This disgusts me.
After botched abortion, baby wound up in trash
Board of Medicine revokes doctor’s license.
Associated Press
The Board of Medicine revoked the license of a Florida doctor on Friday accused of medical malpractice in a botched abortion in which a live baby was delivered, but ended up dead in a cardboard box.
The board found Dr. Pierre JeanJacque Renelique in violation of Florida statutes by committing medical malpractice, delegating responsibility to unlicensed personnel and failing to keep an accurate medical record.
Renelique and his attorney declined to comment after the hearing in Tampa.
The Department of Health said Renelique was scheduled to perform an abortion on a teenager who was 23 weeks pregnant in 2006. Sycloria Williams had been given drugs in advance to dilate her cervix.
According to the complaint, she gave birth at a Hialeah clinic after waiting hours for Renelique to arrive. The complaint said one of the clinic owners put the baby in a bag that was thrown away. Police found the infant’s decomposing remains a week later.
A medical examiner determined the cause of death was extreme prematurity, the complaint states.
Though Friday’s hearing was solely to determine whether Renelique should be disciplined, the physician revealed more details about what happened on the summer day when Williams came in for an abortion.
Renelique said he met the patient a day before the procedure. According to the Department of Health, Renelique gave Williams laminaria, a drug that dilates the cervix. He said he told her to come in the next day at 10 a.m. “for safety,” and planned to later examine her before the abortion.
Renelique said that as he was en route to the clinic, he was called to treat another patient who was bleeding. When he arrived to treat Williams, she was bleeding, but no one told him she’d already delivered, Renelique said. He began the procedure, and realized there was no fetus.
“That’s when one of the employees came to me and said, ‘Dr. Renelique, what are you looking for?’ ” he recalled.
“I said, ‘I’m looking for a fetus.’ And she said, ‘What fetus?’” The employee then told him that Williams had already delivered.
In a lawsuit, Williams says that Belkis Gonzalez, one of the clinic owners, had knocked the infant off the chair where she had given birth, scooped the baby, placenta and afterbirth into a red plastic biohazard bag, and threw it out. The Department of Health recommended that his license be suspended. But the board decided to revoke it, which means he will not be able to practice medicine in Florida.
No criminal charges have been filed in the case, but the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office is investigating.