Kansas Attorney General Six Turns Over Abortion Records to Grand Jury

State   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Jun 6, 2008   |   9:00AM   |   WASHINGTON, DC

Kansas Attorney General Six Turns Over Abortion Records to Grand Jury

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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
June 6
, 2008

Topeka, KS (LifeNews.com) — Kansas Attorney General Stephen Six has turned over 34 redacted abortion records to the Wichita-based grand jury investigating late-term abortion practitioner George Tiller. The records, from 2003, will help the grand jury determine if Tiller broke state abortion laws.

Among other charges, Tiller is accused of doing illegal late-term abortions by not having a second, independent physician sign off on the abortions beforehand.

Six had initially refused to turn over the records but the Kansas Supreme Court intervened last month and set the parameters for releasing them.

A Six representative told AP that 34 of the 61 abortion records he possessed were turned over to the grand jury on May 20 and that the rest fell outside the statute of limitations.

Earlier this week, news reports indicated Six had refused to turn over the records, promoting an outcry from pro-life groups.

"Kansans for Life interprets this report to mean the Attorney General’s office is sitting on 30 ready-to-use redacted files from 2003, one month after the court eased the standard for relevancy, and four months after being subpoenaed by the grand jury," Kansans for Life director Mary Kay Culp told LifeNews.com.

There were originally 90 abortion files from 2003 subpoenaed by Inquisition under Judge Richard Anderson in 2004. Some 61 files were subpoenaed from Tiller’s Wichita abortion center and another 29 files from Planned Parenthood in Overland Park, which is also under investigation for doing illegal abortions.

The office of the Attorney General has never held the original files with personally-identifying information.

Instead, they obtained photocopies of files from 2003 only after repeated redaction by the abortion centers, two court-appointed doctors, and one special attorney appointed as a guardian ad litem for the patients.

Only 20 out of 2000 eligible Tiller records have reached Judge Buchanan, who presides over the grand jury.

"The grand jury should view all the relevant evidence available, instead of being limited to information filtering in from Tiller," Culp said.

Related web sites:
Kansans for Life – https://www.kfl.org