NJ nurses say suit hasn't halted abortion duties

U.S. Rep. Christopher Smith, R-N.J., left, talks to Jacqueline
 Deseo, a registered nurse at the University of Medicine and
 Dentistry of New Jersey, Monday, Nov. 14, 2011, in Newark, N.J.
 Twelve nurses have filed a lawsuit and are opposing a new
 UMDNJ policy requiring them to participate in abortions,
 an abrupt change from long-time policy.

A group of nurses who objected to helping abortion patients on religious grounds said Monday they were still being compelled to assist with the procedures, despite having filed a federal lawsuit against the New Jersey hospital where they work.

The suit was filed by 12 nurses at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey hospital in Newark. Several said despite the lawsuit, they were still being trained and scheduled to assist.

"My spiritual conviction tells me, I would not want to kill innocent babies, and not in my wildest dream, as a nurse, as a person, as a Christian, did I ever think that I would be trained to assist with this kind of procedure," Fe Esperanza Racpan-Vinoya, said at a news conference in front of the hospital.

Racpan-Vinoya and other nurses who attended the news conference — all but four in their unit have signed on to the lawsuit — said they had made their objections known to their supervisor and to hospital officials, and claim their concerns were dismissed or ignored. Hospital officials said previously they would temporarily stop requiring nurses to assist, and a federal judge issued a restraining order to that effect, but the nurses claim it's still going on.

The hospital issued a statement Monday saying no nurse is compelled to participate, or even be in the room, during a procedure to which they object on cultural, religious or ethical grounds.

"The university is in full compliance with all applicable state and federal laws, and is confident its position will be vindicated when the court gives this matter a full hearing," the statement read.

Two hospital spokespeople who attended the news conference declined to answer any questions beyond the release, saying it was an ongoing legal matter.

The hospital performs first- and second-trimester abortions, usually by giving a patient a labor-inducing drug, according to Racpan-Vinoya. She added that nurses are required to care for a patient until they go to an operating room, but said the majority of patients usually remain — and go through the full process — in the unit where the nurses work.

Matt Bowman, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund, a coalition of Christian lawyers and organizations that is representing the nurses, said the hospital had previously hired per-diem nurses or those who volunteered to assist with abortions to help perform them.

Bowman said the hospital notified nurses in writing in September that its new policy would require same-day surgery unit nurses to assist in abortions. The nurses filed suit on Oct. 31, claiming the hospital was compelling them to undergo training that involved assisting in abortions, and indicated they could be subject to termination if they didn't comply.

U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, who attended the press conference in support of the nurses, said the women had "an air-tight legal case" against the hospital, which he said was violating the terms of its federal funding.

"UMDNJ's coercive anti-conscience policy is not only highly unethical but blatantly illegal," Smith said. "Federal and state law couldn't be clearer on this matter."

The matter is scheduled to be heard in federal court in Newark on Dec. 5.

___

Follow Samantha Henry at http://www.twitter.com/SamanthaHenry.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/news/2011/11/nj-nurses-say-suit-hasnt-halted-abortion-duties#ixzz1eL9c8x5P

Anti-Abortion Picket Targets Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, Inc. and Planned Parenthood

DANA POINT, Calif., Aug. 25, 2011 /Christian Newswire/ -- The Center For Bio-Ethical Reform (CBR) and it's project partner, Life Decisions International (LDI), announce an abortion-related boycott and picket of the St. Regis Monarch Beach Hotel, located at the intersection of One Monarch Beach Resort and Niguel Road in Dana Point, CA, 92629, beginning Friday, Saturday and Sunday, August 26-28, 2011, from 2:00PM until 7:00PM each day.

The picketing of this property will continue until Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, Inc., the corporation responsible for the general management of this hotel, enforces its franchise agreements to bar Starwood licensees from providing philanthropic support to Planned Parenthood, America's largest abortion provider.

This particular St. Regis property is owned by Washington Real Estate Holdings LLC, whose investors we urge to enforce their management contract with Starwood in terms which forbid Starwood's corporate sponsorship of Planned Parenthood.

This weekend's picketing will involve the display of handheld abortion photo signs at the entrances to the St. Regis property. Billboard trucks displaying larger versions of related abortion photo signs will circle the hotel each day. Aircraft will tow 50'X100' aerial billboards displaying still larger abortion photos in tight orbits directly above the St. Regis Hotel and golf course.

In the coming months, CBR will begin concentrated picketing of St. Regis special events, such as wedding receptions, using abortion photos which are progressively more graphic. Prior to each of these specially targeted pickets, CBR will issue notice sufficient to permit the St. Regis to provide its clients with adequate opportunities to book alternative arrangements elsewhere.

We believe that Starwood has at least an ethical duty to disclose our picketing intentions to current and prospective customers. Knowingly concealing this information could arguably obligate the St. Regis to refund fees and or expose the hotel to a broad range of civil liabilities.

CBR believes that the targeted hotel is similarly obligated to notify clients with whom it contracts to provide off-site catering, that their events could be picketed by CBR activists who lawfully follow St. Regis catering trucks to their destinations.

We will videotape all of our St. Regis picketing activities and post serialized video vignettes on popular social networking websites. We have also contracted with a private security firm to deploy armed, uniformed officers for all pickets.

In addition to the St. Regis, Starwood hotel trademarks include the Sheraton, Westin, Four Points, Meridian, W and other hotel brands. CBR picketing of additional St. Regis properties and Starwood brands is currently being planned and organized.

Starwood is only the first of 70 corporations, many of which are Fortune 500 companies, whose retail establishments CBR and LDI will picket with abortion photo signs. This group includes such brands as Olive Garden and Red Lobster restaurants, Levi Strauss clothing, Estee Lauder cosmetics, Microsoft computer products, Nike sports gear, Ralph Lauren clothing, Southwest Airline, Staples office products Walt Disney entertainment and Whole Foods Markets. A select sub-group of these 70 businesses will be targeted for intensified picketing between the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays in the Fall and Winter of 2011.

News organizations may request access to a CBR FTP website at which they can download picket-related still photos of publishable quality and picket-related video of broadcast quality. For more detailed information on this project, please visit abortionNO.org. For interviews, please email Gregg Cunningham at cbr@cbrinfo.orgor Don Cooper at dcooper@cbrinfo.org. Gregg Cunningham can be reached by phone at 714-240-6976 and Don Cooper at 541-760-6620.

Eight New Abortion Tapes Reveal Causalities, Callousness, and Cover-up

Contact: Troy Newman, President, 316-841-1700; Cheryl Sullenger, Senior Policy Advisor, 316-516-3034; both withOperation Rescue, info@operationrescue.org

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M., Aug. 15, 2011 /Christian Newswire/ -- Operation Rescue has obtained eight new 911 recordings that reveal a scandalous pattern of botched abortions at two Albuquerque abortion clinics. Together with five 911 calls released last month, the 13 calls show that life-threatening abortion complications requiring emergency assistance occur at the rate of one every 10 weeks.

The eight newly obtained calls were placed between November, 2008 and December, 2009, with six originating from Southwestern Women's Options, owned by Curtis Boyd, and the UNM Center for Reproductive Health, an abortion clinic that acts as an abortion training grounds for the University of New Mexico.

"As disturbing as the critical nature of these life-threatening emergencies are, perhaps more disturbing are the callous attitudes of some of the abortion workers and their willingness to cover up for the abortionists," said Operation Rescue Senior Policy Advisor Cheryl Sullenger. "The clinic workers are careful about how much information they revealed to the emergency dispatchers, and in many cases, even attempt to shift the blame for the complications onto the woman. Their general actions and attitudes toward the woman they just injured are despicable."

One clinic worker from Southwestern Women's Options expressed concern over the questions the 911 dispatcher was asking. While she thought she was on hold, this exchange took place:

SWO Employee:[Whispering] I don't know - I don't know what information he's asking me.

Background Voice: Just talk to him - act dumb.

SWO Employee: [Whispering] Okay. Exactly. Yeah.

The latest tapes obtained under an open records act request made by Tara Shaver of Project Defending Life, who forwarded the recordings to Operation Rescue. They show women ranging in ages from 18 to 34 who were between 8 weeks and approximately 24 weeks pregnant.

Complications included:

• Uterine rupture with heavy bleeding.
   
• A panic-stricken 18-yer old patient with chest pains, numbness, and a severe headache after a late-term abortion.
   
• Cervical laceration with hemorrhaging.
   
• Uncontrolled bleeding after first and second trimester abortions.
   
• Multiple seizures.
   
• Abortion on a woman with an undiagnosed ectopic (tubal) pregnancy.
• 
  

"It's just wrong for paramedics to have to clean up after these abortion quacks every ten weeks. We demand the immediate closure of the two Albuquerque clinics involved for the protection of the public," said Sullenger.

Operation Rescue is preparing new complaints against the abortionists involved. Three abortionists from Southwestern Women's Options, Curtis Boyd, Shelley Sella, and Susan Robinson are already under investigation by the New Mexico Medical Board.

A video containing excerpts of the call has been released on YouTube.com. The full recordings, written transcripts, and the Computer Aided Dispatch transcripts have also been released and are available at OperationRescue.org.

About Operation Rescue®  
Operation Rescue is one of the leading pro-life Christian activist organizations in the nation and has become a strong voice for the pro-life movement in America. Operation Rescue is now headquartered in a former abortion clinic that it bought and closed in 2006.  From there, Operation Rescue launches its innovative new strategies across the nation, exposing and closing abortion clinics through peaceful, legal means. Its activities are on the cutting edge of the abortion issue, taking direct action to stop abortion and ultimately restore legal personhood to the pre-born in obedience to biblical mandates.  

Planned Parenthood 'Chaplain' Caught on Tape Deceiving Mississippi Voters

Contact: Keith Mason, Personhood USA, 202-595-3500

JACKSON, Miss., Aug. 12, 2011 /Christian Newswire/ -- Mississippi voters were in an uproar on Wednesday when Planned Parenthood Seattle Chaplain Vincent Lachina was exposed during a Mississippi Secretary of State's Personhood Amendment Hearing.

Speaking to a crowd of Mississippi voters, Lachina claimed to be a Southern Baptist minister, both "prolife and prochoice." Addressing the crowd in a clerical collar, Mississippians listened intently as Lachina shared that he grew up in Jackson and had a Mississippi heritage. Lachina boldly preached an ideology of choice from the pulpit, calling for a "no" vote on prolife Amendment 26, but left out some critical details.

Lachina failed to mention that he is the Washington State Chaplain at Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

Jacob Dawson, of AFA, was sitting in the audience and decided to do a Google search of Lachina, having never heard of a Southern Baptist preacher from Mississippi by that name -- much less a pro-choice, clerical collar-wearing Southern Baptist Preacher.

Dawson got up before the crowd and stated, "A quick Google search reveals that Mr. Lachina is from Seattle, and is a chaplain for Planned Parenthood."

The crowd was stunned, and many were outraged at the misrepresentation and deception of Planned Parenthood.

Further research on Mr. Lachina revealed the following statement: "We gay men don't need to worry about what the Republicans, the religious right, or homophobes will do to us." Vincent Lachina, "The Good Boy," The Advocate, 1-30-2007.

The "Religious Right" mentioned by Lachina certainly must include Southern Baptists, who have historically opposed abortion and homosexuality, and have made public statements expounding on that opposition.

"Nationwide, we have seen Planned Parenthood's repeated attempts to deceive the public. These are just the kind of underhanded tactics we have come to expect from Planned Parenthood," explained Keith Mason, President of Personhood USA. "It appears that Planned Parenthood flew a man from Washington to Mississippi, put him in a clerical collar, and asked him to appeal to the voters with deep Southern Baptist roots. It's just wrong. His attempts to dissuade voters from voting for Amendment 26 will not be successful. Yes on 26 is an honest campaign for a pro-life measure. No posturing or dress-up is necessary to see that all human beings are people, and that all people have a right to life."

The Yes on 26 Campaign www.yeson26.net has released video of the deception at www.youtube.com/yeson26dotnet.  

Yes on 26 - Greg Sanders - 662-523-6722