Phill Kline (photo by lifesitenews.com)
UPDATES: Day 1 of trial. Day 2 here. Day 3 here, here, and here. Day 4 here. Day 5 here. Day 6 here.
From this excellent NRO piece by Katherine J. Lopez: Phill Kline has been put “on trial for insisting Planned Parenthood be held accountable for what it claims to be about: women’s health care and safety.
Before there was a House vote to potentially begin to end funding of Planned Parenthood, as there was Friday; before there was a 22-year-old girl named Lila Rose leading private investigations exposing Planned Parenthood as a safe haven for pimps of underage girls; before there was a Philadelphia prosecutor exposing a “house of horrors” too long protected by abortion politics, there was Phill Kline, a law-enforcement official doing his job.
Today Kline remains the only prosecutor in the United States to have brought charges against Planned Parenthood. And for this, Planned Parenthood and its allies are determined to see him pay. As if he hasn’t already: Even when he wins it is portrayed as a defeat.
Denis Boyles, author of Superior, Nebraska: The Common Sense Values of America’s Heartland, has explained well the predicament Kline finds himself in, dragged back to his home state for one final humiliation for insisting on doing his job — enforcing the law:
Kline’s strategy was simple: Kansas law requires abortion clinics to document the procedures they perform. Kline suspected that they had performed illegal late-term abortions and abortions on underage girls. To find the truth, he needed to compare the documents sent by the subpoenaed clinics with the records submitted by the clinics to the state health department in the routine reporting of their abortions. It wasn’t a fishing trip; Kline knew what he was looking for.
When, after a long battle, the records finally arrived, Kline asked a district judge, Richard Anderson, to compare the two sets of documents. Anderson hired experts, removed the personal info, went over them all carefully and in a pre-trial hearing, finally said, “it appears someone has manufactured” portions of the paperwork that had been subpoenaed. Anderson said that could mean “that somebody committed a felony in an attempt to cover up a misdemeanor. . . . [T]here is evidence of crimes in those records that needs to be evaluated.”
And while pro-life Republican Sam Brownback may now be governor, Kline will not be getting a warm reception by the judicial branch today. The Kansas judiciary-appointment process is the antithesis of transparency: Judges are appointed by the governor, without confirmation, effectively for life. And the long-standing inquisition against Kline is led by a (former Democratic governor) Kathleen Sebelius-appointed former lawyer for the National Women’s Law Center, known for her activist-like rants against him.”
Read the entire story, Jill Stanek’s take here, and KansasMeadowlark case history here
Kline testified Monday that Judicial Administrator Stan Hazlett’s charges of misconduct against him are the same charges that Hazlett’s own team of investigators concluded on May 21, 2008 had no merit.
The 21-page report submitted by S. Lucky DeFries (Topeka Bar Association Ethics chairman) and Mary Beth Mudrick (investigator for Topeka’s Office of the City Attorney) found “no probable cause to prove that Phill Kline violated any of the rules of ethics.”
KFL’s executive director, Mary Kay Culp, makes these observations:
“The left’s biggest beef with Kline is that he subpoenaed medical records, but what few realize is that the reason he did so was the fault of Tiller and Planned Parenthood themselves.
The one-page abortion report to the Department of Health required by our 1998 post-viable abortion ban law tripped up both of them. That report at no time lists the woman’s name. But the report asks the reason for doing a post-viable abortion to see if it qualifies for what are supposed to be very narrow exceptions.
Tiller ignored it, and it appears Planned Parenthood falsified it, both apparently in order to get away with doing post-viable abortions outside the criteria set down in Kansas law. This left acquiring the medical records themselves (redacted of personal identifying information) as the only way for an A.G. to investigate the facts.
A.G.s frequently subpoena sensitive medical records to prosecute crime. In fact, among the Pennsylvania grand jury recommendations to avoid a future “House of Horrors” clinic like the one run by Kermit Gosnnell, was the admonition that inspectors be able to look at medical records.”
To help pay Phill’s attorney fees through KFL go here, check box #4 and write Phill Kline Defense Fund in the comments section.
