Kansas Board May Discipline Late-term Abortion Associate of George Tiller
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
July 27, 2010
Topeka, KS (LifeNews.com) — The Kansas State Board of Healing Arts has filed an eleven-count recommendation that late-term abortion practitioner Ann Kristin Neuhaus be disciplined. Neuhaus allegedly violated the Healing Arts Act concerning abortion referrals she made to late abortion practitioner George Tiller.
In October 2006, Operation Rescue staffer Cheryl Sullenger filed a complaint with the medical board concerning an improper financial relationship between Tiller and Neuhaus that violated Kansas law.
That complaint was amended in February 2007 and Sullenger was notified of the petition in a letter from the KSBHA dated July 21.
The letter indicated the petition had been filed on April 16 and that an evidentiary hearing will soon be scheduled. Neuhaus could face revocation of her medical license, as Tiller could have for his role in the improper abortions.
Sullenger discovered Tiller used only Neuhaus as the legally-mandated second referring physician for all his post-viability abortions, an arrangement that created a symbiotic financial relationship that appeared to violate the law that prohibited legal or financial affiliation between the abortion practitioner and the concurring physician.
In 2008, Attorney General Paul Morrison agreed and filed 19 criminal charges against Tiller for violating the unaffiliated physician requirement of the Kansas ban on post-viability abortions. Tiller went to trial on those charges in March, 2009, and was acquitted by a jury.
On the heels of the verdict, the KSBHA announced that it had filed an 11-count disciplinary petition against Tiller based on the same allegations at issue in the criminal trial. KSBHA said the trial’s outcome would not affect the KSBHA’s plans to discipline Tiller since the Board operated under a different burden of proof than criminal courts.
"This petition is verification that we were correct about our allegations that Neuhaus and Tiller were operating outside the law," Sullenger told LifeNews.com.
"It is also evidence that the efforts to work peacefully within the legal system that have been employed by us for over two decades are effective at exposing abortion abuses and bringing the perpetrators to justice. The system isn’t perfect, but it does work," said Sullenger.
"We wish that this petition had been filed years ago, when our complaint was first made, but are thankful for the Board’s willingness to pursue this matter against an abortionist who has been illegally operating for years in a manner that has endangered the lives of women and cost the lives of viable babies that the laws of Kansas were enacted to protect," she added.
The Neuhaus complaint is based on the same eleven patient files that were the basis for the Tiller disciplinary petition. Patients range in age from 10-18 years old with gestational ages between 25 and 29 weeks. All eleven patients were referred to Tiller for post-viability abortions based on mental health concerns between July and November, 2003.
Information about the patients’ abortions was gathered from files produced under subpoena at the request of former Attorney General Phill Kline, who fought a 3-year legal battle with the Kansas Supreme Court over access to the incriminating abortion records. Identities of the women are protected and were never sought.
At the time the medical board announced it was pursuing the matter, Operation Rescue was convinced Tiller was preparing for retirement and would soon close his abortion center to avoid facing any disciplinary charges.
Tiller associate LeRoy Carhart confirmed at a banquet earlier this year that Tiller announced his impending retirement to his staff just two weeks before his death, the pro-life group said.
Tiller was shot and killed in May, 2009 by Scott Roeder, who has no affiliations with the pro-life movement or Operation Rescue.
Neuhaus came under Board discipline in 1999 and again in 2001 for medical abuses, which included violations of consent laws, shoddy record-keeping, and lack of proper patient care. The KSBHA declared at that time that Neuhaus was a "danger to the public" and limited her ability to practice medicine.
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