Abortion Clinic Closes in Ohio After Pledging to Stay Open

State   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Jan 30, 2013   |   4:26PM   |   Lima, OH

An abortion clinic in Columbus Ohio, Capital Care Women’s Center, has finally officially closed, after reports last year indicated it would do so and a pledge from its operators to stay open.

As LifeNews reported last year, Cheryl Sullenger, Senior Policy Advisor for Operation Rescue and Pro-Life Nation notified LifeNews the abortion center would close, saying Capital Care has been plagued with decreased business and financial problems and recently cut back clinic hours due to difficulty keeping an abortion practitioner employed. An increasingly strong pro-life presence in Central Ohio is credited with contributing to the decision to close, she added.

She indicated that two abortion practitioners known to work at Capital Care are Harley Blank and Thomas Michaelis. Blank, who also works at the Founder’s Women’s Health Center abortion clinic in Columbus, was honored by Planned Parenthood earlier this year for his 30-year career as an abortionist in Columbus.

Michaelis, who now works at the Capital Care Network abortion clinic in Toledo, has a history of a different sort. In 1991, he was convicted of two counts of Attempted Gross Sexual Imposition, one count of Voyeurism, and one count of Public Indecency. The convictions involved incidents where Michaelis engaged in sexual predation on minor girls.

Two days after the LifeNews report, a representative of the abortion business assured the local media it was not closing.

“I don’t want people to think an abortion facility is closing, or that it can’t get doctors, because that’s not the case,” she said.

Now, multiple pro-life groups inform LifeNews the abortion clinic has closed, including Ohio Right to Life and Shawn Carney of 40 Days for Life.

“We were about to announce the launch of campaigns in 262 locations … but we lost one,” he said of the upcoming campaign to pray at abortion clinics. “Well, the reason there will not be a campaign in that 262nd city — Lima, Ohio — is that the local abortion center shut down this week … and permanently went out of business. This now makes 27 abortion facilities that have gone out of business following peaceful 40 Days for Life vigils outside their doors.”

“We called the Capital Care abortion center,” said one of the volunteers, “and they said they were ‘all done in Lima’ and not taking appointments.”

“We were a little skeptical, but we went out to pray,” she said. “At the end of the day, one of the abortion workers started throwing furniture from the abortion
center in the dumpster! They were taking boxes out of the building and putting them in their cars. It was a wonderful sight!”

Faithful Christians have held fur 40 Days for Life vigils in front of that abortion center in Lima, Ohio. “God has heard the prayers of all those who have been
praying and witnessing to life,” said the volunteer.

Emmalee Kalmbach of Ohio Right to Life is also ecstatic about the closing.

She told LifeNews, “We are overjoyed with this great news and we celebrate with Heartbeat of Lima in this outstanding victory. Anytime the doors are closed to an abortion clinic we know lives are saved. With this closing and a Columbus clinic’s closing last fall, we are encouraged that 2013 will be a promising year for the unborn.”

Operation Rescue previously released medical transcripts it received from a confidential informant through a third party that revealed a pattern of botched abortions and violations of health and safety regulations at Complete Health Care for Women.The group said they “paint a grisly portrait of an unsafe abortion business that routinely injures women and violates the law.”

CHCW is operated by abortion practitioner Mervyn J. Samuel and the medical transcripts were smuggled out of a Columbus hospital and redacted by the informant before they were given to Operation Rescue. The records show that on March 16, 2012, a 23-year old woman reported to a hospital emergency room with heavy bleeding and fever after an abortion by “Dr. Samuel” with a possible incomplete abortion. The patient suffered significant bleeding and drove herself to the ER while suffering lightheadedness and dizziness.

OR indicates a pro-life sidewalk counselor at the abortion center noticed another failed abortion. In July 2010, the counselor observed a young woman leaving the abortion clinic after an abortion. The young woman swooned, dropped to her knees, and began to vomit. She was bleeding heavily through her clothing. The sidewalk counselor ran to assist the 19-year old abortion patient and drove her to the local hospital where she was treated.

The newly-obtained medical transcripts indicated that the patient was 13 weeks pregnant at the time of her abortion. She had been “nauseated and lightheaded” while at the abortion clinic, but was discharged while still suffering these symptoms after having been at the clinic for a total of only two hours. At the emergency room, she was treated for heavy bleeding, and given medication for her dizziness and nausea. She was discharged after having spent six hours at the hospital.

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In a third incident in the records Operation Rescue uncovered, a 19-year old abortion patient was recently admitted to a Columbus hospital after suffering excessive bleeding and pelvic pain after her abortion at CHCW in her tenth week of pregnancy. According to transcripts, she suffered from a hematoma, (internal bleeding inside the tissues), and excessive clotting. Efforts by hospital staff to contact the clinic were unsuccessful.

Operation Rescue also has documentation of a dozen OSHA violations at Complete Health Care for Women – four of which were classified as “serious” – that netted the abortion business fines totaling $5,061. The most serious infractions had to deal with “blood-borne pathogens”, meaning the clinic failed to protect workers and patients from contamination caused by exposure to blood.

“Here is an abortion clinic that is endangering the lives and health of women every day. Women do not know when they walk into that office if they are going to wind up in the hospital or worse,” said Sullenger.

She added, “Rest assured that the appropriate complaints are being filed against Mervyn Samuel so that he can be legally prevented from inflicting his brand of abortion quackery on others.”