Practitioner Who Killed Woman in Botched Abortion Surrenders License

State   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Nov 22, 2010   |   1:20PM   |   Severna Park, MD

Maryland-based abortion practitioner Romeo Ferrer, who has been under fire involving a case of a woman he killed in a failed abortion, has permanently surrendered his medical license.

In September, Ferrer closed his Gynecare Center abortion facility after a 10-year campaign from dedicated pro-life organizations.

The Maryland Board of Physicians suspended his medical license and now one of the pro-life groups seeking to hold him accountable indicates he has permanently surrendered his Maryland medical license and promised not to seek licensure in any other state.

Operation Rescue indicates Ferrer voluntarily surrender his license on October 27 rather than face revocation.

When his license was suspended in September, Ferrer hired abortion practitioner Gheovant Wartanian in an attempt to keep his Severna Park abortion clinic open , but when Operation Rescue exposed Wartanians’s troubled past and pro-lifers prayed and protested at his office, Wartanian quit the abortion business, forcing Ferrer to permanently close.

“Even though the authorities were on to Ferrer, it was pro-life efforts that helped bring this case into the public eye and forced the closure of his abortion mill and the ultimate surrender of his license,” Operation Rescue president Troy Newman told LifeNews.com over the weekend.

He added: “This is what can be accomplished when pro-life groups work together through the legal avenues available. This is a tremendous victory for the pro-life movement and for women and their pre-born babies who will no longer be subject to Ferrer’s dangerous abortion practices.”

Due to the publicity surrounding Ferrer’s troubles and an unrelated illegal late-term abortion scheme operated by fellow Maryland abortion business owner Steven Chase Brigham, Wartanian had expressed reluctance to do abortions at Ferrer’s troubled clinic beyond September 30.

Wartanian, a doctor of obstetrics and gynecology, had been sued over 18 times for malpractice and negligence for incidents ranging from the death of newborn babies to causing brain damage and a host of other medical mistakes.

Ferrer faced permanent license revocation for the abortion-related death of Denise Crowe, a 21-year-old African-American woman, in 2006.

Crowe sought a second trimester dilation and evacuation abortion procedure but it eventually claimed Crowe’s life and left her three-year-old son without a mother.

Ferrer is accused of failing to properly administer pain medications, failing to monitor the patient’s respiration and ventilation, and failing to employ standard methods of care to resuscitate the patient. He is accused of giving her a fatal overdose of meperidine, a narcotic also known as Demerol.

The case was stagnant for years until the Maryland Board of Physicians, in April, filed a petition against Ferrer for “failure to meet the standard of quality care” in his negligent treatment of Crowe that resulted in her death. That case is still under consideration and could take months to resolve.

Her death was kept secret for four years until the Maryland State Board of Physicians filed to initiate disciplinary action against him on April 7. Operation Rescue worked with Maryland pro-life groups to draw attention to the dangers Ferrer’s abortion business posed the public and call for speedy discipline and criminal charges. [related]

“We have every reason to believe that criminal charges could soon be filed against Ferrer for his part in Crowe’s death. We will keep working until that becomes a reality and Ferrer is behind bars where he belongs,” said Newman.