Strict Abortion Measures Enacted in Oklahoma/Two Convicted of Denying Access to Abortion Clinic

Strict Abortion Measures Enacted in Oklahoma
By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: April 27, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/28/us/28abortion.html?th&emc=th


HOUSTON — The Oklahoma Legislature voted Tuesday to override the governor’s vetoes of two abortion measures, one of which requires women to undergo an ultrasound and listen to a detailed description of the fetus before getting an abortion.

Though other states have passed similar measures requiring women to have ultrasounds, Oklahoma’s law goes further, mandating that a doctor or technician set up the monitor so the woman can see it and describe the heart, limbs and organs of the fetus. No exceptions are made for rape and incest victims.

A second measure passed into law on Tuesday prevents women who have had a disabled baby from suing a doctor for withholding information about birth defects while the child was in the womb.

Opponents argue that the law will protect doctors who purposely mislead a woman to keep her from choosing an abortion. But the bill’s sponsors maintain that it merely prevents lawsuits by people who wish, in hindsight, that the doctor had counseled them to abort a disabled child.

Gov. Brad Henry, a Democrat, vetoed both bills last week. The ultrasound law, he said, was flawed because it did not exempt rape and incest victims and would allow an unconstitutional intrusion into a woman’s privacy.

Of the other measure, Mr. Henry said, “It is unconscionable to grant a physician legal protection to mislead or misinform pregnant women in an effort to impose his or her personal beliefs on a patient.”

The Republican majorities in both houses, however, saw things differently. On Monday, the House voted overwhelmingly to override the vetoes, and the Senate followed suit on Tuesday morning, making the two measures law.

“This is a good day for the cause of life,” said State Senator Glenn Coffee, the Republican majority leader. “The voice of the people has spoken twice now this session in the Senate and twice in the House, and I sincerely hope those who would reverse the people’s voice would think twice before acting.”

Both of the laws enacted Tuesday over the governor’s objections were first passed in 2008 in an omnibus bill, along with several other anti-abortion measures. But state courts struck down the measure on a technicality, because it violated a clause in the Oklahoma Constitution requiring bills to deal with a single subject.

This year, Republican leaders broke the omnibus bill into pieces to satisfy the courts’ concerns, passing several separate anti-abortion measures. Mr. Henry has signed two into law: a measure requiring clinics to post signs stating that a woman cannot be forced to have an abortion, and another making it illegal to have an abortion because of the sex of a child.

Two other anti-abortion bills are still working their way through the Legislature and are expected to pass. One would force women to fill out a lengthy questionnaire about their reasons for seeking an abortion; statistics based on the answers would then be posted online. The other restricts insurance coverage for the procedures.

Taken together, the various pieces of legislation would make Oklahoma one of the most prohibitive environments in the United States for women seeking to end a pregnancy, advocates for women and family planning said.

“These laws all have the same goal, and that’s to discourage women from seeking abortions in the first place,” said Anita Fream, the chief executive of Planned Parenthood of Central Oklahoma. “They just throw down one roadblock after another in front of women and hope maybe they will give up.”

Just hours after the vote, the Center for Reproductive Rights, an organization based in New York that advocates for abortion rights, went to state court to challenge the ultrasound law as unconstitutional. It argued that the law violates the doctor’s freedom of speech, the woman’s right to equal protection and the woman’s right to privacy, said the group’s president, Nancy Northup.

Several states have passed laws in recent years requiring women to undergo an ultrasound before having an abortion, and at least three — Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi — require doctors to offer the woman a chance to see the image. But Oklahoma’s new law says that the monitor must be placed where the woman can see it and that she must listen to a detailed description of the fetus.

“The goal of this legislation is just to make a statement for the sanctity of human life,” State Senator Todd Lamb, the majority floor leader, said in an interview after the vote. “Maybe someday these babies will grow up to be police officers and arrest bad people, or will find a cure for cancer.”

Hailey Branson contributed reporting from Oklahoma City.




Two Convicted of Denying Access to Abortion Clinic
By COLIN MOYNIHAN
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: April 27, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/28/nyregion/28clinic.html?hpw


For the first time in New York City, federal prosecutors have used the Freedom of Access to Clinics Entrances Act to secure a conviction in a case where access was blocked to a clinic that provides abortions.

The prosecutors used the statute, signed into law in 1994, to charge two men who stood in front of an entrance at the Margaret Sanger Center, a clinic operated by Planned Parenthood at the corner of Bleecker and Mott Streets.

The men, Richard R. Dugan and Theodore A. Puckett, were each convicted on Monday of a single count of violating the act after a one-day bench trial conducted in Manhattan by Judge Robert W. Sweet of United States District Court. Each man faces a maximum six-month sentence and a fine of $10,000. Sentencing was scheduled for June 10.

Although the statute had never been used in a criminal prosecution in New York City, a spokeswoman for the United States attorney’s office in Manhattan said prosecutors there had used the measure in 1996 in a civil case.

According to a criminal complaint, Mr. Dugan, 48, of Breaux Bridge, La., and Mr. Puckett, 58, of Normandy, Tenn., blocked staff and patients from using two entrances to the clinic on Dec. 12, 2009, and refused to leave.

During the proceeding on Monday morning, Mr. Dugan, who represented himself, told Judge Sweet: “They were going in there to kill babies, and we were stopping that. So I think the whole case should just be dismissed right now.”

Mr. Puckett told Judge Sweet that he did not recognize the court’s jurisdiction, adding, “I can’t participate in this farce.”

An official in the United States attorney’s office said that the two men obstructed the driveway of a clinic in Dobbs Ferry, N.Y., in 1995, and that a judge later issued an injunction barring them from blocking that building.

Alejandro Miyar, a spokesman for the Justice Department, said that since 1994 the agency had filed 58 criminal cases across the country related to the FACE act, resulting in 80 convictions. In addition, he said, the department had filed 19 civil suits using the act.

Over the last year or so, groups of several dozen protesters had been showing up on the first Saturday of each month at the clinic on Bleecker Street, said Joan Malin, the president and chief executive officer of Planned Parenthood in New York City. Members of the crowd have displayed pictures of aborted fetuses, passed out pamphlets and sometimes attempted to dissuade women from entering the premises.

Those protests have generally been peaceful, Ms. Malin said, but Mr. Puckett and Mr. Dugan emerged from such a gathering to block the clinic doors.

Ms. Malin said she hoped the convictions on Monday would send a message.

“I am concerned when people blockade and make it difficult for clients and staff to get in,” she said. “We provide health care services, and for people to obstruct that is wrong.”