NEWS

DeWine's Planned Parenthood review faces scrutiny

Nathan Baca
10TV

COLUMBUS –  The Ohio Attorney General’s December announcement that Planned Parenthood centers in Ohio allowed fetal remains to be sent to a landfill attracted attention nationwide.

“We found that these fetuses were steam cooked and then were taken to a Kentucky landfill,” Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine said at a press conference on Dec. 11.

It was not only wrong, it was against the law, he said.

The comments sparked outrage. The Ohio legislature, which was already talking about defunding Planned Parenthood, began the process to do so soon after. And legislators offered to pass another law so this couldn’t happen again.

Autoclaving experts and Kentucky state inspectors, though, say DeWine was wrong. The misinformation includes:

  • No fetuses were buried intact in Kentucky, said Lanny Brannock, executive staff adviser for the Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection.
  • Neither Accu Medical Waste Services Inc., the company used by Planned Parenthood, nor the Green Valley Landfill have been cited for any law violations or inhumane activities by the state of Kentucky.
  • In fact, no one from Ohio spoke or visited Kentucky facilities to see what occurred,  Brannock said.

“It is illegal to landfill any human tissue in Kentucky, and by law it’s required to be incinerated. We have no knowledge of any human tissue going into Kentucky landfills,” Brannock said.

10 Investigates also discovered Planned Parenthood wasn’t alone in using this process. The state of Ohio had a contract with the same disposal company used by Planned Parenthood, state records show.

And although the state of Ohio does not handle abortions, miscarriages do occur at state prisons and medical facilities.

The state would not release records showing what specifically happened in cases of miscarriages, but state protocols call for inmate patients to be treated at a hospital with “materials/tissue” sent with them.

Anything not packaged with the patient is flushed down the toilet or sent with the prison’s infectious waste transporter, which state records show is Accu Medical – the same company Planned Parenthood used, according to state records.

10 Investigates shared the findings with the attorney general and some legislators. The attorney general said he was not aware of what the state did.

“I find it to be disturbing and I find it to be not humane. I don't think it matters who does it. What matters is this is being done. So I was not aware of that at all. You know when we began our investigation, it was very narrow question,” DeWine said.

State representatives from across the aisle said they were troubled by the misinformation.

“Now I’m very troubled that our attorney general would go to such lengths in what seems to me to be a witch hunt,” said Ohio Rep. Nickie Antonio (D-Lakewoood). It is “very, very disturbing.”

For more on this, go to www.10tv.com/factcheck.