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The HHS inspector general’s investigation of the Planned Parenthood baby parts scandal is further confirmation of the serious legal and ethical issues raised by Planned Parenthood’s unaccountable abortion-for-baby-parts business. All state and federal investigations, including the Congressional Select Committee on Infant Lives and the new HHS audit, must leave no stone unturned in examining the illicit baby parts payments from groups like StemExpress, ABR, Novogenix, and even the NIH itself to Planned Parenthood.

The First Amendment liberties of freedom of speech and of the citizen press are under attack in the censorial lawsuit brought against CMP by the National Abortion Federation, Planned Parenthood’s allies and proxy group. The National Abortion Federation is a criminal enterprise and a key partner in Planned Parenthood’s late-term abortion and baby body parts business. NAF seeks a Preliminary Injunction gag-order to silence CMP from publishing the evidence of criminal activity between NAF and Planned Parenthood and to censor the video evidence already released. CMP’s recently-filed opposition to NAF is available (with court-mandated redactions) here and includes:

• The factual background of CMP investigators’ interactions with the National Abortion Federation, revealing NAF invited CMP investigators to attend its meetings precisely because it was so interested in its members receiving payment for fetal tissue and organs (page 5)

• The important precedent of the recent Animal Legal Defense Fund v. Otter case in the 9th Circuit, ruling definitively that investigative journalism is not “fraud” and fully protected by the First Amendment
  

• 5 pages of examples of criminal and unethical admissions from NAF and Planned Parenthood abortion providers documented at NAF meetings, redacted from the public filing and prevented from release by court order (pages 10-15)

• The invalidity and unenforceability of NAF’s poorly-constructed and contradictory conference Exhibitor and Confidentiality Agreements, which NAF has admitted in court to have a primary non-disparagement purpose nowhere stated in the agreements themselves (pages 18-28)

• The blatantly unconstitutional character of prior restraints on speech (pages 32-38)

From CMP’s Opposition filing:

In September 2013, the National Abortion Federation (“NAF”) became aware of a start-up company called BioMax Procurement Services, LLC, which offered to pay abortion clinics for fetal tissue. NAF representatives encouraged BioMax to attend and exhibit at NAF’s Annual Meeting in April 2014 in San Francisco. In response to a tentative e-mail inquiry from BioMax about pricing and availability of exhibit space at the next meeting, NAF responded by sending a prospectus containing what NAF now claims is its most secret information: the exact date, time, and location of its next Annual Meeting.

BioMax representatives attended the 2014 NAF Annual Meeting and told dozens of members and staff that its business plan was to pay abortion clinics for fetal tissue—and pay more than its competitors. From 2014 to 2015, it made the same proposal to abortion providers and clinic owners in several other venues. Consequently, BioMax became popular and respected in the abortion community.

[…]

CMP’s investigation uncovered extensive evidence in the abortion industry of willingness to engage in criminal practices, including the sale of fetal body parts for profit and the alteration of abortion methods to procure fetal body parts for research, as well as evidence of de-sensitization toward the highly developed human fetus by practitioners of late-term abortion.

NAF has spun this investigative journalistic endeavor into an eleven-count complaint containing allegations ranging from racketeering and fraud to trespass. Despite months of rhetoric about CMP’s putative “fraud” and “crime spree,” however, for its preliminary injunction motion, NAF relies on only two claims: breach of contract and violation of California Penal Code § 632.

Plaintiff cannot show a likelihood of success on these claims, nor can it show a threat of irreparable injury on the basis of the actions of third parties unrelated to Defendants who are strangers to this lawsuit. Moreover, NAF’s requested relief is both unsupported by the evidence and contrary to the public policy against restraining publication of matters of enormous public interest.

The National Abortion Federation and Planned Parenthood continue to trample on the First Amendment freedoms of the American people even as these two halves of the abortion industry are under state and federal investigation for their criminal sale of baby body parts. The arguments on NAF’s Preliminary Injunction gag order will be heard in the San Francisco Northern Federal District Court of California on December 18. The public filings can be found below:

Democracy has returned to the Congress as the Senate votes by majority to end taxpayer subsidies to Planned Parenthood’s scandal-ridden abortion and baby parts business. There is no justification for Planned Parenthood to continue to build their criminal enterprise and abortion empire on over half-a-billion taxpayer dollars each year. Now, President Obama must listen to the will of the people through their elected representatives by ending taxpayer subsidies to Planned Parenthood and ordering an immediate investigation by the Justice Department of Planned Parenthood’s interstate commerce in fetal tissue and organs with StemExpress, Advanced Bioscience Resources, Novogenix Laboratories, Da Vinci Biosciences, and many others.

The Center for Medical Progress condemns the barbaric killing spree in Colorado Springs by a violent madman. We applaud the heroic efforts of law enforcement to stop the violence quickly and rescue the victims, and our thoughts and prayers are with the wounded, the lost, and their families.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

#PPSellsBabyParts PLANNED PARENTHOOD TX DOC: HARVESTING INTACT FETAL HEADS “WILL GIVE ME SOMETHING TO STRIVE FOR”
Dr. Amna Dermish, Planned Parenthood Late-Term Abortion Doctor in Austin, TX, Taught by PPFA Senior Director of Medical Services Dr. Deborah Nucatola to Use Partial-Birth Abortions For Intact Fetuses

Contact: Peter Robbio, probbio@crcpublicrelations.com, 703.683.5004

AUSTIN, Oct. 27–The eleventh video release from The Center for Medical Progress in the ongoing Planned Parenthood baby parts scandal shows the abortion doctor for Planned Parenthood in Austin, TX, Dr. Amna Dermish, describing a partial-birth abortion procedure to terminate living, late-term fetuses which she hopes will yield intact fetal heads for brain harvesting.

Dr. Dermish admits she was trained by the Senior Director of Medical Services at Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Dr. Deborah Nucatola. Nucatola described a partial-birth abortion technique to harvest fetal organs in the first Planned Parenthood video released July 14 by CMP.

“My aim is usually to get the specimens out pretty intact,” says Dermish, speaking to actors posing as a fetal tissue procurement company. Dermish admits that she will sometimes use ultrasound guidance to convert a 2nd-trimester fetus to a feet-first breech presentation: “Especially the 20-weekers are a lot harder versus the 18-weekers, so at that point I’ll switch to breech.”

“That’s what Deb [Nucatola] was telling us, was it really makes a difference for tissue collection at PPLA,” says one of the actors, referencing Nucatola’s technique for organ harvesting. “It’s really nice when it’s, yeah–I trained with her,” replies Dermish.

In reply to a question about harvesting fetal brain, Dermish notes, “I haven’t been able to do that yet,” but exclaims with laughter, “This will give me something to strive for!”

Dermish does not use the chemical digoxin to kill the fetus before 20 weeks, so her feet-first, intact extraction abortions are done on living fetuses. Using ultrasound guidance to manipulate the fetus from vertex to breech orientation before extracting the yet-living fetus is a hallmark of the illegal partial-birth abortion procedure (18 U.S.C. 1531).

Dermish also affirms a fetal body part price of $50 or $60 per specimen. The sale or purchase of human fetal tissue is a federal felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $500,000 (42 U.S.C. 289g-2).

The state of Texas recently moved to disbar Planned Parenthood from taxpayer funding on account of Medicaid fraud and abortion-related crimes. Governor Greg Abbott recently said in an interview that the state of Texas is now in possession of “hard evidence” that Planned Parenthood is engaged in “violations of federal and state law concerning abortion procedures.”

“Less than 4 miles away from the Texas state capitol, Planned Parenthood routinely practices barbaric partial-birth abortions on living, late-term fetuses,” notes CMP Project Lead David Daleiden. “Planned Parenthood’s crimes are not just the result of local bad actors, but are tolerated and even encouraged at the highest levels of the national organization. State-level criminal investigations must press charges, and Congress’ new select committee must pursue a deep and comprehensive accounting of Planned Parenthood’s atrocities against humanity.”

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See the video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tgez97aG74

Tweet: #PPSellsBabyParts

For more information on the Human Capital project, visit centerformedicalprogress.org.
The Center for Medical Progress is a 501(c)3 non-profit dedicated to monitoring and reporting on medical ethics and advances.

For three months, Planned Parenthood has tried to pass off its baby-parts-for-money scheme as totally legitimate. Today, Planned Parenthood’s latest PR stunt of so-called “policy” change is an admission of guilt.

If the money Planned Parenthood has been receiving for baby body parts were truly legitimate “reimbursement,” why cancel it? This proves what CMP has been saying all along—Planned Parenthood incurs no actual costs, and the payments for harvested fetal parts have always been an extra profit margin.

Without releasing the text of the alleged new “policy” and the exact model from the their Washington affiliate, Planned Parenthood’s stunt today tells us nothing. This only raises more serious questions about what Planned Parenthood leadership has been allowing its clinics to do with money and baby parts, and intensifies the need for Congress to pursue full auditing and oversight of Planned Parenthood’s unaccountable criminal enterprise of baby parts trafficking.

Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards admits in her written testimony before Congress today that she is “proud” of Planned Parenthood’s baby body parts harvesting program. In person, Planned Parenthood’s CEO frequently hid behind the corporate veil of Planned Parenthood’s affiliates and could not provide basic information about Planned Parenthood’s abortion revenue and fetal harvesting practices. Planned Parenthood’s CEO’s evasive testimony will only prolong the controversy over this corrupt and unaccountable organization, while taxpayers continue to foot the bill for their expanding late-term abortion business and baby parts harvesting chop-shop. Her testimony clearly demonstrates that Planned Parenthood, at least on Cecile Richards’ watch, has no intention of ending these atrocities against humanity and is not worthy of taxpayer funding.

The Center for Medical Progress continues to cooperate with the now-five Congressional Committee investigations, subject to an unconstitutional prior-restraint TRO from Planned Parenthood’s allies at the National Abortion Federation. If Planned Parenthood wants to see all of CMP’s footage released, as they claimed in the hearing today, then they should tell their cronies at the National Abortion Federation to back down from their unconstitutional suppression of First Amendment rights to free speech and citizen journalism.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

#PPSellsBabyParts TOP PLANNED PARENTHOOD EXEC AGREES BABY PARTS SALES “A VALID EXCHANGE,” SOME CLINICS “GENERATE A FAIR AMOUNT OF INCOME DOING THIS”
Planned Parenthood Consortium of Abortion Providers National Director Deborah VanDerhei Agrees “Give Our Organization Money for the Tissue” is “A Valid Exchange,” Calls Fetal Organ Harvesting “Donation for Remuneration”

Contact: Peter Robbio, probbio@crcpublicrelations.com, 703.683.5004

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 15–The fourth episode in a new documentary web series and 10th video by The Center for Medical Progress features several top-level Planned Parenthood executives discussing the organization’s secretive practices around aborted fetal parts harvesting. The video includes comments from Deborah VanDerhei, the National Director of the organization’s Consortium of Abortion Providers, describing the harvesting of fetal body parts as “donation for remuneration.”

The “Human Capital” documentary web series, produced by The Center for Medical Progress, integrates expert interviews, eyewitness accounts, and real-life undercover interactions to explore different themes within Planned Parenthood’s sale of aborted fetal tissue. Episode 4, “Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s Criminal Enterprise,” launches today at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9EU_02c5bM

The video highlights conversations with Dr. Carolyn Westhoff, Senior Medical Advisor for PPFA; Dr. Vanessa Cullins, Vice President for External Medical Affairs for PPFA; and Deborah VanDerhei, National Director for the Consortium of Abortion Providers (CAPS) at PPFA.

“We’ve just been working with people who want particular tissues, like, you know, they want cardiac, or they want eyes, or they want neural,” says Dr. Westhoff to a prospective fetal organ buyer. “Certainly, everything we provide–oh, gonads! Oh my God, gonads. Everything we provide is fresh.” Westhoff continues, “Obviously, we would have the potential for a huge P.R. issue in doing this,” before offering to introduce the buyers to “national office abortion people” from Planned Parenthood.

Deborah VanDerhei is the National Director for CAPS, an influential committee within Planned Parenthood that drives abortion policy across the organization. VanDerhei refers to payments for fetal tissue as “donation for remuneration,” which carries the connotation of financial reward or benefit without regard for actual expenses. VanDerhei explains, “I have been talking to the executive director of the National Abortion Federation, we’re trying to figure this out as an industry, about how we’re going to manage remuneration, because the headlines would be a disaster.”

“Is this really worth getting–I don’t even know what in general, what a specimen generally brings in?” VanDerhei later asks a prospective buyer. When she is told $100 per specimen, she remarks, “But we have independent colleagues who generate a fair amount of income doing this.” VanDerhei suggests that Planned Parenthood goes to great lengths to avoid leaving a paper trail about their fetal tissue activity: “It’s an issue that you might imagine we’re not really that comfortable talking about on email.”

In a conversation recorded between VanDerhei and Vanessa Russo, Compliance Program Administrator for Planned Parenthood Keystone in Pennsylvania, Russo argues, “A company like this that wants to give our organization money for the tissue–I think that that’s a valid exchange, and that that’s okay.” VanDerhei nods her head up and down and affirms, “Mhm.”

The sale or purchase of human fetal tissue is a federal felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison or a fine of up to $500,000 (42 U.S.C. 289g-2).

Vanessa Cullins, the Vice President of External Medical Affairs, seems fully aware of the criminal exposure that fetal body parts sales present to Planned Parenthood: “This is important. This could destroy your organization and us, if we don’t time those conversations correctly,” she tells a prospective buyer.

Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the country, responsible for 327,000 abortions every year, and receives $528 million in taxpayer money each year. “From email black-outs to contorted oxymorons like ‘donation for remuneration,’ the lengths to which Planned Parenthood leadership will go to cover-up their illegal sale of aborted baby parts are nothing less than the desperation of a guilty conscience,” notes David Daleiden, Project Lead for CMP. “Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards openly admits they receive ‘$60 per tissue specimen,’ and their contracts with StemExpress offer payments per fetus ‘determined in the clinic to be usable.’ Planned Parenthood runs their abortion and baby parts business in open disregard for the law and should be prosecuted immediately. Their taxpayer funding should be reassigned to Federally Qualified Health Centers, which provide more and comprehensive health services at locations outnumbering Planned Parenthood 20 to 1.”

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See the video at: https://www.centerformedicalprogress.org/2015/09/top-planned-parenthood-exec-agrees-baby-parts-sales-a-valid-exchange-some-clinics-generate-a-fair-amount-of-income-doing-this/

Tweet: #PPSellsBabyParts

For more information on the Human Capital project, visit centerformedicalprogress.org.

The Center for Medical Progress is a 501(c)3 non-profit dedicated to monitoring and reporting on medical ethics and advances.

It is telling that the House Energy & Commerce Committee’s Minority Memo, drafted by Planned Parenthood’s political cronies, can only cite multiple contracts between Planned Parenthood affiliates and Tissue Procurement Organizations which explicitly confirm that Planned Parenthood charges per fetus and per fetal body part for only high-quality procured tissue specimens, but the Memo cannot cite any evidence at all of actual costs incurred by Planned Parenthood. The facts are clear that Planned Parenthood receives substantially scalable payments for harvested fetus body parts, but there is still no evidence that these payments correspond in any way to any actual costs. Planned Parenthood’s political cronies, paid for with Planned Parenthood’s abortion and baby parts money, continue to abuse the English language the credulity of the American people by shrilly insisting that Planned Parenthood’s admissions of payment for baby parts and alterations to abortion procedures are not evidence of criminal activity and barbaric atrocities against humanity that the American taxpayers should not be forced to pay for.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

#PPSellsBabyParts PLANNED PARENTHOOD BABY PARTS VENDOR ADVANCED BIOSCIENCE RESOURCES PAYS OFF CLINICS, INTACT FETUSES “JUST FELL OUT”
ABR, Oldest Supplier of Baby Parts, Paid “Advisor Fee” to Clinic Leadership; Planned Parenthood CEO Admits ABR Pays Clinic $60 Per Baby Part

Contact: Peter Robbio, probbio@crcpublicrelations.com, 703.683.5004

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 1–The ninth video in the Planned Parenthood baby parts scandal focuses on Advanced Bioscience Resources, Inc. (ABR), the small and secretive company that has harvested and sold fetal body parts at Planned Parenthood clinics longer than any other entity: https://www.centerformedicalprogress.org/2015/09/planned-parenthood-baby-parts-vendor-abr-pays-off-clinics-intact-fetuses-just-fell-out/

The video features undercover conversations with Dr. Katharine Sheehan, the long-time medical director of Planned Parenthood of the Pacific Southwest until 2013; Perrin Larton, the Procurement Manager for ABR; and Cate Dyer, the CEO of rival fetal tissue procurement company StemExpress.

Sheehan tells actors posing as a new human biologics company that at Planned Parenthood Pacific Southwest, “We have already a relationship with ABR.” Sheehan explains, “We’ve been using them for over 10 years, really a long time, just kind of renegotiated the contract. They’re doing the big collections for government-level collections and things like that.” When one of the actors negotiates, “We return a portion of our fees to the clinics,” Sheehan responds eagerly, “Right, get a toe in and make it, make a pro–alright.”

In an August 27 letter to Congress, Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards referenced a California Planned Parenthood affiliate that currently receives $60 “per tissue specimen” from a tissue procurement organization. The Center for Medical Progress, the group producing the videos, identified Planned Parenthood Pacific Southwest and ABR as the affiliate and TPO referred to in Richards’ letter, based on process of elimination.

“We now know from Cecile Richards’ letter that $60 per collected tissue specimen is what will ‘get a toe in’ to harvest baby parts at Planned Parenthood Pacific Southwest,” wrote CMP Project Lead David Daleiden. As multiple tissue specimens often come from a single fetus, $60/specimen can quickly add up to hundreds of extra dollars in revenue per abortion. The sale or purchase of human fetal tissue is a federal felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison or a fine of up to $500,000 (42 U.S.C. 289g-2).

Perrin Larton, the Procurement Manager at ABR, is shown describing ABR’s fetal tissue harvesting practice to a prospective buyer. “I literally have had women come in and they’ll go in the O.R. and they’re back out in 3 minutes, and I’m going, ‘What’s going on?’ Oh yeah, the fetus was already in the vaginal canal whenever we put her in the stirrups, it just fell out,” she explains of situations where there has been a great enough degree of cervical dilation to procure an intact fetus.

ABR, founded in 1989 by CEO Linda Tracy, charges $340 per second-trimester fetal tissue specimen, yet seems less concerned about tissue quality than other harvesting companies: “Whenever we have a smooth portion of liver, we think that’s good!” says Larton.

Cate Dyer, who used to work as a procurement technician for ABR before founding her own company StemExpress, shares some of the financial details of ABR: “They were funding places in Hawaii for themselves,” she divulges. “Some staff–not that I know so much on the Planned Parenthood side, but I wouldn’t be surprised–there are some staff in the past that have been on the payroll with ABR.” According to Dyer, ABR would pay an “advisor fee” to a clinic manager or director in order to preserve their exclusive right to harvest fetal tissue at that location. “There’s like, well enough known,” says Dyer, that “for a long time there were certain clinics that because they had paid advisors that were sitting on boards for these clinics, that were also an advisor to ABR, you were just never going to go anywhere with them, you know what I mean?”

“In the twisted world of baby parts trafficking from Planned Parenthood abortion clinics, there are few unbroken rules,” notes CMP’s Daleiden. “After the serious admissions in Planned Parenthood’s letter to Congress last week, it is imperative for lawmakers and law enforcement to act decisively to determine the full extent of Planned Parenthood and their proxies’ lawbreaking, hold them accountable, and stop the taxpayer funding of these barbaric atrocities against humanity.”

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See the video at: https://www.centerformedicalprogress.org/2015/09/planned-parenthood-baby-parts-vendor-abr-pays-off-clinics-intact-fetuses-just-fell-out/

Tweet: #PPSellsBabyParts

For more information on the Human Capital project, visit centerformedicalprogress.org. The Center for Medical Progress is a 501(c)3 non-profit dedicated to monitoring and reporting on medical ethics and advances.