George Tiller did not have to die. He was assassinated while in church in Wichita, Kan., on Sunday, targeted for legally performing abortions. His death might have been prevented simply through enforcement of existing laws. His alleged killer was seen vandalizing a Kansas City clinic, Aid for Women, both the week before and the day before the murder, putting glue into its door locks. The manager of that clinic, who calls himself "Jeff Pederson" to protect his identity, told me he called the FBI and local police both times, but the vandal, the alleged killer Scott Roeder, was not arrested. Pederson had Roeder's first name and his license-plate number. He had images of him on the security video. He recognized him from previous protests.
Pederson said: "The clinic was closed on Memorial Day weekend. A worker tried to get in on Memorial Day but couldn't. The locks were Super-Glued. I went to the videotape and I saw the same guy on the videotape who had done it in 2000." Pederson called his contact at the FBI, agent Mark Colburn. "He [Colburn] said the videotape wouldn't be clear enough, and since I had touched the locks, I had ruined it with my DNA. So I bought new color video cameras."
On Saturday, May 30, the clinic manager said "Scott" struck again: "My head nurse calls me, 5:40 Saturday morning. She had come to prep for the patients. When she was coming back from the store she noticed the Taurus [Roeder's car]. She made her way to the back door. She saw him. He saw her and bolted. She followed him to his car and started talking to him.
"He tried to stand in front of the license plate, but she got it, 225 BAB. As she ran back to the clinic, he shouted 'Baby killer!' at her."
Pederson called Colburn, reporting the second vandalism and letting him know he had better video. Pederson said Colburn told him, "The Johnson County prosecutor won't do anything until the grand jury convenes." The next day, Tiller was murdered, allegedly by Roeder.
I called the Kansas City FBI and reached Colburn. He immediately referred me to FBI spokesperson Bridget Patton. I asked her about the incidents at the clinic and why the suspect hadn't been arrested either time. She said: "I am not sure of the timeline, but whenever an act of vandalism occurs at an abortion clinic, we are notified of that vandalism and respond appropriately."
Tiller's medical practice, which included performing late-term abortions, drew rage, protests and attacks during the decades of his career. His clinic was bombed in the mid-1980s. He survived an assassination attempt in 1993, when he suffered gunshot wounds to each of his arms. Bill O'Reilly on Fox News Channel demonized him as "Tiller the Baby Killer." He was the target of a political prosecution by a former Kansas attorney general, Phill Kline, and was acquitted just months ago on misdemeanor charges that he violated state rules on providing abortions.
Roeder was picked up shortly after the shooting Sunday in his Ford Taurus. On Tuesday, he was charged with first-degree murder.
I asked Pederson if he thought Tiller's murder could have been prevented if the authorities had simply arrested Roeder after he vandalized the Kansas City clinic. Pederson paused. "I don't know," he said.
But Dr. Susan Robinson was adamant. She flies to Wichita every month to perform abortions in Tiller's clinic. She said, "It is generally regarded amongst those who do clinic security, if local authorities are not responsive, if they don't show up or they don't vigilantly enforce the law, that it encourages the anti-abortion people to push it further and further."
She said: "In Wichita, Dr. Tiller was constantly dealing with the same lack of enforcement. Wichita prohibits placing signs on city property. But they allow the anti-abortion protesters to set up dozens of crosses and leave them all day. Dr. Tiller went to the city attorney over the crosses, and complained that people block the clinic driveway. He told me that the city attorney said, 'I would rather be sued by George Tiller than the anti-abortion folks.' "
The 1994 federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE) makes it a crime to block or damage a reproductive health service facility.
Enforcing FACE saves lives. George Tiller will be buried on Saturday.
Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column.
Amy Goodman is the host of "Democracy Now!," a daily international TV/radio news hour airing on more than 750 stations in North America. She is the co-author of "Standing Up to the Madness: Ordinary Heroes in Extraordinary Times," recently released in paperback.
© 2009 Amy Goodman
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I pray for the Tiller family ;it is awful to lose a loved one through an act of violence and I also pray for Scott Roeder who sadly like Dr Tiller resorted to violence as a solution Abortion is never a solution for anyone It is always a death sentence for the baby and a life sentence for the poor mother A deliberate decision to abort goes totally against the natural instincts of a woman to nurture and protect and it is very damaging to the body heart and mind of any poor soul who endures such an experience.If we really care about women's health we can neither condone allow or encourage abortion.There are some things in life which are simply wrong Both slavery and abortion treat a human being as if it is a disposable asset. The child in the womb is not the property of the mother nor is it the property of the father It is a new citizen with rights that should be upheld and respected in Law. "
Abortion is the only possible solution to a dead fetus, a non-viable fetus, a fetus with severe genetic abnormalities, a pregnancy which threatens the mother's health. Refusing abortions in these cases, precisely the type of cases where Dr. Tiller specialized is a death sentence for the mother in a case where the fetus is already doomed. No reasonable person feels that two deaths are more 'moral' than one death. Anti-legal abortion assumes that women are disposable assets.
For that matter, many early-term abortions could be avoided if there were better and more accessible birth control options, sex education, and better public and private infrastructure to help support mothers and families?
It's the rare pregnant woman who wouldn't choose to bear and raise her child if she felt she could. Women are being boxed into increasingly small spaces regarding work schedules & expectations, finances, marriage , balancing childrens' needs with everyone else's, domestic violence, schools, day care, health coverage. The very layout of our lives---roads everywhere, few bicycle trails, sidewalks to nowhere, diminishing green spaces---is anathema to young families.
Instead of picketing, protesting, and murdering, why isn't the Holier-Than-Thou Religious Right pushing to reduce the need for abortion by better accommodating real human and family needs?
Killer-Christians. Anti-Christians. That's what they are, after all.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/39038726@N04/sets/72157619136003386/
But you are right, there is a "Threshold" that must be reached before your local police can do anything.
But to the main topic ~ I have spent many years wishing that someone would PLEASE explain the truth about late-term abortions to the whack-jobs ~ women do NOT get these procedures done because they simply decide late in the game not to have a baby! And that's not even to address the inexcusable past murders of more mainstream termination providers.
Now that Obama has so eloquently addressed the sensitive Mideast divisions that have racked the world for centuries, maybe he can some up with an analogous speech on this equally divisive issue. We need someone to bring sanity to the debate.
As Joseph Welch challenged Sen. McCarthy in 1954, I ask those who take their anti-choice beliefs far too far, I ask, "Have you no sense of decency, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?"
What are our pro-choice groups doing wrong in that we have not gotten the truth and a clear picture of who really are the patients and what the majority of circumstances are that make up the cases of late-term abortions? Also, why do they get to define what partial-birth abortion is? First calling it partial-birth is entirely a strategy on their part.
Why can't we get the real truth out there?
I think Goodman is right here: had authorities done their job, Tiller probably would not have died. Since he's had an assassination attempt previously, it stands to reason that he deserved to have the laws that already exist enforced more securely, no?
Most of us don't do that right?
The fact is that Scott Roeder was a severely mentally ill person who should have been in a mental hospital. He had the classic symptoms..."Personality Change" Obsession. He had even been violent in the past and had been found to have bomb making equipment in his car , not to mention the fact he was anti tax and anti governent.
Now, maybe I might listen to you when you start to realize that there are folks this sick out there ok?
Having said that, after reading about Roeder's odd behavior after the arrest, I have to say that he probably does suffer from mental illness, but his mental illness may have had nothing to do with the actual murder Dr. Tiller. Other more powerful factors were probably responsible for the murder: hate and indoctrination, which are not symptoms of mental illness. Stop sending the wrong the message out.
Thanks for your article Amy, I read it before on Democracy Now! but it's good to see your byline over at the Huff, I daresay they need more like you around here.
I am so fed up with these laws not being enforced. I wonder what the GOP percentage is among those in uniform. I do know that a high percentage, relatively speaking, of those in uniform perpetrate acts of domestic violence.
Have also noticed that most serial killers seem to be members of the GOP (such as Ted Bundy, Charles Manson and Gary Ridgway, the Green River Killer and oh yeah - BTK, too).
Coincidence? Have fun, trolls.
Dr. George Tiller was not only a compassionate caring doctor but he was a Martin Luther King for Women and W omen's rights. He saved so many of their lives. It's sad this country doesn't know more about this kind of human being. And even sadder that main stream media is allowed to propagandize such lies and hate like O'Reily's do.
It is time America knew!
How about enforcing the law against torture, or even that old thing we used to call the Constitution..?
Until we complete purge The Justice Dept. of the Federalist Society and other zealot sycophants such as those who attended Pat Robertson's Talmudic Sanhedrin School...of Law and Torture we really don't have a Justice Dept...!
Also everyone should know that attending a church in America is incredibly dangerous, due to all the regular gun play in them...!
The opposition occupies what they believe is a moral high-ground based on the fact that they mention Dr. Tiller as a a doc who just wants to kill as many babies as he can, which is absolutely untrue and wrong on the face of it.
Amy, please visit us here with your comments more often. It's such a joy to hear from you
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Any so-called PRO-LIFE(???) activities more agressive than quiet leafletting should be BANNED!
I disagree with you strongly that pro-life protestors should be restricted to quiet leafletting. They should be afforded the same rights, protections and responsibilities as any other protestor.
I hope to see your byline more often on HuffPo. Please support the single-payer health care initiative. You can use your bully pulpit so well, and this is one cause that needs every influential spokesperson on board NOW.
Thank you for all you do, day in and day out on DemocracyNow!