Illinois abortion clinic remains closed after health violations

Rockford, Ill., Nov 30, 2011 / 00:30 am

An Illinois abortion clinic which set up blasphemous and obscene window displays directed at pro-life demonstrators will remain closed after a judge ruled that its license suspension for health violations will continue until a Jan. 4 hearing.

The Illinois Department of Health brought a series of charges against the Northern Illinois Women’s Center of Rockford, Illinois, the Chicago-based Thomas More Law Society reports. All three of the clinic’s operating rooms failed to ensure a sanitary environment, the clinic failed to prevent contamination of surgical equipment, including surgical gloves. Sterilization equipment also failed tests at least twice.

The abortion facility also did not meet the legal requirement for a qualified registered nurse to be present in the operating room during procedures, and failed to keep records properly, suggesting that women were left to care for themselves after surgery.

Doctors also lacked admitting privileges at local hospitals, possibly putting patients at risk of serious injury or death.

A prosecuting attorney from the health department on Nov. 28 told an administrative law judge that “two to three issues” remained unresolved. The department cited the clinic in June and September. It ordered an emergency suspension of the clinic’s license on Sept. 30 and fined it $15,000.

The clinic believes that the suspension was not warranted and violated the constitutional rights of the clinic and its patients. The Jan. 4 hearing will determine whether the clinic can reopen or if its closure will be extended.

The Thomas More Law Society is representing concerned Rockford area citizens, including the Rockford Pro-Life Initiative and a nurse who helped persuade public health authorities to investigate the facility after 14 years in which no inspections took place.

Society president and chief counsel Tom Brejcha said the group will continue to monitor the proceedings “as closely as possible” and to do “all we can” to ensure that the clinic is “held fully accountable for compliance with Illinois law before it is permitted, if ever, to reopen and continue its grisly business of the mass slaughter of human beings.”

“We pray that this Christmas season may mark NIWC’s permanent closure.”

Staffers at the abortion clinic have a history of trying to provoke and insult pro-life demonstrators. They placed anti-Christian symbols in the facility’s window, including images of Jesus making an obscene gesture. Other items included a nun doll in a miniature casket and hand-drawn signs attacking priests and other demonstrators as HIV-positive child molesters.