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Doctor Charged With Murder


Steel2Velvet

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PHILADELPHIA – A doctor accused of running a filthy "abortion mill" for decades in an impoverished Philadelphia neighborhood delivered babies alive, killed them with scissors and allowed a woman who had survived 20 years in a refugee camp to be overmedicated and die at his clinic, prosecutors said.

Dr. Kermit Gosnell, 69, was charged Wednesday with eight counts of murder for the deaths of seven babies and one patient. Nine employees also were charged, including four with murder.

Prosecutors described the clinic as a "house of horrors" where Gosnell kept baby body parts on the shelves, allowed a 15-year-old high school student to perform intravenous anesthesia on patients and had his licensed cosmetologist wife do late-term abortions. Gosnell made millions performing thousands of abortions. A second woman, a 22-year-old mother of two from Philadelphia, died in 2000 from a perforated uterus.

Four months after Karnamaya Mongar reached the United States after spending nearly two decades in camps in Nepal she was dead at Gosnell's clinic. The 41-year-old mother of three died of cardiac arrest when she was given too much Demerol and other drugs, prosecutors said.

"Pennsylvania is not a third-world country. There were several oversight agencies that stumbled upon and should have shut down Kermit Gosnell long ago. But none of them did, even after Karnamaya Mongar's death," city prosecutors charged in a nearly 300-page grand jury report.

The "Women's Medical Society" opened in 1979 and was inspected by the state Department of Health only sporadically. The last inspection was in 1993. Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams accused state health officials of "utter disregard" for Gosnell's patients, who were mostly poor minority women like Mongar.

Kind of puts murder in an intriguingly awkward perspective.

I'm pretty sure Sarah Palin can't be brought into the lineup room as a co-conspirator in this case.

In fact, I'm betting no one individual except the criminal(s) will have fingers pointed in their direction.

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These weren't late-term abortions. Once the fetus is delivered alive, it's not an abortion if you kill it after that. Most doctors would never even perform a late-term abortion unless delivery would kill either the mother, the fetus, or both.

Abortions are done in utero. There is no one, pro-choice or otherwise, who would or will defend what this "doctor" did. I am staunchly pro-choice and this was way beyond the pall.

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Sick murder. A huge portion of responsibility lies upon the shoulders of the State of Pennsylvania, and the city as well, if this was an accredited facility and physician. The excuse for that will come down to lack of funding .... which just isn't acceptable. :P

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  • 4 weeks later...

You can't murder something that's not a viable human being. Until then, it's a clump of cells with the potential to become a viable human being. Once the fetus is viable outside the womb, however, the only time an abortion should be performed is if continuing the pregnancy and/or delivery will kill either the mother, the fetus, or both.

Before the viability point, the mother has plenty of time to decide if she wants to continue with the pregnancy. If she can't make up her mind before then, she's got more problems than an unwanted pregnancy. I've never had one, but a friend of mine has, and she had one because her birth control pill failed. Why should she go through a pregnancy she was already trying to prevent? Unless your next argument is no one should have sex unless they want to be parents. Sex is for recreation as much as it's for procreation.

I just got the sick feeling we're heading down some pseudo-religious babble road.

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You can't murder something that's not a viable human being. Until then, it's a clump of cells with the potential to become a viable human being. Once the fetus is viable outside the womb, however, the only time an abortion should be performed is if continuing the pregnancy and/or delivery will kill either the mother, the fetus, or both.

Before the viability point, the mother has plenty of time to decide if she wants to continue with the pregnancy. If she can't make up her mind before then, she's got more problems than an unwanted pregnancy. I've never had one, but a friend of mine has, and she had one because her birth control pill failed. Why should she go through a pregnancy she was already trying to prevent? Unless your next argument is no one should have sex unless they want to be parents. Sex is for recreation as much as it's for procreation.

I just got the sick feeling we're heading down some pseudo-religious babble road.

Actually, I'm more akin to an atheist, but it doesn't take rocket science or a degree in theology to know life is life is life. You may refer to life as a "clump of cells" and "not viable," a human life is just that. We're all a bunch of cells, really. Outside of the womb, a newly-born human is still not viable: a baby cannot feed and defend him-/herself and will not survive unless they're taken care of for many years to come. It's revolting there are some people who rationalise murder in this guise.

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I'm an atheist as well, not that it really matters. Viability in this instance refers to the ability of the fetus to survive without relying on the mother in utero. Meaning, if the mother spontaneously delivered or went into early labor, would the fetus be able to survive without the mother. It has nothing to do with being able to feed itself or defend itself, or needing to be taken care of for years to come. It's the point in the pregnancy that the fetus can survive being delivered at that point. That's what viable means in this discussion.

What's revolting is that there are people out there who think that because they disagree with something, it shouldn't exist. If you disagree with abortion, fine. Don't have one. Counsel women you know who are pregnant not to get one. Work for pro-life groups. Don't take choices away from other people. Pro-choice is not pro-abortion or pro-murder. It's merely that. Pro-CHOICE. Meaning, women should have the choice to have one or not have one. It's not like they're mandated or required. If you want one, it's there for you. If you don't want one, that's fine too. It's a personal choice, up to that woman and her doctor.

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"...I have to wonder if the defendant kept a thorough record of every sperm emission made during his life?...Well, unless the defendant attempted to contact every single one-night-stand to determine if a child resulted in those unions -- he has no parental claim over this child whatsoever. Why now? Why this sperm?...And for that matter, all masturbatory emissions where his sperm was clearly not seeking an egg could be termed reckless abandonment." ~ Elle Woods on Legally Blonde. She won the case.

Regarding sex as a recreational thing, humans are the only mammals who pursue that as recreation, or perhaps the bonobo monkey certainly dos. Cats, pigs, etc. pursue mating as a means to procreate - and end. And so honestly, I look at it as it was put there to be enjoyed as a procreation tool - procreate, but take care of what results from it. Otherwise, be a level above animals and DON'T have sex strictly for fun... because you might find, no matter how hard you try to protect yourself against the inevitable, the inevitable will find you.

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I'm an atheist as well, not that it really matters. Viability in this instance refers to the ability of the fetus to survive without relying on the mother in utero. Meaning, if the mother spontaneously delivered or went into early labor, would the fetus be able to survive without the mother. It has nothing to do with being able to feed itself or defend itself, or needing to be taken care of for years to come. It's the point in the pregnancy that the fetus can survive being delivered at that point. That's what viable means in this discussion.

What's revolting is that there are people out there who think that because they disagree with something, it shouldn't exist.

That "viability" is defined in such an arbitrary way to meet an end doesn't make it any less wrong/criminal. I disagree with murder. I agree that people should be held accountable for their actions, whether to choose to take the life of another or not.

"...I have to wonder if the defendant kept a thorough record of every sperm emission made during his life?...Well, unless the defendant attempted to contact every single one-night-stand to determine if a child resulted in those unions -- he has no parental claim over this child whatsoever. Why now? Why this sperm?...And for that matter, all masturbatory emissions where his sperm was clearly not seeking an egg could be termed reckless abandonment." ~ Elle Woods on Legally Blonde. She won the case.

That doesn't make any sense. A case like could never be won on a statement like that. Has there been an instance when a human life was formed from a single sperm or single ovum? Haploid people? It's only a movie, of course :beatnik:

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If you disagree with abortion, fine. Don't have one. Counsel women you know who are pregnant not to get one. Work for pro-life groups. Don't take choices away from other people. Pro-choice is not pro-abortion or pro-murder. It's merely that. Pro-CHOICE. Meaning, women should have the choice to have one or not have one. It's not like they're mandated or required. If you want one, it's there for you. If you don't want one, that's fine too. It's a personal choice, up to that woman and her doctor.

:bow:

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What interested me about this story and prompted me to post it was the irony that aborted human remains were kept on the premises of a facility, the business of which is (was) to terminate pregnancies. Studies have shown that when women are allowed to view the signatures of life inside their wombs through sonograms or even hear the heartbeat of the developing fetus, they are 50% less likely to have the abortion performed. That makes this an extremely poorly run abortuary, from a business standpoint.

Another ironic aspect to this industry, as a whole, is that it claims to champion a woman's right to choose and yet globally, more women's hearts cease through this procedure - thereby negating any chance at choice - than through all other means combined. Women and men begin their lives in the same fashion.

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