A Michigan abortion practitioner who botched an abortion on a woman in her second trimester and left her decapitated unborn baby inside her has had his medical license suspended.
Robert Alexander’s abortion clinic was shut down in December 2013 by the city of Muskegon, Michigan after unsafe and unsanitary conditions were found. But that wasn’t the only issue.
“Dr. Alexander perforated the woman’s uterus so badly that it was hanging on by two blood vessels,” another physician said in testimony about what happened in the late-term abortion. “The decapitated head of a fetus was in the woman’s abdomen and the large intestine had been grasped and pulled away from its blood supply and into the vagina. The woman required a hysterectomy, colonoscopy and several units of blood to save her life. “I for one, was very happy to hear he is no longer practicing in Muskegon, but I fear for women anywhere this man would go.”
As far as the dilapidated conditions are concerned, Michigan Administrative Law Judge Shawn Downey found that Alexander was responsible for negligence and incompetence under the state’s Public Health Code in a case involving filthy “Gosnell-like” conditions at Alexander’s Muskegon abortion business.
Judge Downey based his conclusions on testimony and evidence presented at a disciplinary hearing held on September 3, 2014. His report has been forwarded to the Michigan Board of Physicians, which today issued its decision in Alexander’s case.
Alexander appeared before the Michigan Board of Medicine today for a final hearing on charges of gross negligence and incompetence. Despite the fact that an administrative judge found that Alexander, who suffers from mental illness, was not fit to practice medicine and recommended his permanent license revocation, the Board voted to suspend Alexander’s license for 6 months and 1 day. The also told Alexander that he would have to re-apply to have his license reinstated, at which time he would be required to pay a fine of $75,000.
As the pro-life group Operation Rescue informed LifeNews, if Alexander does not reapply for licensing, his license would not be automatically renewed after his suspension and he would continue to be barred from practicing in Michigan.
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Operation Rescue said the decision that allows Alexander an option to eventually petition for reinstatement of his medical license is disturbing given the fact that Administrative Law Judge Shawn Downey recommend permanent revocation for Alexander, stating concerns for his mental illnesses and lack of credibility during his testimony at a hearing on September 3, 2014.
“Given the facts that Alexander suffers from mental illness, has a long string of documented botched abortions, and was operating in such squalid conditions that it made Kermit Gosnell look like ‘Mr. Good Housekeeping,’ it is unfathomable that this Board could even entertain the possibility that Alexander could soon resume his practice,” said Troy Newman President of Operation Rescue. “We can only hope that Alexander never has access to $75,000 to pay his fine and get his license back. If anyone should be permanently barred from the practice of medicine, it is Robert Alexander.”
Why were the conditions so bad at his abortion clinic? Operation Rescue responds:
Alexander had ridiculously claimed that the wretched conditions found at his Muskegon abortion facility in December, 2012, were staged by pro-life groups. He changed his story to shift responsibility onto a former employee who worked with Operation Rescue to blow the whistle on Alexander. Later, he blamed his own mental illness for the mess that included moldy, leaky ceilings, bloody surgical instruments, rusty equipment, and the contents of at least one abortion that was left to decompose in the abortion machine over a long Christmas break.
A former Medical Board Director, Dr. George Shade, enabled Alexander to continue his incompetent practices by improperly protecting him from further discipline by ordering that there be no investigation of a 2009 complaint filed by the obstetrician of two patients that suffered botched abortions by Alexander. The scandal created by that incident was the basis for a change in Michigan law that prohibits board members from acting unilaterally.
“Corruption has kept Alexander in business for years when he should have been banned from the practice of medicine years ago. Women suffered injury and illness as a result,” said Newman. “We doubt that Alexander will be financially able to petition to restore his license, but if he does, the responsibility for any misery he is sure to inflict will be shared by the Michigan Medical Board.”
