Kansas Supreme Court Unseals Two Suits Demanding Former AG Kline Return Abortion Records

Main Category: Abortion
Also Included In: Litigation / Medical Malpractice
Article Date: 07 May 2008 - 8:00 PDT

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Kansas Supreme Court on Friday unsealed two lawsuits demanding that Johnson County, Kan., District Attorney Phill Kline (R) return abortion records to Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri, the Kansas City Star reports. In unsealing the cases, the court released hundreds of documents related to the two cases.

Kline, who obtained the records while serving as state attorney general, praised the court for unsealing the documents. Caleb Stegall, Kline's attorney, said the documents show precautions Kline took to protect the identities of PPKM patients. Pedro Irigonegaray, an attorney representing PPKM, said he has "very serious concerns about the way the records were handled" while in Kline's possession. According to a document released Friday, Kline at times stored the records in a garage, and for one month stored them in a Rubbermaid container in an investigator's dining room. Kline's staff also copied a Wichita, Kan., clinic's records at a retail store (Carroll, Kansas City Star, 5/2).

According to the AP/Hutchinson News, abortion-rights opponents are likely to use the documents to buttress their claims that certain state government officials have "given abortion clinics preferential treatment." Abortion-rights supporters have dismissed such claims as "nonsense," the News reports (Hanna, AP/Hutchinson News, 5/4).

Background

The documents from the two lawsuits stem from an investigation Kline was conducting of PPKM's Overland Park, Kan., clinic Comprehensive Health. Kline in October 2006 received the records of 29 patients who received abortions at the clinic. He has used the records as a basis to file charges against Comprehensive Health for allegedly falsifying abortion records and providing illegal abortions in 2003, among other charges.

In November 2006, Kline lost an election to former Attorney General Paul Morrison (D). Kline transferred copies of the records to his new job as Johnson County's top prosecutor three days before he left the state attorney general's office. PPKM in May 2007 asked state Judge Richard Anderson, who oversaw Kline's investigation, to order Kline to turn over the records (AP/Hutchinson News, 5/4). Anderson refused, saying that Kline had "sound theories" for keeping the records (Hanna, AP/Dodge City Daily Globe, 5/4). PPKM then sued Kline, and Morrison filed a separate suit against Anderson (AP/Hutchinson News, 5/5). Both cases were originally sealed under the plaintiffs' request.

The state Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments on the suits on June 12 (Kansas City Star, 5/2). The court on Friday also rejected a PPKM request to take judicial notice of a letter Morrison wrote last summer clearing Comprehensive Health of wrongdoing, saying it is "not an appropriate subject for judicial notice" (AP/Topeka Capital-Journal, 5/3).

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