Woman sues LeRoy Carhart estate, claiming horrifically botched abortion

A late-term abortionist committed a horrifically botched abortion just four months before his death, according to a new lawsuit filed against his estate.

Key Takeaways:

• Chanetta Smith was 24 weeks pregnant when she was referred to LeRoy Carhart's Maryland abortion facility by a “national abortion services company."

• Her medical records from Carhart said she underwent a routine dilation and evacuation (D&E) and was discharged in stable condition.

• In reality, she had to be taken to the emergency room in an ambulance and had suffered numerous lacerations, as well as a uterine perforation and rupture.

• Smith had to undergo multiple surgeries over the next 18 months to repair the damage from Carhart's botched abortion.

The Details:

According to the lawsuit, Smith was referred to Carhart's abortion facility in January of 2023. She was 24 weeks pregnant at the time, and traveled from her home in Delaware to Carhart's Maryland facility. While it is not known which organization referred her to Carhart, he maintained certification with the National Abortion Federation (NAF) despite a long history of injuries and deaths.

Smith underwent a D&E abortion procedure, which typically takes several days to complete. At her first visit, the staff performed an ultrasound, gave her oral medication, and inserted laminaria (seaweed sticks) into her cervix to begin the process of dilation. She returned the next day and was given more oral medication, before Carhart then committed the dismemberment abortion procedure, during which the baby's arms and legs were torn off his/her body and his/her skull was crushed.

According to Carhart, the procedure went smoothly:

Neither Dr. Carhart nor the CARE Abortion Clinic produced notes that detailed the performance of the procedure by Dr. Carhart, other than to record that Ms. Smith was dilated further using "mixture of Pratt and Denison Dilators", that her cervix was dilated to 49, that the fetal injection was given at 12:23 p.m., that Plaintiff Smith tolerated the procedure "very well", that there were "no complications" and that she was allegedly stable and discharged.

In actuality, the procedure was horrifically botched, and Smith almost died.

After committing the abortion, Smith began to seriously hemorrhage, and she began saying she felt extremely cold and like she was going to die. Emergency services needed to be called, and she was taken to the hospital in an ambulance. EMTs gave her medication to try to stop the bleeding, as well as fluids.

By the time she reached the hospital, Smith's life was at risk. Her blood pressure was dangerously low, at 57/32, and her hemoglobin count was just 4.3, indicating she had lost nearly two-thirds of her blood volume. She had to be given multiple transfusions of red blood cells, FFP (fresh frozen plasma), and platelets to keep her alive. In the meantime, she became lethargic, was shaking violently, and had a fever, all signs that her organs were shutting down.

When hospital staff performed an ultrasound, they found retained "products of conception," meaning Carhart did not complete the abortion, and left parts of her baby's body inside her uterus.

Zoom In:

At this point, hospital staff realized she was too sick to receive adequate care, and after being stabilized, she was transferred to the University of Maryland (UMMC), which had a higher-level trauma center. There, she was diagnosed with hemorrhagic shock and was rushed into the operating room. In addition to committing a second abortion procedure, to remove the body parts Carhart had left behind, staff found tears in her vagina and cervix. Smith was discharged the next day, though her condition didn't improve.

Five days later, she went to another emergency room, saying she had constantly been leaking urine, and new scans were performed; only then was the full extent of Carhart's damage revealed. Her uterus had been perforated and ruptured, and she had a vesicovaginal fistula, or a hole between her bladder and her vagina. A two-inch pocket of infected fluid or blood had pooled outside, which was physically crushing her ureter (the tube that carries urine from the kidney to the bladder). Because this had caused urine to get backed up, her right kidney had become swollen.

By July of 2024, Smith was still suffering, having had a bladder catheter inserted for seven months. A urology expert finally discovered that Carhart's botched D&E had also torn a hole in her ureter. Over 18 months later, the damage from Carhart's abortion was fixed, with surgeons having to cut her kidney tube away from the damaged area, carve a new opening into her bladder, and sew the kidney tube back into a different part of her bladder, with a stent left inside of her.

Carhart had been dead for a year by the time Smith's suffering was finally over.

The Big Picture:

At the time of this abortion, Carhart was 81 years old and had liver cancer, yet he continued committing abortions. He died at the age of 82 in April of 2023. And sadly, Smith's experience was far from rare; Carhart committed multiple issues, including botched abortions, throughout his career.

There had been numerous complaints filed against Carhart, including allegations of unprofessional conduct like altering patient charts, talking on the phone while committing abortions, and falling asleep while injecting a patient with lidocaine. He also allegedly committed an abortion on a patient who had active tuberculosis, and didn’t allow his staff to wear masks during the procedure. A staffer likewise accused him of, bizarrely, leaving the facility in the middle of an abortion procedure to go outside and throw rocks at the window.

Former staffers said Carhart allowed abortions to be committed without the proper licensing, and that he lied about the gestational age of preborn children in order to circumvent the law. He was also accused of keeping his facilities in an unsafe condition, with dried blood on surgical instruments, missing narcotics, illegal drug use by employees, and illegal abortions. Other complaints said he illegally disposed of biohazardous waste, private patient medical information, and drugs.

Carhart also had been accused of animal neglect, with four horses and two dogs confiscated by authorities. Animal control officers found the animals emaciated, and left in mud and excrement a foot deep. One horse was allegedly in such poor condition that it would have died without receiving immediate intervention.

Strangely, the emergency number given to Carhart’s abortion patients was found to belong to his wife’s horse business.

Carhart was known to be responsible for the deaths of at least two patients: Christin Gilbert and Jennifer Morbelli. In both cases, the women’s families desperately tried to reach staff at Carhart’s abortion facilities, but they ultimately received no emergency care.

In the years preceding his death, Carhart was accused of botching increasing numbers of abortions, even coming under investigation by the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services after a 35-year-old woman allegedly suffered internal hemorrhaging, coded at least once, and needed life-saving surgery. According to a witness, this was because the staff at Carhart’s facility “let her lie there too long” before finally calling 911.

In addition, Carhart "mangled" two patients so horribly and just days apart that when ER hospital staff carried out surgery on them, they were so traumatized by the injuries that hospital administrators sent an e-mail to staff to acknowledge the trauma they experienced.

The Bottom Line:

There can be no denying the pain and trauma Smith went through, and Carhart's estate should be held responsible.