Houston News Paper Publishes Front Page Coverage of Karpen “House of Horrors” as Former Patients Come Forward

June 11, 2013 By Leave a Comment


Houston, Texas – Yesterday The Houston Chronicle posted a banner headline article on page A-1 that continued to hammer late-term abortionist Douglas Karpen, noting details of several malpractice suits that alleged horrific abortion complications, including the late-term abortion death of 15-year old Denise Montoya in 1985.

This article came on the heels of letters sent to by Rep. Phil King and 20 state legislators to Richard Kleczynski with the Homicide Division of the Houston Police Department, Ms. Mari Robinson, executive director of the Texas Medical Board, and David L. Lakey MD., Commissioner of the Texas Department of State Health Services, requesting a full investigation into allegations that Karpen is conducting illegal late-term abortions then intentionally killing viable babies that are routinely born alive at this Houston abortion clinics. [Read the letters]

Rep. King also sent a DVD copy of an unedited interview of three former Karpen employees conducted by Mark Crutcher of Life Dynamics, Inc. on May 3, 2013, to Lt. Kleczynski in order to aid the police investigation.

Operation Rescue originally was contacted in by the employees, who provided documentation of their accusations, including four cell-phone photos of late-term aborted babied that had large gashes in their necks. Former Karpen employee Deborah Edge told Operation Rescue and Life Dynamics, Inc. that Karpen would twist the heads off babies born alive. The wounds suffered by the babies in the photos are consistent with this description. [Read OR’s full exposé on Karpen, including photos and the video interview by LDI.]

Since the Karpen story has become public, women who had abortions done by Karpen have begun to come forward and tell Operation Rescue horror stories about their experiences at Karpen’s Aaron Women’s Center. Their stories include the following allegations:

• Painfully inserts laminaria into women’s cervixes without pain relief when they cannot afford the extra fee.
• Slaps patients that he feels are not complying fast enough with his orders
• Manipulates ultrasound results to either avoid compliance with the 24 week limit on abortions or pad a gestational age in order to charge the patient more money.
• Has untrained staff conducting medical duties for which they are unqualified
• Is rude to heavy women and treats them roughly.

“All these allegations are consistent with information given us by the former Karpen employees who blew the whistle on their former boss and was provided to the Texas Medical Board over a year ago. Instead of doing the right thing, the Board chose to ignore the abuses and protect Karpen. There is obviously some serious house-cleaning that needs to go on at the Texas Medical Board,” said Troy Newman, President of Operation Rescue.

The Houston Chronicle article also included defensive comments by Amy Hagstrom-Miller, head of the Whole Women’s Health, a Texas abortion clinic chain that itself has run afoul of the law. Operation Rescue conducted an undercover investigation of Hagstrom-Miller’s Texas clinics in 2011, which resulted in $83,000 in fines for the illegal dumping of aborted baby remains.

“Uncovering crimes and reporting them is actually a public service, the farthest thing from a witch hunt,” said Newman. “Hagstrom-Miller tells reporters that she doesn’t want the Attorney General investigating abortion clinics, and it’s easy to see why because Hagstrom-Miller knows her own clinics could not stand up under that kind of scrutiny,” said Newman.

In spite of the high media attention to the Karpen case, authorities have been slow to act.

“We can only imagine that any useful evidence that may have existed at Karpen’s clinics has since been destroyed,” said Newman. “The reluctance of authorities to act will only ensure that the abortion horrors will continue.”

Read the full Houston Chronicle article published June 10, 2013

Filed Under: Pro-Life Tagged With: , , ,

‘Dogged Determination’ Helps Close 30th Abortion Clinic in 2013 After Botched Abortions, Patient Death

June 10, 2013 By 2 Comments

June 9, 2013 – Nova Women’s Healthcare, a Fairfax, Virginia, abortion clinic with a history of botched abortions and at least one patient death, will be forced to close at the end of June.

This closure is one of 30 abortion clinics to close in 2013 alone, more than doubling the number of closures over all of last year.

“With the increased attention on abortion clinic abuses, we are beginning to see a trend toward greater awareness and enforcement. Many of the 30 clinics to close this year have done so due to enforcement measures,” said Troy Newman, president of Operation Rescue. “Others closed due to lack of business, which means the pro-life movement is succeeding at changing the public opinion and behavior toward abortion. In 1991, there were 2,176 surgical abortion clinics in America. After the closure of Nova at the end of this month, there will be only 630 surgical abortion clinics left. While we still have a long way to go to end the barbaric practice of abortion in this nation, we have shown real progress.”

Local activists working with Operation Rescue and other national groups learned the news when attending a City Council meeting on May 14, 2013, to oppose plans for relocation of the abortion clinic to a prominent location on Main Street. Nova’s lease in its current location was terminated via a lawsuit by the property owners on the grounds that the abortion clinic created a nuisance.

Nova had previously applied for a building permit but was denied because it was one parking space short of compliance with city ordinances. It attempted to reapply as a “Health Spa” to circumvent the need for the additional space, but the city manager saw through the rouse and again denied the application.

Pro-life activists once again heard of plans to relocate the clinic for a proposed July opening. Over 20 activists attended the City Council meeting on May 14 and spoke in opposition to the plan, noting the negative aspects of the abortion business. One activist noted that that often women were observed at the present location lying in the common areas, bleeding and vomiting.

Fairfax Mayor Scott Silverthorne informed the audience that the clinic had withdrawn its application the previous day, noting that if another application were to be submitted, he would “go the extra step” and make sure that the community and churches were well informed.

Operation Rescue had publicized a medical emergency at Nova involving a 35-year old diabetic patient suffering from heavy bleeding after an abortion who was rushed to the hospital on March 3, 2012. Operation Rescue had reason to believe that the clinic owner, Mi Yong Kim, may have been involved in the botched abortion even though her medical license had been surrendered in 2007 amid findings that she improperly sedated a patient in 2005 and failed to realize that the woman had gone into cardiac arrest. Kim did not attempt to resuscitate her and the woman died as a result. Operation Rescue filed complaints against Kim and the clinic.

An unannounced inspection of Nova was conducted by state officials two months later, which revealed numerous health and safety violations, generally substandard care, and an additional botched abortion patient that required emergency hospitalization.

Public pressure brought by local pro-life activists, including Ruby Nicdao, helped bring about the closure by exposing the harm caused by the clinic.

“A short battle has been won, but the war continues,” Nicdao told Operation Rescue.

“Nova will be closing due to the dogged determination of a core of local activists who pursued every available opportunity – from prayer to public protest – to expose this heinous abortion mill and protect the public from its dangerous practices,” said Newman. “Ruby Nicdao and her fellow activists are to be commended.”

For more information about abortion clinic closures and documentation of abuses, please visit AbortionDocs.org.

Filed Under: AbortionDocs.org, Press Releases, Pro-Life Tagged With: , , ,

Abortion Patient Death Prompts Third License Suspension

June 5, 2013 By 3 Comments

Baltimore, MD – Operation Rescue has learned that The Maryland Board of Physicians has suspended the medical license of a third abortionist associated with the notorious Steven Chase Brigham after abortion patient Maria Santiago died in February, 2013.

Michael Angelo Basco was summarily suspended from practicing medicine in Maryland on May 29, 2013, the same day two of his associates, Iris E. Dominy and Mansuor G. Panah, were also issued suspensions. All four Maryland abortion clinics operating under the name Associates in OB/GYN Care, which is affiliated with New Jersey abortionist Steven Chase Brigham, were ordered to stop all surgical abortions on May 9.

“Basco is an abortionist that had been flying under the radar,” said Troy Newman, President of Operation Rescue. “Now, the public can be warned about this dangerous man who has a history of discipline and lawsuits in other states.”

While Basco was not involved in Sanitago’s death, he was found to have engaged in other dangerous conduct that could have resulted in grave injury or death of another woman.

According to suspension documents made public by the Maryland Board of Physicians, Basco allowed an unlicensed, unqualified worker conduct an ultrasound exam on a pregnant with a multiple gestation pregnancy. She came up with several gestational ages. Without consulting anyone, she started an abortion on the woman by administering Cytotec, a dangerous drug that induces uterine contractions, in Basco’s absence. When Basco saw the woman, he refused to continue with the abortion because of the advanced fetal age and complexity of aborting twins. He gave the woman few options and essentially turned her adrift in the process of an abortion.

It was later learned that it was standard procedure at the four Brigham affiliated abortion clinics in Maryland to start all women who were beyond 11 weeks of pregnancy on Cytotec before they saw the abortionist. The Maryland Office of Health Care Quality determined that this practice posed a danger to the health and safety of the public.

This was not Bascoe’s first disciplinary action.

Basco was issued a Reprimand by the Texas Medical Board on August 15, 2003, after he failed to provide information about a malpractice suit against him on an application for hospital privileges. The Texas Medical Board determined that the omission constituted “dishonorable or unprofessional conduct that was likely to deceive or defraud the public, or injure the public. “

At the same time, he had also been accused of Cytotec, an ulcer drug used off-label by abortionists to induce uterine contractions, which can be dangerously strong and unpredictable in nature by one employee, but was never disciplined.

On August 26, 2011, Texas Medical Board issued an Agreed Order, disciplining Basco for inadequate medical records and for not adequately informing a patient of all options prior to a hysterectomy. Basco was ordered to attend classes on proper recordkeeping procedures and ordered to pay an administrative fine of $3,000.

Pennsylvania and Maryland both issued Reciprocol Reprimands last year based on the Texas action.

“Even though Basco, Dominy, and Panah have all been suspended in Maryland, and four clinics ordered to halt surgical abortions, vigilance is still required because we have seen Brigham-operated clinics defy the law before,” said Newman. “Brigham-operated abortion mills are among the worst in the nation. He has a history of ignoring the law, hiring troubled abortionists who are at the bottom of the barrel, and evading responsibility at every turn. His abortion clinics are continuously being closed by various states, but he finds ways to reopen them time and again. We pray that his entire chain of abortion clinics that span four states will be brought down and Brigham is put behind bars where he belongs.”

Brigham’s web site, which goes under the name American Women’s Services, continues to list eight abortion locations in New Jersey, four in Maryland, two in Pennsylvania, and two in Virginia. Pennsylvania ordered the two abortion clinics in that state closed last year after both failed safety inspections.

Other Brigham-affiliated abortionists also have a long history of problems. Operation Rescue has been exposing these dangerous abortionists for years. [Read more about them.]

Brigham has also been known to operate secret abortion facilities. In 2010, he and his associate, Nicola Riley, operated a bi-state late-term abortion scheme designed to avoid the laws of New Jersey. Brigham would begin the abortions in New Jersey then caravan women in full labor to a secret location in Elkton, Maryland, where their abortions would be completed. That illicit operation was discovered and shut down after Riley nearly killed a patient during a seriously botched abortion. Brigham, who has never held a medical license in Maryland, was assisting Riley with the patient. Police raided the Elkton clinic and discovered the bodies of 35 late-term aborted babies stored in a freezer. Brigham and Riley were both arrested and jailed on murder charges in Maryland, but the case was dropped after an expert witness who would have testified that the babies died in Maryland, withdrew from the case.

Filed Under: Brigham, Pro-Life Tagged With: , ,
«Older Posts