Texas Tech cancels presentation by third-trimester abortionist after outcry

Texas Tech University planned to host longtime third-trimester abortionist Shelly Sella for a presentation promoting her new book — until pro-life advocates noted that the presentation would be promoting illegal activity in the state.

Key Takeaways:

• Shelley Sella is one of a small number of abortionists in the United States willing to commit abortions through all nine months of pregnancy.

• She previously worked alongside George Tiller before his murder. She and other late-term abortionists — Warren Hern, LeRoy Carhart, and Susan Robinson — were featured in the film “After Tiller,” which portrayed late-term abortionists as heroes. 

• After Tiller's murder, Sella worked at Southwestern Women’s Options (SWO) in New Mexico, a late-term abortion facility owned at the time by well-known abortionist Curtis Boyd.

• Sella's medical disciplinary history includes multiple malpractice suits filed on behalf of patients who were injured or killed.

• Texas Tech planned to host Sella for a promotional talk about her book, “Beyond Limits: Stories of Third Trimester Abortion Care," but local pro-life students and activists fought back, pointing out that the talk would promote abortion (an illegal activity in Texas) on a taxpayer-funded campus.

The Details:

The Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (TTUHSC) admitted in a statement to the Texas Scorecard that the presentation featuring Sella was canceled after public backlash. It was scheduled to take place this week, but after outcry from the campus community, the university backed down.

“Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center evaluated the request and determined that it is not in the best interest of the university to host this event on campus,” TTUCH said in a statement.

The campus Turning Point USA (TPUSA) chapter worked with Mark Lee Dickson, director of Right to Life Across Texas and founder of the Sanctuary Cities for the Unborn initiative, as well as Jim Baxa, who is running for local office, to fight back against Sella's planned event. The local Knights of Columbus chapter had informed TPUSA about the event, which set off the campaign to stop it.

On Facebook, Dickson was able to share the promotional image for the presentation, which promised "a physician's perspective on third-trimester abortion care, ethics, and patient-centered medicine" — and which promoted Sella's book. The presentation was sponsored by Texas Tech's Medical Students for Choice club.

As virtually all preborn babies are protected from abortion in Texas, the coalition fighting against Sella coming to Texas Tech pointed out that, as the university is funded by taxpayers and is within a pro-life jurisdiction, Sella's event would not only be promoting illegal activity, but would be doing so in a government building.

The organizers would be allowed to reschedule the event on private property instead.

“I am elated that Texas Tech has taken this action,” Preston Parsons, the president of TPUSA Texas Tech, told the Texas Scorecard. “Under the leadership of Chancellor Brandon Creighton, Texas Tech has upheld truth and stands for what’s right. Turning Point USA at Tech will ALWAYS be vehemently pro-life, I would like to thank all of those who have fought, and will continue to fight, with us to protect the sacred lives of the unborn.”

Why It Matters:

Sella has a checkered past which is often ignored by abortion activists, though it is disturbing. She began her career working for George Tiller — a Kansas late-term abortionist so prolific in ending children's lives that he owned his own crematorium. Before his murder in 2009, Tiller was a mentor to Sella, and his disturbing legacy could explain Sella's career that followed. For example, in 2008, a nurse working at Tiller's facility accused Sella of infanticide:

Well, my job, like I said, my job was to hold the leg and count the parts, if it was in pieces.

And this was… maybe 35 weeks. That’s pretty big…. It was a big baby…. [The] baby came out, and it was moving. I don’t know if it was alive or if it was nerves, I have no clue.

But Dr. Sella looked up right away at me and took a utensil and stabbed it, right here, and twisted.

And then it didn’t move anymore.

After Tiller died, Sella relocated to Southwestern Women's Options (SWO) in New Mexico, working under abortionist Curtis Boyd. Her medical disciplinary history includes multiple malpractice suits filed on behalf of patients who were injured or killed by the abortionists at the facility.

An SWO abortionist was responsible for the death of Keisha Atkins, who died after a second-trimester abortion that involved the experimental use of mifepristone (the abortion plll). Sella did not commit that abortion; however, she committed an abortion on Atkins’ sister, Nichole, who was repeatedly drugged over a period of several days during the process of an induction abortion, using the drugs misoprostol and digoxin. Nichole was 17 weeks pregnant.

Documents later revealed that Nichole Atkins’ baby was given to the University of New Mexico (UNM), which had partnered with SWO in search of “digoxin treated brain.” The most common abortion procedure at 17 weeks is a dilation and evacuation (D&E) procedure, in which the preborn baby is dismembered. But the partnership with UNM could explain why Sella committed an induction abortion instead (delivering the baby intact) while also using digoxin. Nichole had not consented for her baby's body or organs to be donated.

In addition to all of this, Sella botched the abortion, causing such severe lacerations that Nichole required a hysterectomy.

Sella, along with other abortionists at SWO, experimented on hundreds of women, combining abortion drugs with surgical late-term abortion procedures to see if it could speed up the process, which typically occurs over multiple days. Numerous women were injured in the process.

The Bottom Line:

Texas Tech was right to cancel the talk from Sella, who is now retired. Her book presents a sanitized version of her career, and if anything, students deserve to know the truth about who they're hearing from.

There is nothing ethical or patient-centered about infanticide, experimenting on women without their consent, or brutally maiming them in the process.