:00.002-05:00

Babies 'cry in mother's tongue'

Third trimester fetuses evidently are paying attention to their mothers' voices and gauging their cries accordingly after birth.

1923: Death in a Chicago hospital

2009-11-06T07:49:00.000-05:00

On November 6, 1923, Mrs. Agnes Wendt died at Chicago's St. Anne's Hospital from complications from an abortion performed there that day.

Dr. Irene Wagoner was exonerated by the coroner, but nevertheless indicted for murder in Agnes' death.

Agnes' abortion was typical of criminal abortions in that it was performed by a physician.

Keep in mind that things that things we take for granted, like antibiotics and blood banks, were still in the future. For more about abortion in this era, see Abortion in the 1920s.

1977: Abortion quackery kills Texas mom

2009-11-04T07:56:00.001-05:00

Louchrisser Jackson, a 23-year-old mother of five, was 12 weeks pregnant when she went to Dr. Robert L. Gardner for a safe and legal abortion at Reproductive Services in Dallas on November 4, 1977.

Louchrisser began hemorrhaging. Gardner said that he ordered blood for a transfusion, but it didn't arrive so about an hour before her death he attempted to give her a transfusion with his own blood -- which turned out to be an incompatable type.

A private ambulance was called but was not informed of the nature of the transport. In that jurisdiction, private ambulances are only permitted to transport stable patients; they are prohibited from responding to emergency calls. Because the ambulance service had no reason to expect an emergency, they did not respond promptly, nor did they refer the transport to the fire deparment's ambulance service.

When the ambulance crew arrived, Louchrisser had gone into cardiac arrest. The crew, upon discovering that they'd been called for an emergency transport, rushed Louchrisser to the hospital immediately rather than calling for a fire department ambulance.

Louchrisser died that day. Gardner requested that the body be released without an inquiry. Another physician at the hospital learned of the case and requested an inquiry.

The autopsy found massive hemmorage of at least two liters of blood, and a "1.8 x 2 cm. ragged perforation in the right lateral wall just above the internal os of the cervical canal. This perforation commonicates freely with the retroperitoneal space on the right side. The endometrial surface of the uterus is ragged and hemorrhagic." Death was attributed to "massive retroperitoneal hemorrhage due to perforation of the uterus during a therapeutic abortion."

1928: Woman dies in doc's office

2009-11-04T07:54:00.000-05:00

On November 4, 1928, 22-year-old Anna Borndal died at the office of Dr. Lou E. Davis of Chicago, from complications of an abortion performed there that day.

Davis was held by the coroner for unintentional manslaughter. She was indicted by a grand jury for homicide.

Anna's abortion was typical of illegal abortions in that it was performed by a physician.

Keep in mind that things that things we take for granted, like antibiotics and blood banks, were still in the future. For more about abortion in this era, see Abortion in the 1920s.

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

PP director quits after witnessing abortion

2009-11-03T16:50:00.000-05:00

Planned Parenthood Director Quits After Watching Abortion on Ultrasound

Praise God!

"Law & Order" does balanced show on late abortion

2009-10-29T18:16:00.002-04:00

Thanks for the link go to Jill Stanek.

It seems the writers went a bit overboard to make sure to fit in stereotypical and atypical people on both sides, reasonable people on both sides, fanatics on both sides, and the arguments of both sides. But with just one hour, he/she needed to cram it in a bit.

The only fault I can find is the characterization of the abortions as being typically done on babies with horrendous congenital conditions, since this is atypical even of late abortions, but I do appreciate that these children were shown as still having dignity and lives worth living.

So I'd have to rate it high.

Another example of "Figures lie, and liars figure"

2009-10-27T17:45:00.002-04:00

The Bogus Death Statistic That Won't Die:

Democratic Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida has found his calling: death demagogue. First, he accused Republicans of wanting sick patients to "die quickly." Next, he likened health insurance problems to a "holocaust in America." Now, he's unveiled a new website entitled "namesofthedead.com" in memory of the "more than 44,000 Americans [who] die simply because they have no health insurance."

Just one problem: The statistic is a phantom number. Grayson's memorial, like the Democrats' government health care takeover plan itself, is full of vapor. It comes from a study published this year in the American Journal of Public Health. But the science is infused with left-wing politics.

....

How did these political doctors come up with the 44,000 figure? They used data from a health survey conducted between 1988 and 1994. The questionnaires asked a sample of 9,000 participants whether they were insured and how they rated their own health. The federal Centers for Disease Control tracked the deaths of people in the sample group through the year 2000. Himmelstein, Woolhandler and company then crunched the numbers and attributed deaths to lack of health insurance for all the participants who initially self-reported that they had no insurance and then died for any reason over the 12-year tracking period.

This is the sort of data massage the CDC uses to inflate "childbirth" deaths -- they count any death of a woman who was pregnant or recently pregnant as a "childbirth" death, even if she just happened to be on the 98th floor of the World Trade Center on 9/11 on her first day back from maternity leave.

It works for the abortion lobby. Why not for the scaremongers trying to take away all our choices in health care?

1922: Chicago abortion death

2009-10-25T10:17:00.000-04:00

On October 25, 1922, 24-year-old Lillian Hulbert died at Chicago's St. Anne's Hospital from complications of a criminal abortion performed on her there that day.

The coroner identified a Mrs. M.C. Anderson as responsible for Lillian's death.

Anderson's profession is given as nurse or midwife.

Keep in mind that things that things we take for granted, like antibiotics and blood banks, were still in the future. For more about abortion in this era, see Abortion in the 1920s.

Wow! Law & Order presents some reality of late abortion

2009-10-25T09:15:00.002-04:00

Keep in mind, the sort of thing the fictitious nurse describes happens hundreds of times a year in the US -- the main difference being that the babies in real life typically could have lived long, normal lives if carried to term (or even, in many cases, if brought to the NICU at the time of birth instead of being disposed of as medical waste).

For more on the real-life scenarios, see:

Obama Comments, I Respond

Planned Parenthood Admits to Live Births

A Fetus With Attitude

A Question About Born-Alive Babies and Criminal Charges

Obama, McCain, and "Health"

Third Trimester Abortions and the Law

Funeral Scheduled for Baby Shanice, Thrown on a Roof to Die

Just Why are Abortions Being Done so Late in the Pregnancy That the Babies Can Be Born Alive

More Born-Alive Babies

Jill Stanek and FactCheck's Faulty "Facts"

"Mermaid Girl" Shiloh Pepin dies at age 10

2009-10-24T16:53:00.005-04:00

Shiloh Pepin, one of a handful of known sirenomelia survivors, has died. She was 10 years old.

Sirenomelia is a rare birth defect that causes the legs to be fused. Babies with siernomelia are typically not born without normal pelvic area features such as urethra and anus, and as such typically die shortly after birth. Surgeons can now sometimes correct the abnormalities that are incompatible with life.

Shiloh wasn't a candidate for leg separation surgery because of issues with how her blood vessels were formed. She used a wheelchair to attend school and dreamed of becoming a jeweler.

ABC News once arranged for Shiloh to meet with another sirenomelia survivor, Tiffany Yorks of Florida. You can read about it here.

1981: One of three deaths for NAF hero

2009-10-23T08:00:00.000-04:00

Nineteen-year-old Diane Boyd lived in a state institution for the mentally disabled. There, she was beaten and raped in July of 1981, and was later discovered to be pregnant. A safe, legal abortion was arranged for Diane at National Abortion Federation member Reproductive Health Services in St. Louis, and Diane's mother signed a consent form. The abortion was performed October 22, 1981. Diane died the next day.

According to suits later filed by Diane's mother, RHS staff and abortionist Robert Crist did not check for possible drug interactions before giving Diane valium and sublimaze. These drugs evidently reacted with Diane's usual medication, thorazine, causing her to stop breathing. Diane's mother said that the clinic lacked heart monitoring equipment or resuscitation equipment.

Diane was not the last woman to die after abortion by Crist. Seventeen-year-old Latatchie Veal bled to death after an abortion by Crist in 1991. Twenty-two-year-old Nichole Williams died of DIC (disseminated intravascular coagulopathy) after an abortion by Crist in 1997.

As for RHS, they'd performed an abortion on fourteen-year-old Sandra Kaiser in 1984 without her mother's knowledge or consent. Sandra's already fragile mental health deteriorated further, and she committed suicide shortly thereafter by throwing herself into traffic.

For more abortion deaths, visit the Cemetery of Choice:

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Doctor fingered in 1936 abortion death

2009-10-23T07:59:00.000-04:00

On October 16, 1936, 26-year-old Katherine DiDonato, mother of two, was admitted to Roosevelt Hospital to be treated for complications of a criminal abortion.

Katherine's husband reported that the abortion had taken place three days earlier.

Detectives were told that Katherine had bought pills from drug clerk Hyman Kantor, who had then recommended Dr. Aloysius Mulholland to perform an abortion.

Katherine died at 2 AM on October 23. Both Mulholland and Kantor were arrested and charged with homicide.

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

An abortion death from the early 20th Century

2009-10-23T07:55:00.002-04:00

Emma Bickel, a 59-year-old midwife, was charged with second-degree manslaugher in the death of 19-year-old Emily Nohavec of St. Louis. Bickel had been a midwife for 28 years, and had a reputation for "uprightness" and honesty.

Emily, who was single, had been living with her sister in St. Louis, and she worked as a clerk in her sister‘s vegetable store. On October 18, 1913, she first reported feeling ill. On Monday, October 20, a Dr. Reber was summoned to see her. He diagnosed her with septic peritonitis. The next day, her condition was critical and she was admitted to Rebekah Hospital. There, Dr. Garcia was called in for consultation. Drs. Reber and Garcia agreed that an immediate laparotomy was needed to try to save Emily‘s life.

The doctors found Emily‘s abdominal cavity inflamed. A cyst about the size of a pear surrounded her left ovary, her right ovary was surrounded by pus, and there was pus in her fallopian tubes. The doctors removed these purulent organs and inserted drainage tubes.

Dr. Reber also curetted Emily‘s uterus and packed it with iodoform gauze. Emily‘s uterus noted an ulceration about the size of a hazelnut inside the cervix. The edges of this ulceration were ragged and torn, and Reber concluded that this was caused by instrumentation. Reber also believed that swelling near where the fallopian tube entered the uterus was caused by instrumentation. Reber believed that an abortion had been performed a week to ten days before he was first called to examine Emily.

Dr. Garcia, on the other hand, agreed that Emily had recently been pregnant, and that the pregnancy had ended at about two months, but noted &quo;there were no direct punctures or cuts, scratches, or anything of that kind in the uterus, or in the abdomen.&quo; He agreed with Dr. Reber that the sepsis was caused by an abortion, but he disagreed about the abortion having been induced. Dr. Garcia concluded that Emily might merely have miscarried.

Despite the efforts of both doctors, Emily died the following day, October 23.

That same day, Dr. Hockdoerfer performed an autopsy. He made the same findings as Drs. Garcia and Reber, except that he also found a section of placental implantation about the size of a quarter. He agreed that retained placental tissue had caused the sepsis, but did not find any signs of damage from instruments. Emily had been in good health prior to her final, fatal illness.

While Emily was hospitalized, police officer William H. Coates arrested Emma Bickel and brought her to Emily‘s bedside. Coates testified that he asked Bickel if she knew the girl, and Bickel said yes, she did know her. Coates testified that he then said, "You performed an abortion on her, didn‘t you?" To which, he testified, Bickel replied, "Yes." Coates took Bickel to the police station where she made a statement. Coates wrote out the statement as follows:

Department of Police, City of St. Louis.
7:16 P. M., Oct. 22, 1913.
To whom it may concern I herein state that on or about October 13th, 1913, Emily Nohavec came to my house in the evening and said she was in trouble and wanted me to help her out. I told her it was dangerous for to do a thing like that, and she said, ‘You need not be afraid,‘ that ‘I won't tell on you.‘ I then inserted a catheter into the private parts and opened her womb. She then paid me about five or seven dollars; I don‘t remember which. She came back in two days, and I again put the catheter into the womb. She left, and I never saw her until I saw her this evening at the hospital.
The above statement was made of my own free will, and not by any threats or promises or violence to me.
[Signed] EmmaÂ Bickel.
Witnesses: Off. W. H. Coates; Off. David J. O‘Connor.

When called upon to testify in court, however, Bickel denied having performed an abortion on Emily. She said that she never knew Emily until the girl came to her house, saying that she was &quo;in trouble." Bickel said that she asked Emily, "How far along?" To which Emily replied that her period was two weeks late. Bickel said that Emily told her that she was married, and that she had taken some medicine to cause an abortion, and had also taken a box of pills. Bickel said that she told Emily, "Well, if you are only two weeks gone they ought to bring you by your next monthlies." Bickel said that she then sent Emily away.

Bickel said that about two weeks later Emily, who had still not given her name, returned, saying that she was ill, and willing to pay $7 for an examination. Bickel said that she used a speculum to examine Emily, and found her cervix open and exuding a foul discharge. Bickel testified that she told Emily to consult a doctor. She said that this took place about two weeks prior to Emily‘s death, and that she‘d not seen the girl between the examination and being brought to the hospital by Officer Coates.

Bickel testified that she had confirmed that she knew Emily, and that the girl had come to her house, but that Coates did not ask her at the hospital if she had performed an abortion. She said that she was taken to the police station, that Coates had written out the statement and told her to sign it, so she‘d complied.

Bickel said that she‘d never told Coates that she‘d inserted a catheter, that she‘d tried to discourage abortion, telling Emily "that it was a dangerous thing to do a thing like that." She said that she‘d only signed the statement because she was excited and confused and was merely doing what she was told.

Despite her protestations of innocence, Bickel was convicted. She was sentenced to three years in prison. She unsuccessfully appealed her conviction.

Note, please, that with overall public health issues such as doctors not using proper aseptic techniques, lack of access to blood transfusions and antibiotics, and overall poor health to begin with, there was likely little difference between the performance of a legal abortion and illegal practice, and the aftercare for either type of abortion was probably equally unlikely to do the woman much, if any, good. For more information about early 20th Century abortion mortality, see Abortion Deaths 1910-1919.

Great collection of BO Nobel cartoons

2009-10-11T19:37:00.002-04:00

Dr. Roy's Thoughts

I particularly like the first and third the most.

They're from this collection", which just gathered them without evidently taking sides. But the consensus seems to be that the Nobel Peace Prize now means about as much as the prize you get in a box of Cracker Jack.

2000: Fatal abortion in Dayton

2009-10-11T09:13:00.001-04:00

L’Echelle Head, age 21, died October 11, 2000, after an abortion at Dayton Women's Health Services. Dayton Right to Life said that L'Echelle was pronounced dead at Samaritan Hospital after she'd been sent home from the clinic.

Police had been called to a private residence to investigate the report of an unresponisve 21-year-old woman shortly after 6 p.m.

L'Echelle's obituary indicates that she left behind a daughter, her parents, and three sisters.

Peggy Lehner of Dayton Right to Life said, "The final results of the autopsy are still pending. From early indications it appeas she suffered some sort of blood clot or embolism."

Dayton Women's Health Services had been caught operating without a license in 1999. It was inspected on October 27, 1999, to see if a license should be granted. Inspectors found rusty instruments, improperly-marked medications, and a failure to follow sterile technique. The clinic administrators were told they'd have to correct the problems to get a license.

The clinic got the license after getting a waiver regarding follow-up care for patients.

For more abortion deaths, visit the Cemetery of Choice:

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1981: Fatal abortion for teen

2009-10-11T09:10:00.002-04:00

Life Dynamics lists 17-year-old Sharonda Rowe on their "Blackmun Wall" of women killed by safe and legal abortions. According to LDI, Sharonda had an abortion done in a doctor's office in Washington, DC on October 11, 1981. She suffered lacerations in her vagina and uterus, causing a massive, fatal air embolism (air in her bloodstream).

For more abortion deaths, visit the Cemetery of Choice:

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