INDIANAPOLIS, Ind.(BP) — While members of Congress call for an investigation of Planned Parenthood for failing to report the suspected sexual abuse of minors, pro-life activists and two U.S. congressmen from Indiana are confronting matters in their own state.
Indiana Right to Life announced the filing of 48 consumer complaints against nine Indiana abortionists who allegedly failed to follow state reporting laws regarding abortions they performed on girls under the age of 16 (and as young as 12). The law requires abortionists to report such abortions to the Indiana State Department of Health and the Department of Child Services within three days of the procedure.
“The doctors’ failures to indicate this step was taken demonstrate that they may have violated the law, possibly deliberately, and thereby possibly allowed for the continuation of abuse,” wrote U.S. Reps. Jim Banks and Todd Rokita in a letter to Indiana Attorney General Curtis Hill. The two congressmen urged Hill to investigate.
The state reporting law took effect last July, bringing the reporting requirement into alignment with Indiana’s age of consent for sexual activity, which is 16. Prior to 2017, the law only required reporting for abortions on girls ages 14 and under.
Echoing pro-life advocates’ requests, the representatives called for an “immediate investigation” of the abortionists, the facilities where they work, and their use of Title X funds. They also encouraged the suspension of medical licenses and abortion facility licenses while the investigation is ongoing.
Mike Fichter, president of Indiana Right to Life, said his organization requests termination-of-pregnancy reports every year and looks for errors. This year it found 48 instances of noncompliance. In 2016, the group’s work resulted in the suspension of an abortionist’s medical license for his failure to report abortions he performed on girls as young as 10.
“What we hope to see is the full investigation surfacing, whether or not the abortions on these young girls were reported to the Department of Child Services,” Fichter said. “If they were not, and the attorney general’s investigation proves that out, we will pursue the full revocation of every license of a doctor that failed to report in the state of Indiana as well as the revocation of operating licenses for the abortion businesses themselves that pay these individuals to do the abortions.”
Fichter is confident the Indiana attorney general will launch a thorough investigation. But he doesn’t expect the county prosecutors to take any action. He noted that in Lake, Monroe and Marion counties specifically, Democratic prosecutors recently said they would not defend a new pro-life law undergoing a legal challenge.
The recent actions by Indiana pro-lifers come on the heels of a separate investigation by Live Action, a pro-life group that detailed in a recent video series how Planned Parenthood workers also fail to report suspected sexual abuse of minors to authorities. In response to that report, 56 members of Congress urged the Department of Health and Human Services to launch an investigation.
