US doctor who treated 10-year-old rape victim faces hearing

The Indiana Medical Licensing Board, in the Midwestern United States, has opened a disciplinary hearing against a doctor after she spoke out about offering abortion services to a 10 year old rape victim last June.

The doctor, Caitlin Bernard, initially told her story to The Indianapolis Star to illustrate the immediate effects of a Supreme Court decision in nullify constitutional law to an abortion.

That story sparked a national outcry, with abortion rights activists denouncing the obstacles the 10-year-old girl faced and opponents criticizing Bernard for his actions.

At Thursday’s hearing, the board heard a complaint from Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita, a Republican and opponent of abortion rights, accusing Bernard of violating state and federal laws.

The complaint seeks “appropriate disciplinary action” against Bernard. The board has the power to suspend or even revoke a doctor’s license.

The attorney general’s office has alleged that Bernard violated Indiana law by failing to report the rape to authorities, as well as federal regulations for patient privacy.

Bernard “has repeatedly and regularly spoken to the press to perpetuate coverage of his patient’s private life,” the complaint says.

While the patient was never named in any of Bernard’s interviews, the complaint accuses Bernard of triggering “an intense media search” for information about the girl.

Bernard and his attorneys, however, have denied any violation of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), the law that protects patient privacy.

At Thursday’s hearing, Bernard defended her ability as a doctor to speak widely on medical issues of public concern.

“I think it’s incredibly important that people understand the real-world impacts of this country’s abortion laws,” Bernard said. He added that hypotheses rarely have the same effect on public consciousness.

In July of last year, Bernard’s employer, Indiana University Health, issued a statement confirming that the doctor had complied with patient privacy laws.

Bernard has also denied allegations that he did not submit proper documentation to document the 10-year-old girl’s case.

She said she followed protocol for reporting cases of child abuse to hospital staff. News outlets such as the New York Times and National Public Radio have also reported that she complied with procedures for documenting the abortions with the state.

At the time of the abortion on June 30, police were already investigating the rape in the girl’s home state of Ohio.

But with the US Supreme Court. repeal last year’s Roe v Wade —the 1973 decision guaranteeing the constitutional right to abortion—Ohio was able to impose an existing six-week abortion ban that had been mired in legal controversy since 2019.

That forced the 10-year-old girl and her mother to seek abortion services across state lines, in Indiana. When Bernard first heard about the 10-year-old girl, she was six weeks and three days pregnant.

The boy finally got a medical abortionand a 27-year-old suspect in the rape case was arrested in July.

Bernard’s public statements about the case sparked a political firestorm, with many anti-abortion advocates, and even prominent politicians like Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, questioning the veracity of the story.

President Joe Biden, a Democrat, even referenced the story during a press conference.

“Should they force a 10-year-old girl to give birth to a rapist’s child?” Biden told reporters, venting her outrage. “I can’t think of anything more extreme.”

Alice Morical, Bernard’s attorney, said that although her client had dealt with child abuse cases before, this story put her under the microscope like never before.

“Dr. Bernard could not have anticipated the unusual and intense scrutiny this story received,” Morical explained Thursday. “She didn’t expect the politicians to say that she made up the story.”

Health care groups linked to Bernard, such as Family planning and Physicians for Reproductive HealthThey have also come to his defense, arguing that the attacks on his professionalism are “politically motivated”.

But at Thursday’s hearing, Indiana Assistant Attorney General Cory Voight argued that it was Bernard who was pushing his own political agenda.

“There hasn’t been a case like this before the board,” Voight said. “No doctor has been so brazen in pursuing his own agenda.”

Vought’s words echoed those of Attorney General Rokita. As early as July of last year, Rokita appeared on Fox News to criticize Bernard as an “abortion activist acting as a doctor.” He promised at the time to investigate Bernard and “fight this to the end.”

Bernard sued to stop his investigation, which subpoenaed patients’ medical records, but in December, Marion County Judge Heather Welch denied his request.

However, the judge also ruled that Rokita had himself violated confidentiality laws by publicly discussing his investigation on cable television news without first filing an official complaint.

Rokita’s media appearances, Welch said, were “clearly unlawful violations of the license investigations statute’s requirement that employees of the Attorney General’s Office maintain confidentiality about pending investigations until referred to the prosecution.”