Matt C. Abbott
Illinois: America's 'paradise' for child rapists
By Matt C. Abbott
The Thomas More Society, whose president and chief counsel is Thomas Brejcha, is one of my favorite pro-life organizations. (Incidentally, Peter Breen, executive director and legal counsel of TMS, is running for state representative. Check out his blog.)
The following is an edited version of TMS' most recent fundraising letter:
August 9, 2009
The Thomas More Society, whose president and chief counsel is Thomas Brejcha, is one of my favorite pro-life organizations. (Incidentally, Peter Breen, executive director and legal counsel of TMS, is running for state representative. Check out his blog.)
The following is an edited version of TMS' most recent fundraising letter:
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At long last, after 14 years, the Illinois Parental Notification Act of 1995 is going into effect. This was a major victory won by Thomas More Society lawyers who spent the last four years pressing for this result. But it's no time to rest on our laurels. A dark cloud hangs over our recent victory in the long battle for Parental Notification in Illinois. Here's why.
- In September of 2006 we filed a brief with the Illinois Supreme Court, whose Justices had refused to issue procedural rules needed to put the 1995 Parental Notification law into effect. We urged the six new Justices finally to take action so the law (which had been enjoined years earlier by a federal court in Chicago for lack of those procedural rules).
- Within a week the Illinois Supreme Court issued its rules so that the law could be enforced.
- But instead of going right into federal court to lift the injunction and get the law enforced, Attorney General Lisa Madigan played footsie with her pals in the ACLU. She dragged her feet nearly five months until the following February. Then, when she appeared before U.S. District Court Judge David Coar, instead of asking him to lift the federal ban, she told him (as the ACLU had been contending) that Illinois wasn't yet ready to abide by the law, that he should delay its enforcement, and appoint a federal "special master" to tell him when Illinois officials were ready to enforce the law! Judge Coar told the Attorney General he couldn't understand what she was asking him to do and to come back when she felt Illinois was ready to enforce the law.
- We delivered a transcript of this bizarre hearing before Judge Coar to the Chief Justice of the Illinois Supreme Court. A week or two later, on February 27, 2007, there was a blockbuster development: each member of the Illinois Supreme Court signed an unprecedented one-page letter to Ms. Madigan, informing her in no uncertain terms that the courts of Illinois were fully prepared to implement the Parental Notification law! What a stinging rebuke!
- Stung by this letter from all seven Justices of the Illinois Supreme Court, Madigan grudgingly went through the motions of asking Coar to lift the federal injunction against Parental Notification. Her pals at the ACLU responded, serving up the same brazenly false arguments that Illinois courts still weren't ready to enforce the law. And they added a new contention that the law was unconstitutional — a flimsy contention in the teeth of another statute. The ACLU argued the law didn't empower a court to consent to a minor's abortion once it ruled that a minor needn't notify parents in cases of abuse. But Illinois has a specific statute giving the pregnant minor herself power to consent to any medical procedure!
- Madigan wrote a half-hearted reply brief. It was inept, lukewarm, and unworthy of her office. Her brief didn't even mention the ACLU's new flimsy contention about court consent.
- Judge Coar sat on the matter and then rejected the argument that the courts weren't ready to apply the law. But then he bought the ACLU's flimsy new argument that the Parental Notification law was unconstitutional — for a reason that doesn't even exist — lack of judicial power to consent. This was the point to which Ms. Madigan didn't respond — a blunder of colossal proportions.
- We appeared before Judge Coar to point out his error so he could correct it immediately. But Madigan undercut our effort. She simultaneously filed an appeal to delay the matter even further. Because of Madigan's appeal, Judge Coar declared the matter out of his hands.
- We asked Ms. Madigan to withdraw her appeal so that we could give Judge Coar an opportunity to correct his blunder quickly. But she stubbornly refused.
- So we immediately went up to the U.S. Court of Appeals and argued that Judge Coar should have heard our argument regardless of Madigan's filing of an appeal.
- And here's the latest blockbuster news. On July 14, 2009, the U.S. Court of Appeals finally dissolved the injunction against the Illinois Parental Notification law! And on August 4, 2009, the Court of Appeals' mandate went down to Judge Coar: put the law into effect!
You see, the ACLU lawyers who persuaded federal judges — as well as Illinois officials — to put this law "on hold" for so long are already scheming to undo this pro-life win. Yes, the ACLU isn't giving up. They are planning to run into court to get yet another injunction to prevent Parental Notification whenever a 12- or 13-year-old girl wants a secret abortion.
And keep this in mind: It doesn't matter to the ACLU if the father of the unborn child is a 38-year-old statutory rapist. The ACLU absolutely insists that the 12- or 13-year-old girl has a right to a secret abortion — behind her parents' backs. Parents' loving concerns for the welfare of their daughters — not to mention grandchildren — are viewed by the ACLU as nothing but an obstacle to be overcome or circumvented. Radical sexual autonomy — even for minors — is their sole lodestar!
Right now our heroic lead attorney Tom Brejcha is sounding the alarm and preparing to do battle once again against the ACLU lawyers. It's necessary in order to make our victory stick!
Here's another difficulty. The pro-abortion Attorney General of Illinois, Lisa Madigan, aided by the ACLU and other abortion-friendly officials, will likely continue dragging her feet on enforcing the Parental Notification law.
Well, Lisa Madigan and the ACLU can do whatever they will, but we're going to hold their feet to the fire on Parental Notification. This law MUST be enforced. It's the law, period!
Earlier in the fight over Parental Notification we told you a true story about what happens without the parents being notified. This story is so incredible it bears repeating. You should think twice about reading this story if you have high blood pressure.
When "Amanda" (not her real name) got pregnant at the age of 14, her boyfriend's mother hounded her to have an abortion. She told Amanda abortion was no big deal — like getting a manicure or a hairdo. And she had had five abortions!
But Amanda' s parents are Christians. They're pro-life. Amanda wanted to have the baby, too. Amanda had seen an ultrasound picture of her baby boy. She had heard his heartbeat. She named him Bradley. Everyone in her family looked forward to his upcoming birth.
Meanwhile, the boyfriend's mother kept on harassing and pressuring Amanda to have an abortion simply because a baby would "disrupt" her son's college plans "and ruin his life." The pressure proved too great, and Amanda caved in.
And so, pretending to be Amanda's "grandmother," the boyfriend's mother got Amanda excused from school and then snuck Amanda into her car with her son. They drove to the notorious Hope Clinic in Granite City, Illinois. Yogendra Shah is the abortionist there.
I've told you about his clinic before: how statutory rapists from neighboring states' with parental notice laws drag their victims to Dr. Shah's clinic for "don't ask, don't tell" abortions. He's one of America's most notorious abortionists for giving abortions to underage girls.
Purely by chance, Amanda's mother, "Grace," found out she wasn't in school or at home. She put two and two together and sped to the Hope Clinic as quickly as possible to see if Amanda was there. Amanda wasn't in the reception area. Then Grace saw Amanda's name checked off on the clipboard at the reception desk. Her blood ran cold. She knew for sure her daughter was in one of Shah's abortion chambers, waiting to go under the knife.
Grace demanded to see her daughter right away. A clinic employee who knew full well that Amanda was inside smugly taunted Grace." You can't prove your daughter is here," she snickered. Grace replied that she had seen her daughter's name on the guard's clipboard. She was told, "It's your daughter's rights. It's her body." Another employee chimed in, saying, "You have no rights."
Grace was frantic. Her daughter was having invasive surgery, and her baby was near death! Having no alternative, Grace yelled out at the top of her lungs, "AMANDA... AMANDA... DON'T DO IT!!!"
But Dr. Shah's helpers had ushered-Amanda to a room deep inside the clinic where Amanda could not hear her mother's urgent plea. Police were called to arrest Amanda's mother for trespass!
Like cowards, Amanda's boyfriend and his mother left through the back door of the abortion mill so they wouldn't have to face her mother. They didn't even wait to see if Amanda was "ok." Not willing to lose a "sale," Shah put Amanda at the head of the list and killed her baby without delay.
In the meantime, when the police arrived Amanda's mother explained that she desperately needed to see her 14-year-old child, who was on the brink of having an abortion. She begged the police to help her. Instead of escorting her inside the clinic so she could talk to her daughter, the police slapped handcuffs on her and said, "You're under arrest." They escorted her out of the abortion mill and into the back seat of a squad car.
Stories like this make our blood boil. Now you know why we must take steps to make our recent victory for parental notification stick. We must defeat the ACLU's challenge to our victory — a challenge that will be well underway by the time you receive this letter.
Let me tell you one more story to emphasize the urgency of our Parental Notification struggle and the need to make our victory for Parental Notification stick.
Like Amanda in the previous story, "Caitlin," a 15-year-old girl from Fayetteville, Arkansas, was looking forward to having her baby.
When she told her boyfriend about the pregnancy, her boyfriend's mother blew her stack. She told Caitlin her pregnancy couldn't continue because her husband had leukemia, and "this would kill him." The boyfriend's mother used heavy pressure to heap "guilt" onto Caitlin. Caitlin, like Amanda, caved in to her boyfriend's mother's demand.
So the boyfriend's mother bought three tickets for a direct flight Chieago. Why? Because Arkansas has a Parental Notification law. It also has a Parental Consent law. And it was well known there, as in all other Midwestern states, that in Illinois it was always "open season" for minors' abortions, where any young girl's unborn child could be disposed of — no questions asked!
The boyfriend's mother sent a taxi to get Caitlin in the dead of night, at 3:00 a.m. She snuck out of her house and crept quietly into the taxi. Yet, almost immediately her conscience came back to life. She knew she was going down the wrong path.
The next morning, Caitlin's mom experienced a mother's worst nightmare. She found her daughter's bedroom empty! You can imagine her shock: she knew the boyfriend's mother was pushing hard for an abortion, and she suspected that this wicked woman had taken her daughter across state lines for an abortion. She felt helpless in her anguish.
The boyfriend called Caitlin's mother to say she was "fine." Frantic with fear, the mom asked, "Are you in town?" He lied, telling her "Yes." "Did she have an abortion?" Again he lied: "No." Then he hung up.
After landing in Chicago, Caitlin told her boyfriend and his mother she didn't want to go through with it. But they pressed her: "This is what you have to do!" They brought her to the notorious Michigan Avenue clinic without delay. They hustled her in while it was still dark. The abortionist wasted no time in killing her baby. This happened on March 14, 2007.
Then the boyfriend called Caitlin's mom to tell her Caitlin would be at the Fayetteville airport at 10:15 a.m. Accompanied by the police, Caitlin's mom met the plane. The police were planning to take the boy and his mother in for questioning. But neither he nor his mother was on Caitlin's flight home.
Instead of escorting his traumatized, post-abortive teen girlfriend back to Arkansas, "Romeo" flew off to Cancun, Mexico, to drink beer on the beach with some friends.
The Arkansas police wanted to help Caitlin's mom. But there was nothing they could do to punish the callous boyfriend or his twisted mother. Why so? Here's why: ACLU lawyers had won a federal court injunction, blocking Illinois' Parental Notification law. It was "on ice" for 14 years!
Caitlin was left scarred for life. She told her mom that she'll never forgive herself. She lost 10 pounds though she was petite to begin with. And she's had a series of bladder infections. Furthermore, she had abdominal pains that wouldn't go away — pains the doctors couldn't explain.
Her baby is dead. She wasn't sure whether her baby was a boy or a girl, so she has named her deceased baby Abriel. And the baby's death has hit the whole family hard. Everyone, including Caitlin's brothers, shed tears over the baby.
On the other hand, Caitlin's boyfriend had a good time drinking beer on the beach with his buddies in Cancun, freed of his "burden," and his mother got what she wanted: a dead grandchild.
Many more families like Caitlin's will be left scarred unless we can make our victory for Parental Notification stick. That's why we must meet the ACLU's new challenge and make dead sure that Illinois' pro-abortion officials enforce the law. And there's another important reason to enforce our victory for Parental Notification. Notifying the parents when a minor seeks abortion exposes the crimes of statutory rapists who prey on underage girls.
You see, child molesters depend on secret abortions to cover up the evidence of their crimes. If they are accused of statutory rape after the baby is dead, they can just deny, deny, deny. And it's the rapist's word against the girl's.
But if the baby isn't aborted, a DNA test would prove that the rapist committed the crime. We expect that Planned Parenthood will continue to violate the Parental Notification law. Funds permitting, we'll hire private investigators to catch them in the act of violating the law. And there will be consequences: Planned Parenthood would be nailed for criminal fraud.
Although the saga of the Parental Notification battle is complicated, let me briefly explain it in plain language. Illinois passed a Parental Notification law in 1995, but it hasn't been enforced because of hard-core pro-abortion politicians who've been dragging their feet. Lately, the primary culprit has been Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan. She's avowedly "pro-choice." Yet it's her solemn obligation to defend and enforce the laws of Illinois, whether she likes the laws or not.
Here's a brief chronology of the Parental Notification struggle. You may find some of it downright shocking:
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