https://phelimmcaleer.substack.com/p/exclusive-kermit-gosnell-is-dead?utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web&triedRedirect=true&fbclid=IwdGRzaAQwlf1jbGNrBDCVX2V4dG4DYWVtAjExAHNydGMGYXBwX2lkDDM1MDY4NTUzMTcyOAABHhkr7cP9IFxdPiWk9AjTk-H8fciOZAYeTngtwQp65oyBRUHsd4pZyMxVZZZN_aem_5ulvtcuzR4mP6y5t35fTWwKermit Gosnell, the abortion doctor who is thought to have murdered thousands of babies in a 30 year killing spree, has died in prison.
We covered the Gosnell trial in Philadelphia, interviewed him in prison and had dozens of phone calls with the serial killer as part of our research for the book, podcast and movie we made about the case.
He was a chilling monster who could sometimes come across as charming. Gosnell liked to portray himself as affable, a humanitarian even, but the mask slipped when he was challenged or caught in a lie.
And he lied a lot.
Gosnell seemed unfazed by his crimes. He claimed he was innocent and that he would eventually be exonerated. Gosnell also seemed to take pleasure in remembering his time as a killer. He would often smile and smirk as he defended the death and destruction at his clinic.
In a press release announcing his death Ann expressed how unsettling it was, meeting Gosnell and researching his crimes.
“It was tough but it was a very, very important piece of journalism. Meeting Gosnell was one of the few times in my journalism career that I felt I was face to face with evil.
Gosnell is gone, but we should take time to think of the thousands of innocent babies who were his victims. They lived for a short period of time but must not be forgotten. They achieved some measure of justice with Gosnell’s prosecution and incarceration.
I think in particular of Baby Boy A, who was so big that even Gosnell’s workers were shocked by the barbarity of his killing and took a photo of him after he was murdered. He shook their hardened hearts. Baby Boy A lived for about an hour before he was killed. The picture of him curled up in a tupperware container helped seal Gosnell’s fate and ensured he’d never kill again. That heartbreaking picture has also meant that I’m not the only one who will never forget Baby Boy A.
I’m also thinking of the two women who needlessly died in Gosnell’s diabolical clinic. Karnamaya Mongar, who came to this country as a refugee after living a life of danger in Bhutan. She came to America for refuge but four months later was dead at the hands of Gosnell.
And Semika Shaw, the young mother who tragically died after a botched abortion at the hands of Kermit Gosnell.
Their deaths were also caused because of bureaucratic incompetence and the liberal political imperative to shield abortion and abortionists from criticism.
These women were sacrificed for politics.”
According to prison and law enforcement sources, Gosnell died two weeks ago but his death has gone unreported until now. His cause of death is unknown but he was known to be in failing health in recent years. He was 85.
Detective Jim Wood was the police officer most responsible for stopping Gosnell’s killing spree. A drugs investigator for the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office, Wood was investigating the illegal sale of opioid prescriptions when he was alerted to Gosnell and his side business of selling prescriptions. Then Wood started to find out about what was really going on behind the doors of Gosnell’s clinic.
Speaking yesterday Jim said: “May God have mercy on his soul but his soul was filled with evil so there may be no mercy for him, like there was no mercy for the babies.”
Arising out of Detective Wood’s investigation, Gosnell was convicted in 2013 of the first-degree murders of three infants who were born alive during illegal late-term abortions and then killed by having their spinal cords severed with scissors. He was also found guilty of the involuntary manslaughter of 41-year-old Karnamaya Mongar, a refugee from Bhutan who died from a lethal overdose of anesthesia, administered by unlicensed staff in his clinic. She died in a house of horrors where cats walked the corridors and lifesaving equipment was broken, severely rusted or just nonexistent.
In Gosnell’s 30 years of running his filthy abortion clinic in Philadelphia, it is thought that he murdered thousands of babies born alive. The grand jury which investigated his case wanted to charge him with 200 recent murders but the move was stymied and reduced to just seven after pressure from senior political and law enforcement officials.
According to sources close to the investigation, law enforcement and politicians did not want their homicide numbers to spike in an era of falling crime and murder statistics.
Police evidence photo of Gosnell’s filthy clinic.
Gosnell’s case became an international news story after the US mainstream media failed to cover the trial - leading to one of the first “Twitter storms”.
Conservatives were outraged by the mainstream media failure to cover the story and the name Gosnell trended on Twitter for weeks before media organisations were shamed and forced to turn up. Several liberal journalists admitted they had been reluctant to write about the case because it clashed with their pro-choice beliefs and because they were reluctant to shine a negative light on abortion.
Marc Lamont Hill, the then host of HuffPost Live, readily acknowledged the bias at work. “For what it’s worth, I do think that those of us on the left have made a decision not to cover this trial because we worry that it’ll compromise abortion rights,” he said.
The “House of Horrors”
Gosnell’s murders bore many of the hallmarks of a serial killer. He seemed to enjoy killing the babies and kept trophies of his victims. Investigators who raided his clinic, found the remains of 47 babies in his freezer and the preserved feet of several of his victims in jars labelled and stored in an unlocked cupboard.
FBI evidence photos of severed baby feet in jars stored in Gosnell’s House of Horrors.
FBI evidence photos of severed baby feet in jars stored in Gosnell’s House of Horrors.
When we met Gosnell in Huntingdon prison in May 2015 we observed that he had a foot fetish/obsession, he remarked often about people’s feet. It was one of the first things he talked about during the prison interview. He was proud of his own big feet and hands, holding up his palms for us to admire at one point during the bizarre interview. His demeanour throughout was almost jovial. His only distress was that he had failed to secure a place in the prison poetry class.
The Grand Jury described Gosnell’s Women’s Medical Society Clinic as a “House of Horrors.”
FBI evidence photos of babies’ bodies stored in Gosnell’s clinic including one in a Minute Maid juice container.
It also revealed how Gosnell could have previously been stopped on multiple occasions, particularly after the death of Semika Shaw in 2000 and other incidents. But years of complaints from staff, patients, and visiting health workers, and the death of two women, did not matter to the Department of Health in Pennsylvania, and the killing continued. Their inaction was largely due to pressure from then-Republican Governor Tom Ridge, who was keen to tout his “pro-choice” credentials in swing-state Pennsylvania. As a result officials declined to seriously investigate the clinic or attempt to close it down.
The grand jury report described this as a “live and let die policy.”
“The Pennsylvania Department of Health abruptly decided, for political reasons, to stop inspecting abortion clinics. The politics in question were not anti-abortion, but pro. With the change of administration from Governor Casey to Governor Ridge, officials concluded that inspections would be “putting a barrier up to women” seeking abortions. Better to leave clinics to do as they pleased, even though, as Gosnell proved, that meant both women and babies would pay,” the report stated.
Gosnell’s crimes were finally uncovered on February 18, 2010, when Detective Wood led a raid, along with the FBI and DEA, on the clinic at 3801 Lancaster Avenue as part of a prescription-drugs for sale investigation.
The investigators found a facility in an appalling condition: blood-splattered floors and chairs; flea-infested cats roaming amid cat feces and urine-soaked blankets; rusty, unsterilized instruments; expired medications; and fetal remains stored haphazardly in jars, milk jugs, cat-food containers, and freezers.
Unsanitary conditions included a cat in the abortion clinic.
Unlicensed staff — including a high-school student — administered powerful anesthesia without monitoring, and women were sometimes left to deliver babies on toilets.
During Gosnell’s trial the court heard that the clinic’s handyman frequently complained that the toilets and drains were blocked with the “arms and feet” and other remains of aborted babies.
Prosecutors presented evidence that Gosnell and his employees routinely induced labor in women pregnant well beyond 24 weeks, delivered live babies, and then killed them by cutting their spinal cords with scissors. Former employees testified that this “snipping” occurred hundreds of times over recent years. Gosnell had been performing abortions since the early 70s.
Gosnell was charged with seven counts of murder for infants born alive; the jury convicted him on three first-degree murder counts (for babies identified in court as Baby A, Baby C, and Baby D) and acquitted him on one.
Gosnell's most recent mugshot from the PA Department of Corrections
On May 15, 2013, he was sentenced to three consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole for the murders, plus additional concurrent sentences for manslaughter and other counts. In December, 2014, he received a concurrent 30-year federal prison term for the drug conspiracy and distribution charges.
You can find more details about the case and interviews in our New York Times best-selling book: Gosnell: The Untold Story of America’s Most Prolific Serial Killer.
You can hear Gosnell’s voice defending the indefensible, interviews with his surviving victims and those who put him behind bars in our top ranking podcast on the case. Serial Killer: A True Crime Podcast .
We also co-wrote and produced the movie about the case starring Dean Cain and directed by Nick Searcy.
Topic: Abortionist Kermit Gosnell dies in prison (Read 198 times)