‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’: Planned Parenthood sends pre-teen victims back to sexual abusers

Is Planned Parenthood an enabler where sexual abuse is concerned, because of its failure to report suspected abuse, leaving victims vulnerable? According to a new docuseries released this week by Live Action, Aiding Abusers, the answer is yes. The nation’s number one abortion corporation has failed to report sexual abuse many times — even child sexual abuse. The compelling evidence contained in Live Action’s Aiding Abusers docuseries and investigative report includes undercover investigations, witness testimony, and court documents, along with news reports showing that sexual abuse victims continued to be abused because of Planned Parenthood’s apparent “don’t ask/don’t tell” practices on reporting sexual abuse.

Today, as society takes a stand against complicity in covering sexual abuse through social media campaigns such as #MeToo and #TimesUp, Planned Parenthood, a corporation which has profits of millions of dollars a year and receives half a billion in taxpayer dollars annually, must also be held accountable.

Live Action president and founder Lila Rose stated in a press release:

Despite Planned Parenthood’s public rhetoric as well as laws requiring it to report suspected abuse, its failure to report has been deliberate and widespread. Time and again, rather than reporting abuse to authorities, Planned Parenthood has repeatedly looked the other way and performed abortions on victims as young as 12 years old. These girls deserved advocacy but instead Planned Parenthood staff ignored their abuse and returned them to the waiting arms of their abusers.

Because of flagrant violations like these, the proposed Title X rule tightening on reporting abuse is absolutely necessary. Planned Parenthood has proven that its priority is selling abortions, not caring for the most vulnerable of girls. Planned Parenthood’s culture of cover-up must end, the cycle of abuse of innocent children must end, and Planned Parenthood’s half a billion dollars in annual federal funding must end. Taxpayers cannot be forced to subsidize these abuses of children.

Live Action is releasing this report as the Time’s Up movement is exposing both sexual abusers and those who help them cover up their crimes — the people who knew about the abuse but stayed silent. While Planned Parenthood has attached itself to the Time’s Up movement, the movement should be calling out Planned Parenthood for decades of enabling sexual abusers.

In the most recent of several releases in the Aiding Abusers series, Live Action details just of few of the heart wrenching criminal cases of rape and sexual abuse that have been uncovered, showing that time and again, Planned Parenthood’s response was not to protect these victims, but instead to release them back to their abusers:

Sex Abuse Cover Up at Planned Parenthood - Recorded Cases

CASE INFORMATION

Arizona, 2014

In 2014, a Planned Parenthood counselor “intentionally miscoded” a sexual assault report as a “consensual encounter” to avoid reporting the incident to police, according to a report by the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office.

The 15-year-old victim allegedly became pregnant from a rape and sought an abortion at a Tempe Planned Parenthood. The rape was perpetrated by 18-year-old Tyler Kost. According to reports, the counselor told the victim and her mother that it “wasn’t worth the hassle” to report the rape.

If the workers had reported the alleged assault, it could have jump-started a sheriff’s investigation into Kost months before he allegedly assaulted other teens at his school, court documents say.

Tyler Kost was charged with sexually assaulting 11 girls from the ages of 12 to 17, although authorities believe he assaulted additional students, according to a Fox News report.

On Feb. 10, 2017, Kost was sentenced to three years in prison in this serial sex crimes case.

Ohio, 2004

Sexual abuse victim Denise Fairbanks claims that Planned Parenthood’s “don’t ask/don’t tell” practices caused her to undergo additional abuse after she was taken to Planned Parenthood in 2004 by her father, John Blanks, who began sexually abusing her when she was just 13 years old. In her lawsuit, Fairbanks claims that she told Planned Parenthood about the abuse, but rather than help her, the workers there became complicit in covering sexual abuse by failing to report it to authorities.

Life Legal Defense Foundation, whose attorney represented Fairbanks, states on its website:

When she became pregnant at age 16, her father took her to Planned Parenthood for an abortion. Although she informed the abortion clinic staff that she was being forced to have sex, they chose not to comply with mandatory reporting procedures. The Planned Parenthood staff did not inform local law enforcement, nor did they make any further inquiries into Fairbanks’ paternal abuse. After the abortion, Fairbanks was returned to the same abusive situation, where she remained for another year-and-a-half. More than a year later, her father was apprehended through a report filed by Denise’s basketball coach, and sent to jail.

Planned Parenthood eventually settled the case. However, the victim claims that “Planned Parenthood did everything possible to try to defeat my claims and drown out my message, that when Planned Parenthood knows or suspects that a young girl is being sexually abused, it must meet its duties under the law and immediately report that abuse to the proper authorities.”

“This is just one of multiple cases that have demonstrated Planned Parenthood’s willingness to cover for sex offenders,” said Dana Cody, then Executive Director of the Life Legal Defense Foundation. Cody was referring to another example, the case of Roe v. Planned Parenthood from the same Hamilton County Court, which was resolved previously. Cody added:

“What this young woman went through as a young teenager is horrifying enough. She was forcibly raped, impregnated, forced to have an abortion, and then sent back for more abuse — a tragedy that Planned Parenthood could have prevented by simply complying with the law.”

“Ms. Fairbanks’ case, like others before it, has demonstrated a disturbing trend in Planned Parenthood practice, a continued disregard for the health and well-being of women and children.”

Ohio, 2004

“Jane Roe” was just 13 years old when her when her soccer coach, John Haller, began a sexual relationship with the child. In March of 2004, when Jane was 14, the 21-year-old coach impregnated “Jane” and took her for  an abortion at a Planned Parenthood in Southwest Ohio.

According to oral arguments before the Supreme Court of Ohio, when Haller persuaded her to have an abortion, she lied to abortion workers and said that she had been impregnated by a classmate and that her parents consented to the abortion. She gave them Haller’s cell phone number, saying it was her father’s.

Planned Parenthood called the number but made no effort to verify that the person they were getting consent from was her father and not her abuser. They also didn’t obtain written parental consent, but merely verbal consent from an unknown person on the other end of the line. In fact, the victim’s parents never provided consent for the abortion.

Haller then took “Jane” to Planned Parenthood for an abortion, claiming to be her stepbrother. Despite her age, the abortion center did not report any suspected abuse to authorities. Shortly after the abortion, Haller resumed having sex with “Jane.” As a result of a subsequent report made by a teacher, Haller was later found guilty of seven counts of sexual battery.

Jane’s parents later filed a civil suit seeking damages from Planned Parenthood, alleging:

1. Planned Parenthood intentionally violated Ohio’s informed consent laws for failing to meet with the teen 24 hours in advance of the abortion (instead, they let Haller pick up some documents from their offices to take to Jane);

2. Planned Parenthood failed to obtain their written consent for the abortion;

3. Planned Parenthood failed to notify police or a child services agency of suspected sexual abuse of a minor.

Planned Parenthood settled the case. After a criminal investigation, Haller was convicted of seven counts of sexual battery.

Washington, 2017

According to a November 2017 Court of Appeals document from the state of Washington, George Savanah repeatedly raped his daughter and impregnated her when she was 14, 16, and 17 years old, then took her to Planned Parenthood to cover his crimes. The court document reveals that Savanah took the victim to two different Planned Parenthood facilities for abortion procedures.

As Live Action News previously reported, the court record also indicates that no one else knew about the child’s pregnancies [except for the two abortion facilities] and that the victim had never had sex with anyone but Savanah.

The sexual assaults only became public once the victim, not Planned Parenthood, spoke to her aunt about the abuse, nearly seven years after the victim was taken for her first abortion at Planned Parenthood. Savanah was eventually convicted of two counts of third degree rape of a child and two counts of first degree incest. Savanah was sentenced to 120 months plus 18 months community custody, which he appealed.

Colorado, 2012

A lawsuit filed against Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood and several of its staffers revealed that after a 13-year-old child became pregnant by her stepfather, Timothy David Smith, he brought her to Planned Parenthood to cover up his crime. Tragically, according to the court document, not one of the four staffers with whom the victim interacted bothered to inquire about the circumstances of her pregnancy, or even verified her relationship with Smith.

The document states, in part:

On May 3, 2012, R.Z. was thirteen (13) years of age and had been the victim of sexual abuse by her step-father, Timothy David Smith (“Smith”) for approximately seven (7) years… Approximately three weeks prior to May 3, 2012, R.Z. took a pregnancy test at the direction of Smith, due to concerns that she might be pregnant. The test indicated that R.Z. was pregnant. A few days to a week before May 3, 2012, Smith pressured R.Z. to call Planned Parenthood to make an appointment for an abortion. The appointment for an abortion was scheduled for May 3, 2012 at Planned Parenthood’s 7155 East 38th Avenue, Denver, Colorado 80207, location. On May 3, 2012, Smith transported R.Z. to Planned Parenthood’s facility… for her appointment and accompanied her inside the facility. In connection with the abortion, Planned Parenthood required certain forms to be completed. Although R.Z. wrote her date of birth and signed some of the forms, the majority of the forms were completed by Smith, and R.Z. did not read them…

The lawsuit goes on to state that no one at Planned Parenthood spoke to the victim about potential sexual abuse nor verified her relationship with Smith.

In a shocking admission during a deposition in the case, one employee stated that “being 13 and pregnant alone is not a red flag” for possible abuse, in Planned Parenthood’s opinion.  

Months after the abortion, the abuse ended after the victim reported it to her mother.

California, 2010

Edgar Ramirez raped his 13-year-old daughter and impregnated her two times, resulting in two abortions at Planned Parenthood.

According to court documents, the first abortion occurred in July 2010. But rather than suspecting abuse when a 13-year-old child presented to Planned Parenthood as pregnant, the abortionist simply committed the procedure and advised the victim (again, only 13 years old) not to have sex for three weeks after her abortion.

Following that abortion, court documents showed Ramirez resumed having sex with the child “a couple of days later.”

Then, within a few months, Ramirez got his daughter pregnant again, resulting in a second Planned Parenthood abortion, at which time the abortionist implanted an IUD to prevent additional pregnancies. Ramirez wasn’t arrested until the spring of 2011, after the child reported the abuse to police.

According to the court document, the trial court sentenced Ramirez to life in prison.

Arizona, 2002 

23-year-old Shawn M. Stevens impregnated his young victim not once, but twice, and each time he turned to Planned Parenthood for an abortion to cover his crimes. A timeline from the lawsuit indicates that on November 10, 1998, the victim, a 12-year-old child, referred to in court documents as “Jane Roe,” was taken by Stevens to Planned Parenthood for the first abortion.

The abortion corporation not only committed the abortion on the girl, but failed to suspect that a pregnant 12-year-old child might be the victim of abuse, and therefore, she was handed back over to Stevens to be abused for an additional six months. By the time the victim turned 13, Stevens had again impregnated the child again. So, Stevens did what many other pedophiles have done. He turned again to Planned Parenthood. On May 6, 1999, he took the child for a second abortion. According to the case, “Only after the second abortion did Planned Parenthood notify authorities on May 11, 1999,” and media reports indicate that Stevens was arrested in June of that same year and sentenced in 2000 to five years in prison and lifetime probation.

But even the timeline surrounding when Planned Parenthood reported the abuse is disturbing and indicates that they waited five days after the abortion to care to say anything to the authorities. Given this timeframe, it would seem that the sexually abused child was handed back over to her abuser a second time after visiting the abortion business. As a result, the victim sued Planned Parenthood of Central and Northern Arizona along with several others for failing to report the abuse.

The lawsuit states in part:

“Had Planned Parenthood properly reported the incident to authorities, the perpetrator of the child molestation and sexual exploitation would have been apprehended by authorities and Jane Doe would not have had to go through a second abortion procedure. As a direct and proximate result of the gross negligence of Planned Parenthood, Jane Doe has suffered physical pain, humiliation, emotional distress, and permanent psychological damages…Plaintiff alleges that the second procedure may have caused permanent physical injury to Jane Doe.”

In 2002, the Associated Press reported that the judge found Planned Parenthood negligent in the case. In court papers, the organization defended not reporting the abortion because “it does not follow that the negligence caused damages,” and “no reporting would have been required if she had been eight months older,” the AP reported.

Stevens was charged with two counts of sexual conduct with a minor and sentenced in 2000 to five years in prison and lifetime probation.

Pennsylvania, 2013

In 2013, Pennsylvania Department of Health inspectors conducted an annual survey of a Philadelphia Planned Parenthood. They discovered that while some female patients admitted to being sexually active since the ages of 11 and 12, in at least six instances, the abortion provider did not inquire about the possibility of sexual abuse, nor did staff report the cases to authorities, as required by law.

Live Action is among several organizations to document the repeated and systemic abuse cover-ups at Planned Parenthood, publishing several cases (here, here, and here). And, tragically, additional cases will be published in reports by Live Action regarding the Aiding Abusers series.

As stated in Live Action’s investigative report, “Live Action has documented many of Planned Parenthood’s failures and cover-ups, many other groups, such as Alliance Defending Freedom, Life Legal Defense Foundation, Life Dynamics, Americans United for Life, and others, have participated in legal actions or have collected reams of documents from lawsuits, court filings, and regulatory agency reports. Their work has contributed significantly to Live Action’s report.”

While society is demanding that Hollywood, the media, and other institutions and industries be held to account for complicity in covering sexual abuse, this abortion corporation continues to receive a pass at the expense of the victims they are legally required to protect.

Just listen to the words of sexual abuse victim Denise Fairbanks, whose case was highlighted in the videos:

She’s out there. Somewhere. A girl just like me. Somewhere there’s a young innocent girl—barely a teenager. And right now, she’s suffering from the horrors of sexual abuse at the hands of an adult as I did. Somewhere “that girl” is getting raped. Like I was. Impregnated. Like I was. And she may be taken to a Planned Parenthood abortion center. Like I was.

“That girl” may actually be telling Planned Parenthood that she’s being abused. Probably by her boyfriend. In my case, I was abused by my own father…

For six years Planned Parenthood did everything possible to try to defeat my claims and drown out my message, that when Planned Parenthood knows or suspects that a young girl is being sexually abused, it must meet its duties under the law and immediately report that abuse to the proper authorities.

The cases, according to Live Action president and founder Lila Rose, “show a systemic pattern of behavior at Planned Parenthood who claims that sexual assault victims come to its facilities on a daily basis.”

In future video releases, Live Action will continue to demonstrate how Planned Parenthood’s cover-ups aid abusers, and why this organization should be investigated and defunded immediately.