Riverside, CA (LifeNews.com) -- California health officials have reprimanded a Riverside Planned Parenthood abortion business saying it drug its feet in reporting how a woman there died in February after a legal abortion.

The state said Planned Parenthood should have reported the woman's death within 24 hours. The state Department of Health Services is probing the death of Edrica Goode a 21 year-old who died in February after toxic shock syndrome caused by the abortion she had.

Her mother, Aletheia Meloncon, has filed a lawsuit against Planned Parenthood saying it was responsible for not preventing her death. According to a Los Angeles Times report, the health department issued a "deficiency" finding June 29 saying that "based on medical record reviews and staff interviews, the facility failed to report an unusual death occurrence involving a patient's death within 24 hours to the department."

As a result, the Planned Parenthood in Riverside must submit a plan to correct its reporting of abortion deaths to the state within the next 10 days. Planned Parenthood spokesman Vince Hall told the Times that the abortion business plans to respond on time and claimed, "The health and safety of our patients is our highest priority."

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Abortion Practitioner George Tiller's Lawyers Challenge Law He Violated

Topeka, KS (LifeNews.com) -- Late-term abortion practitioner George Tiller may have violated a Kansas law saying that such abortions can only be done for legitimate health reasons and if two physicians sign off on them.

Now that pro-abortion Attorney General Paul Morrison has charged him with 19 violations of the law, he's suing to overturn it. As the first response to the new charges, attorneys for Tiller have filed a lawsuit claiming the Kansas law is unconstitutional.

Tiller's attorneys argue that the provision of the law that requires two or more doctors to sign off on late-term abortions is invalid. In their motion Monday, they also seek to dismiss the 19 misdemeanor charges Morrison filed that would have Tiller in jail as long as 19 years if convicted. He could also be fined $2500 per violation and lose his medical license.

Morrison last week filed charges alleging that before performing 19 late-term abortions in 2003, Tiller received a second opinion from abortion practitioner Ann Kristin Neuhaus, who Morrison said had financial ties with Tiller.

A 1998 Kansas law says that before an abortion of a baby 21 weeks or older, two physicians must determine if continuation of a pregnancy will lead to death or "substantial and irreversible" harm to a "major bodily function."

The consulting doctor can have no financial or legal ties to the abortion practitioner. Tiller's attorneys claim the requirement is unconstitutional because it is vague and say it also violates a woman's so-called right to an abortion under Supreme Court rulings and places an undue burden on abortion practitioners.



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