Kansas County Attorney Doesn’t Want Lawyers Representing Abortion Center 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
November 12, 2007
Overland Park, KS (LifeNews.com) — Johnson County District Attorney Phill Kline said Tuesday he wants a judge to prevent a pair of attorneys from representing Planned Parenthood in the case he has filed against its Kansas City-area abortion center. Kline plans to call on the attorneys as witnesses in the case and can’t do so if they represent the abortion business.
Kline, the former state attorney general, filed over 100 criminal charges against the abortion center last month.
The 107 counts include 23 felonies and 84 misdemeanors and they include 29 misdemeanor counts of doing illegal late-term abortions.
The complaints also allege that the Planned Parenthood facility failed to maintain proper records, falsified information, and did not follow laws about determining viability.
A hearing is slated to take place on the charges on November 16.
At that hearing, Kline intends to call on lawyers Pedro Irigonegaray and Robert Eye to testify against Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri and its Comprehensive Health abortion facility.
The two have represented the abortion business for more than three years Planned Parenthood President Peter Brownlie told the Associated Press.
Eye told AP that Kline’s legal papers don’t say why he wants the pair on the stand and added he would challenge the request.
“We’ve searched this long and hard we find no basis for us to be disqualified,” Eye said Tuesday.
The county attorney has said he can’t discuss why because the legal papers are under court seal. Kline said the reasons would become apparent after the hearing on his request.
Kline said that the Kansas Rules of Professional Conduct disallow attorneys from being an advocate for a client if they will be called to testify in the case.
Kansas Attorney General Paul Morrison, who replaced Kline, dismissed all of the charges Kline filed against the abortion center when he was the attorney general and his spokeswoman Ashley Anstaett told AP he doesn’t think these new charges have any merit.
Pro-life advocates have been closely following the issue and Mary Kay Culp, the director of Kansans for Life, talked with LifeNews.com about it.
"Last year, Morrison used a bogus interpretation of Kansas law in dismissing 30 counts Kline filed against Kansas late-term abortionist George Tiller," she said.
"Eventually, Morrison used it again when he declared the innocence of Planned Parenthood where a judge has now found probable cause to believe that 107 crimes, including 23 felonies, have been committed," she explained.
Related web sites:
Kansans for Life – https://www.kfl.org
