Doctor in 10-year-old rape victim’s abortion could lose license
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Indiana’s medical licensing board will determine as soon as Thursday whether to take any disciplinary action against a doctor who made headlines last year for performing an abortion for a 10-year-old Ohio rape victim, after the state’s antiabortion attorney general alleged the doctor violated ethical standards and state reporting laws.
Indiana’s Republican Attorney General Todd Rokita for nearly a year has pursued punishment for Caitlin Bernard, an OB/GYN and an assistant professor at the Indiana University School of Medicine who performed the abortion in June 2022, less than a week after Roe v. Wade was struck down, enacting trigger laws.
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The stakes of Thursday’s hearing are significant for Bernard, whose lawyers have refuted Rokita’s allegations as baseless and politically motivated. The seven-member board of governor appointees can, by a majority vote, either take no action against Bernard or impose a range of disciplinary measures up to and including the immediate termination of Bernard’s medical license.
Rokita alleges Bernard broke state child abuse reporting laws and federal patient privacy laws by telling an Indianapolis Star reporter about the patient’s care. Bernard’s lawyers argue she properly reported the incident to an IU Health social worker and did not run afoul of privacy laws when she discussed the patient’s case in a general and de-identified manner that is typical for doctors. Records obtained by The Washington Post last year show that Bernard reported the girl’s abortion to the relevant state agencies ahead of the legally mandated deadline.
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Cory Voight, an attorney with Rokita’s office, framed Bernard’s actions as undermining trust in medical professionals and medical privacy and accused her of being “brazen in pursuit of her own agenda” in his opening statement Thursday.
“This is about privacy and trust. Privacy is the foundation, as you know, of health care. It’s something upon which patients rely,” Voight said.
But Alice Morical, one of the attorneys for Bernard, was unequivocal in her opening statement that Bernard followed policy and complied with Indiana law.
“Dr. Bernard could not have anticipated the atypical and intense scrutiny that this story received,” Morical said. “She did not expect that the politicians would say that she made the story up. She did not expect that people would say that the reporter didn’t have sufficient information. The politicalization of this [is] what caused this issue to continue to grow and be a focus.”
Outside the hearing Thursday, several doctors in white coats were seen entering the hearing room to sit in support of Bernard.
It’s not clear how long the hearing will last, though it is expected to extend into the evening, with multiple witnesses testifying in-person and virtually.
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Rokita’s office drew notice from local reporters for the unusual move to bring in outside counsel from a Washington law firm for a medical licensing board hearing. With his deputies arguing on the state’s behalf, Rokita did not attend Thursday’s hearing — but appeared to be watching it remotely as he tweeted comments.
The 10-year-old’s case garnered international attention when it first came to light in a July Indianapolis Star story about pregnant patients coming to Indiana in response to abortion restrictions elsewhere due to trigger laws enacted in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization in June.
The story instantly became a political lightning rod, with abortion rights advocates citing it as an immediate and horrific example of how the end of federal abortion protections was harming women and girls while antiabortion Republicans dismissed the story as fictitious. But two weeks later, a 27-year-old Ohio man was arrested for felony rape after allegedly confessing to the crime.
Bernard sued Rokita last year, alleging in her suit his office relied on “facially invalid consumer complaints to justify multiple, duplicative, and overbroad investigations into law-abiding physicians.” An Indiana judge in December denied Bernard’s request to block Rokita’s efforts, saying it was a matter for the state licensing board. But Marion County Judge Heather Welch also said Rokita acted unlawfully by making public comments about investigating Bernard for potential wrongdoing — a violation of his office’s confidentiality requirements.
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Source: The Washington Post
