Planned Parenthood faces a legal challenge in Colorado after Cary Smith, of Federal Heights, CO, says she discovered that clinic staff failed to inquire or report about suspected sexual abuse of her 13-year-old daughter after giving her an abortion. It was any mother's nightmare, as LifeSite News reports at http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/planned-parenthood-performed-abortion-on-my-teen-didnt-report-sex-abuse-mom.
According to the lawsuit filed on June 20, 2014, Cary's daughter, R.Z., was only about six years old when her new step-father, Timothy David Smith, began to sexually abuse her. At this age, she was too young to realize that her step-father's inordinate attention was actually a crime. Little R.Z. turned seven, then eight. The years went by, and the abuse continued, but her mother never knew. The abuse eventually became both verbal and physical as well, with R.Z.'s step-father even threatening to take her life. Timothy's verbal and physical abuse soon extended to Cary, even when R.Z. was present. Then R.Z. became pregnant. On May 3, 2012, Timothy transported his 13-year-old step-daughter to Planned Parenthood in Denver, Colorado, for an abortion appointment that Timothy had forced R.Z. to schedule. Planned Parenthood staff met R.Z. and her step-father and gave them the necessary paperwork. R.Z. filled out her date of birth and signed a few forms, but Timothy completed all the rest. R.Z. never read these documents.
According to the suit, throughout the visit, four staff members spoke with and observed R.Z. and her step-father. All of them had opportunity to see that R.Z.'s birth date indicated she was only 13—well below the age of consent. Yet, the suit says that none of them asked R.Z. about their relationship. As well, none asked about potential sex abuse, and none of them reported anything to the state. After the abortion, R.Z. walked back out to the parking lot, got into her step-father's car, and went back home. And the abuse continued. Two months later, on July 18, 2012, Timothy was outside of the home, and Cary was left alone with her daughter. R.Z. took the opportunity to tell her mom that her own step-father was sexually abusing her, and had been doing so for years. Cary took the now 13-year-old to the hospital and immediately reported the abuse. She contacted Planned Parenthood for her daughter's medical records, and discovered that her husband had arranged for a secret abortion for R.Z. earlier that year. Timothy Smith was arrested and charged with multiple counts of felony sex abuse, and pled guilty to two counts in late 2012. But although R.Z.'s abuser was now behind bars, the first medical professionals who had seen R.Z.—the four Planned Parenthood staff members—must have known that her daughter was a potential victim of sexual abuse. These were professionals who had the information to do something, but did not. And they had the responsibility to act—to report suspected child sex abuse—under Colorado law. But, according to the lawsuit, these professionals did nothing. Worse, they performed a dangerous, legally-restricted procedure on a minor child, without informing her mother, and turned R.Z. back over to her rapist following the abortion. Cary maintains that defendants' negligence "created an unreasonable risk of physical harm" to her daughter. Cary is now suing Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains for five claims for relief, including negligence, negligent affliction of emotional distress, and extreme and outrageous conduct. Read here the full case of Smith v. Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood.
The option for an abortion has led to great abuse of girls and women, as detailed in "The Rise and Fall of Women's Rights," accessible at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2007200, and R.Z.'s story vividly illustrates that fact. The abortion provider was shielded by the right, but failed to protect the child with mandatory sexual abuse reporting requirements placed on the provider by state law. This case also demonstrates the distancing effect abortion has had on the parent-child relationship, more detailed in Part I of "Roe's Effects of Family Law" at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2441274.
Legal education materials tend to ignore these implications, and even create an "echo-chamber effect" for abortion, even to the detriment of the people it harms. Law students particularly will want to read about that at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2201231.
Child sexual abuse should not be fostered and advanced by abortion providers; rather abortion providers ought to be the first to see when their product heinously abuses children, and presents tragic opportunities for adults to abuse children further.
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