Medical Board Wants License of Abortionist Who Killed Woman Suspended
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
February 18, 2010
San Diego, CA (LifeNews.com) — The California Medical Board is looking to a court hearing today to suspend the medical license of embattled abortion practitioner Andrew Rutland. He faced a medical board hearing earlier this month documents showed he killed a woman during an abortion by administering anesthesia to her and not knowing the proper dosage.
Rutland, of Chula Vista, is slated to appear in a San Diego court today.
The case concerning the woman’s legal abortion death is pending and the medical board and a Administrative Law Judge James Ahler told Rutland to stop doing abortions until its conclusion.
However, The Los Angeles Times indicates Rutland was caught in an undercover sting operation scheduling an abortion in violation of the order to stop doing them while his disciplinary case proceeded.
Two weeks after the court order, a medical board examiner called Rutland with a request for an abortion at his Women’s Choice Family Planning Clinic in Chula Vista. Rutland suggested she allow him to give her the dangerous abortion drug RU 486, which has already killed more than a dozen women and injured thousands of women in the United States alone.
When the medical examiner declined and suggested a surgical abortion, Rutland immediately scheduled one for the next day.
Still, Rutland’s attorney Paul M. Hittelman, according to an AP report, said the abortion practitioner did nothing wrong because he didn’t actually do the abortion.
"We believe nothing was done that would violate the order as amended or in its original form, for that matter," he said.
Rutland has a history of problems and he first surrendered his license in October 2002 after a two-year state investigation that resulted in accusations of negligence, misconduct and incompetence in his treatment of 20 pregnant women, newborns and gynecological patients
The patient in the case where Rutland killed her saw Ying Chen visiting Rutland’s San Gabriel facility last July for a second-trimester abortion.
Rutland injected lidocaine, a local anesthetic, in her cervix and the woman began to have an immediate reaction. The abortion practitioner began to perform CPR but the board documents say there was a "significant delay" in him calling 911 for emergency medical help for the woman.
The woman was in cardiac arrest when the ambulance arrived and was taken to a hospital, where she died six days later. An autopsy revealed Rutland gave the woman the wrong dosage of the anesthesia.
In his written decision, Administrative Law Judge James Ahler said Rutland’s doing the second-trimester abortion in a facility inadequately equipped for emergencies "casts doubt on his professional judgment," according to the Times.
Judge Ahler said Rutland "presents a risk of danger and there is a likelihood of injury to the public" if he continues practicing medicine and he disagreed with Rutland’s contention that he was not actually performing an abortion at the time.
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