Shady Abortion Doctor Headed To Trial For Capital Murder And Could Be Sent To Death Row In “House Of Horrors” Clinic Case In West Philly

Via ABC News:

A Philadelphia abortion provider was to go on trial for murder in a case that could send the 72-year-old to death row. Dr. Kermit Gosnell is charged with running a rogue abortion clinic in West Philadelphia that allegedly performed illegal, late-term abortions and injured countless women through lax medical procedures.

Gosnell, 72, has pleaded not guilty in the deaths of a female patient and seven babies allegedly born alive. Eight clinic workers charged with him have pleaded guilty, including his wife, a beautician accused of helping him perform stealth third-term abortions on Sundays.

His trial begins Monday. A devastating 2011 grand jury report describes nearly unfathomable conditions: fetal body parts stored in glass jars and staff refrigerators; filthy, blood-stained operating areas; women and teens maimed after Gosnell perforated a uterus or colon.

“Anybody walking into that clinic should have known immediately that it should have been shut down,” said Bernard Smalley, a lawyer for the family of Karnamaya Mongar, the 41-year-old refugee who died after being given too much anesthesia and pain medication during a 2009 abortion.

Philadelphia prosecutors accuse state and local authorities of turning a blind eye to laws requiring regular inspections. And they say the occasional complaints that trickled in, one after an earlier patient death, went nowhere.

“We think the reason no one acted is because the women in question were poor and of color, because the victims were infants without identities, and because the subject was the political football of abortion,” said the 2011 grand jury report, released by Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams. Gosnell’s one remaining co-defendant, medical school graduate Eileen O’Neill of Phoenixville, allegedly practiced medicine without a license at the clinic. She is charged with theft by deception, conspiracy and other charges.