Abortion Clinic Files for Bankruptcy After Firing Employees When They Became Pregnant

State   |   Micaiah Bilger   |   Apr 22, 2016   |   12:33PM   |   Trenton, NJ

It isn’t difficult to guess the reasons why a late-term abortion clinic in New Jersey didn’t want pregnant employees to be working there. It could be bad for its $1.8 million-a-year business.

The Pilgrim Medical Center, a Montclair abortion clinic that advertises same-day, late-term abortions, recently lost a discrimination lawsuit filed by three former employees who said they were fired after becoming pregnant, according to the Wall Street Journal. Now, the abortion facility is filing for bankruptcy.

Nicholas Campanella, the abortionist who owns the facility, has a reputation among his staff for “not lik[ing] pregnant employees,” according to the lawsuit. One former employee said she was fired in February 2013 after she became pregnant; Campanella told her there was not work for her anymore, though the abortion clinic had just posted a job opening for her duties, the report states. The other two workers said they were fired after taking maternity leave.

A judge awarded them more than $1 million, but Campanella is appealing the decision, according to the report. Because the abortion facility also is filing for bankruptcy, the former employees cannot collect the monetary damages, the report states.

The legal proceedings have not stopped the abortion facility’s deadly operations either. Pilgrim continues to operate and advertise itself as the only abortion facility in New Jersey to offer one-day abortions at 24.6 weeks. Babies are viable outside the womb at 24 weeks and even earlier, thanks to modern medical advancements.

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In the bankruptcy documents, Campanella touted his abortion clinic’s strong reputation for safety and care; but past inspection reports from the state show otherwise. A 2011 Montclair Times article reported state inspectors found two “immediate jeopardy” issues at Pilgrim that were “serious enough that they posed or could pose a risk for harm” to patients.

The state found the abortion facility was reusing the same needle to withdraw medication for multiple patients, not cleaning up blood properly, and failing to keep emergency medical supplies in stock. State investigators also found that a patient’s chest was not hooked up to an EKG monitor, but an EKG status was written on the person’s medical record, according to the report. During the inspection, one employee did not even know where the EKG monitor was, the report states.

These horrific conditions coupled with the discrimination against his pregnant employees seem to indicate that Campanella has little regard for women’s lives.

Money quite possibly could have been the reason Campanella discriminated against pregnant employees. Having pregnant and newly parenting women working at his late-term abortion clinic could have been problematic for multiple reasons. One could be that pregnant employees could have reminded patients of their own unborn babies and caused them to reconsider, thus taking away business. Another possibility could have been dealing with the trauma of the employees themselves who, being new parents, could be hit with the horrific fact that babies like theirs are being killed there. Maybe he did not want to lose money paying them while on maternity leave. Or maybe, just maybe, their pregnancies were eating away at Campanella’s own conscience.

The abortion industry is lucrative. Campanella’s abortion facility made $1.8 million in revenue last year, according to the bankruptcy documents obtained by the newspaper. Though he wants the courts to believe his mission is to serve women’s needs, his business practices show otherwise.

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