Judge Dismisses KS Attorney General's Charges Against Late-Term Abortionist
by Ed Thomas and Jenni Parker
December 26, 2006
(AgapePress) - - The latest step in Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline's investigation of abortion doctor George Tiller and his clinic records has been thwarted by what some pro-lifers see as a political favor to the late-term abortionist from a county district attorney. This past Friday, Kline suffered a setback in his efforts to bring Tiller and his operation to justice when some 30 charges filed late Thursday involving illegal late-term abortions -- and failure to report them -- were dismissed less than 24 hours later. The charges were thrown out at the local district attorney's request. She claims Attorney General Kline had no authority to file charges against the abortion provider.
As an Associated Press report notes, the outgoing Kansas attorney general has waged a two-year legal battle to obtain the records of 90 patients from Tiller's Wichita clinic and a clinic operated in Overland Park by Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri. The state attorney general's investigation focused on the question of whether Tiller and other abortion providers performed abortions on teenage girls who were victims of sexual abuse and whether or not they did illegal late-term abortions on women for reasons of "depression" rather than legitimate emergency medical reasons allowed under Kansas law.
Late last week, Tiller's attorneys appeared at a news conference and announced the charges filed against him while they were still sealed. They told the press that their client was scheduled to appear Wednesday in Sedgwick County District Court to answer the misdemeanor counts leveled against him. But pro-life leader Troy Newman of Operation Rescue, who attended the news conference, says some shocking news came in the midst of his group's elation over the announcement.
The pro-lifers' joy was cut short, Newman notes, when they learned that Nola Foulston, the local district attorney, had "double-crossed our attorney general by going into court and having these charges removed." According to a LifeNews.com report, Judge Paul Clark dismissed the charges against Tiller on Friday at Foulston's request. The judge issued the order without notifying Kline or his office, throwing out the charges only hours after they were unsealed.
Kline had met with Foulston only the day before, Newman points out, "and the D.A. said she would not interfere with the prosecution of this case." However, "after what we believe to be a phone call from George Tiller to the district attorney," the pro-lifer says, "the D.A. walked in and had these charges taken off the docket," a development Newman believes took Kline and many other supporters by surprise.
Operation Rescue's president says he and his organization believe Foulston's intervention in this matter was "nothing more than a political favor being called in by George Tiller -- a kind of a hail Mary pass, really -- to prevent prosecution of him at this time before Phill Kline leaves office." But the charges were dismissed without prejudice, which means they can be returned to the docket at the district attorney's request, so Newman is urging Christians to pray over the situation, in the hopes that Foulston will change her mind.
Meanwhile, Operation Rescue is calling for the Kansas Board of Healing Arts to suspend Tiller's license and close his clinic. Kline also told LifeNews.com that he will seek to overturn Judge Clark's decision and reinstate the charges, which he says are "the result of a multiyear investigation involving the review of thousands of pages of documents, numerous sworn statements and testimony by witnesses and expert review of records and documents."
The counts Kline had filed against Tiller included charges involving 15 abortion procedures the abortionist performed from July through November 2003, and also involving abortions performed on young women under the age of 22, including a 10-year-old. In a recent statement, the Kansas attorney general said Foulston's argument that he has no authority to file charges against Tiller is false.
