Day 7 included Defense cross examination of Planned Parenthood Orange & San Bernardino Counties’ CEO Jon Dunn, and the sworn testimony of Dr. Deborah Nucatola, Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s previous Senior Director of Medical Services who described criminal partial-birth abortion procedures for fetal organ sales in the first CMP video release. Deborah VanDerhei, PPFA’s Vice President of Abortion Access, gave testimony via videotaped deposition.
- Dunn acknowledged under oath that neither David Daleiden nor any CMP videos ever called for any violence or physical harm against Planned Parenthood or its affiliates.
- Dr. Nucatola testified that Planned Parenthood Federation of America never got her authorization to bring claims in its lawsuit on her behalf. Dr. Nucatola has not worked at PPFA during most of the litigation in PPFA’s lawsuit.
- Dr. Nucatola also testified that she relied on the National Abortion Federation’s alleged “vetting” of conference exhibitors to engage with CMP undercover actors representing BioMax Procurement Services, because she believed NAF was the “gold standard” for security in the abortion industry. However, Dr. Nucatola testified that to this day she has no knowledge of what if anything nAF actually does to “vet” exhibitors at its trade shows.
- For the first time in open court, the Defense played for the jury approximately 4 and a half minutes of Dr. Nucatola’s conversation with CMP undercover investigators at a public restaurant in Los Angeles, in which she described using ultrasound guidance to flip a baby in the womb to feet-first breech position, in order to extract the baby intact and harvest whole, fresh organs. On the clip, Dr. Nucatola states, “We’ve been pretty successful with that, I’d say.” Dr. Nucatola testified under oath that when this video was released in 2015, she “felt the content was no big deal” and that she didn’t think she said anything inappropriate on the video.
- Deborah VanDerhei, head of PPFA’s Consortium of Abortion Providers, testified in her sworn deposition that when Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast’s Research Director Melissa Farrell came to her and Dr. Nucatola with suspicions about the undercover CMP investigators at BioMax, Dr. Nucatola assured them that their suspicions were unfounded. VanDerhei also testified that when she had further suspicions about BioMax at the 2015 NAF trade show, she told NAF about it–but did not tell Planned Parenthood–and NAF said they would follow up, but then never did.
The proceedings continue at 8 A.M. on Thursday, October 17, in San Francisco Federal District Court at 450 Golden Gate Ave, San Francisco, CA 94102, in Courtroom 2 on Floor 17.
