Biohazard bag baby's death blamed on unlicensed staff

A civil lawsuit is being launched in the Florida case of a baby girl who survived an abortion procedure but promptly was shoved into a chemical-laden biohazard bag where police found the body nine days later.

Officials with the Thomas More Society of Chicago say they have begun work with Florida lawyer Tom Pennekamp Jr. on the case stemming from the 2006 death of Shanice Denise Osbourne.

A funeral is scheduled tomorrow for the infant, 27 months after she survived an abortion at the A Gyn Diagnostic Center in Hialeah, Fla.

In front of her shocked mother and a stunned clinic worker, "Shanice was stuffed into a medical waste bag filled with chlorine bleach just after she was delivered alive by abortion clinic owner Belkis Gonzalez," the non-profit legal group said. "This all took place without any licensed medical personnel (doctors or even nurses) in attendance."

Although investigators previously have told WND they were pursuing criminal counts for Shanice's death, no charges have yet been filed. The charges apparently have been delayed or prevented because of the abortion procedure.

"While the Miami-Dade County medical examiner determined that Shanice was born alive, he concluded her death was 'natural,' resulting merely from her 'extreme prematurity,'" officials with the Thomas More Society said. "Then so-called 'experts' publicly claimed that unless an infant could be proved to be 'viable' – able to live on her own – her killing could not be condemned as 'homicide' or otherwise culpable as a matter of law."

WND reported earlier when the death was reported, and then again when authorities confirmed the baby had been born alive.

The investigation was delayed even though a search warrant cited probable cause for investigation of second-degree murder, because, according to the Thomas More Society, "the clinic owner put the baby's corpse on the building's tin roof where it decayed for days under the hot Florida sun."

"But police were called again. This time they found the body," the report said.

The legal group said the only formal disciplinary action that has been taken to date is a restriction imposed on the abortionist, Paul Renelique, who faces a further hearing Nov. 19.

The society decided to intervene last year when it was clear criminal counts were not coming immediately.

An investigator was hired, facts and witness statements documented, police consulted and a pathologist was retained.

The expert, the Thomas More Society said, "critiqued the coroner's botched findings and found that A Gyn Diagnostics' unlicensed staff did play a causative role in the infant's death."

That's when the Florida attorney was consulted, and the process of notifications to bring a lawsuit over the "wrongful death" of Baby Shanice was started.

The circumstances at the clinic have been confirmed, because after police intervened and started investigating the call from the clinic worker, 18-year-old Sycloria Williams came forward to confirm she gave birth to a living girl in the facility's recovery room, and staff then began screaming "that the baby was alive."

"Ms. Belkis Gonzalez cut the umbilical cord, threw it into a red bag with black printing. Ms. Gonzalez then swept the baby, with her hands, into the same red bag along with the gauze used during the procedure," the police search warrant stated.

At the time the body was found, a lawyer for the abortion business issued a statement that no crime was committed, and an 18-year-old had had an abortion without complications.

But Tom Brejcha, president of the Thomas More Society, said, "Just because a human being is feeble or disabled and supposedly can't live independently, on his or her own, doesn't mean that anybody has the right to kill him or her.

"If you suffocate a dying elder with a pillow, you're guilty of homicide," he continued. "If you fail to examine, or aid, or treat an infant – once born – who is struggling for breath and who – with proper care – has any chance to survive to live a healthy life, you should be held equally guilty."

He said a funeral service is scheduled tomorrow at the Worldwide Christian Center Center in Pompano Beach, and burial will follow at Queen of Heaven Cemetery in Fort Lauderdale.

"Killing a baby born alive is still infanticide, and those responsible must be held to account civilly if not also criminally," Brejcha said.

WND columnist Jill Stanek said the baby's brief life and her death "demonstrate the need for the Born Alive Infants Protection Act. While it was legal to kill Shanice pre-birth, it was "wrongful death" to do so after, even if she wasn't viable.

"This is exactly the age baby Barack Obama as state senator fought against giving legal personhood status," she wrote.