BREAKING: Brain harvesting scandal leads to call for special prosecutor

BREAKING: Brain harvesting scandal leads to call for special prosecutor

ALBUQUERQUE:  New Mexico's leading pro-life group is calling for a special prosecutor to investigate claims of illegal aborted baby body part harvesting by the University of New Mexico (UNM). The call comes a day before a statute of limitations runs out on baby brains harvested in 2012.

"Five years ago tomorrow, the University of New Mexico unlawfully ordered the brains of a seven-month aborted baby to dissect with summer camp students," said New Mexico Alliance for Life (NMAFL) Director Elisa Martinez. "Dr. Paul Roth, Chancellor of the UNM Health Science Center, has admitted that UNM obtained these brains, which were never used for research."

"There is ample evidence that UNM has broken state law by collecting these aborted baby parts without lawful consent from the mothers of the children," continued Martinez. "Yet Attorney General Hector Balderas refuses to do the basic duty of his office and investigate what's really going on behind the taxpayer-funded university's closed doors."

"This is malpractice," said Martinez, whose organization provided key information that led to criminal referrals against UNM and late-term abortion center Southwestern Women's Options (SWO) by a Congressional committee. "Taxpayers deserve better than this, which is why NMAFL is formally calling for a special prosecutor to investigate UNM and Southwestern Women's Options."

Under New Mexico law, the Maternal Fetal and Infant Experimentation Act (MFIEA) requires a six-point consent process for fetal tissue donation. Additionally, the Jonathan Spradling Revised Uniform Anatomical Gift Act prohibits the donation of fetal tissue for research. Both laws were cited in the Congressional committee's referrals.

Violations of the Spradling Act are third-degree felonies punishable by up to a $5,000 fine and/or six years in prison. The statute of limitations on such a crime is five years, which in the case of the procured brains is May 24, 2017.

In deposition testimony, a UNM-trained Southwestern Women's Options abortionist admitted she had never obtained consent from a patient at Southwestern to make a fetal tissue donation nor was familiar with the consent form allegedly used at the abortion center. A different woman who went to SWO for an abortion sued the center late last year, claiming that she was never informed that it would send her child's body parts to UNM. 

"Attorney General Balderas has allowed 59 criminal claims to expire since receiving Congress' 300-page criminal referral in June of last year," said Martinez, who noted that a total of 82 claims have expired while Balderas has been in office.

"Each week that goes by, Balderas allows criminal complaints to expire and women are denied justice," concluded Martinez. "Balderas doesn't care about women, so it is time for the state to appoint a special prosecutor to do his job for him."  

The New Mexico Alliance for Life is a nonpartisan organization focused on changing state and local laws by empowering women with better and informed choices when facing unplanned or difficult pregnancies and advocating for better protections for women and unborn children from an unsafe abortion industry. For more information visit www.nmallianceforlife.org.