New York Times Trial Delayed in Killing of Abortion Doctor

Trial Delayed in Killing of Abortion Doctor

By MONICA DAVEY

Published: January 11, 2010

The trial of Scott Roeder, the man accused of killing a doctor known nationwide for performing late-term abortions, was delayed on Monday morning in Wichita, Kan., as prosecutors called for limits to the defense Mr. Roeder may present to jurors.

Even as jury selection was scheduled to start, court officials announced that prosecutors had filed a legal motion in the case against Mr. Roeder, an abortion opponent accused of shooting Dr. George R. Tiller in the head as Dr. Tiller attended his Kansas church last May.

Prosecutors, who are trying Mr. Roeder on a charge of first-degree murder, want to bar defense lawyers from presenting a theory that might lead to a conviction for voluntary manslaughter, which carries a far milder punishment and which could offer Mr. Roeder a chance to present his views on abortion in court.

Legal arguments over the matter were set for Tuesday, and the case is now expected to start on Wednesday,

Whatever the timing, Troy Newman, the leader of Operation Rescue, an anti-abortion group with headquarters a few miles from the courthouse, says he will probably be at his desk, as usual, and certainly nowhere near the courtroom.

National groups like Mr. Newman’s have publicly denounced Mr. Roeder.

“This trial isn’t meaningful for the movement,” Mr. Newman said last week. “What happened is antithetical to the Christian cause and to the stated foundation principles of pro-life.”

But for a contingent of abortion opponents — those who argue that the killing of an abortion doctor can be considered justified by the abortions it prevents — Mr. Roeder’s case has become a rallying point.

“He’s a hero,” said Regina Dinwiddie, a longtime abortion opponent from Kansas City, Kan., who was once ordered by a federal judge to stop using a bullhorn within 500 feet of abortion clinics. “His case is certainly the most important in my lifetime,” added Ms. Dinwiddie, who said she and several others intended to travel to Wichita for the trial.

In a way, Mr. Roeder’s trial would appear open and shut: prosecutors plan to call church members who say they saw Mr. Roeder walk into the church foyer, fire a gun into Dr. Tiller’s head and run away. And though jurors may not be told as much in court, Mr. Roeder has admitted to the shooting in jailhouse interviews and, as recently as last week, in a 104-page legal memorandum he filed himself to the judge.

Yet Mr. Roeder, who has pleaded not guilty, and his supporters have made it clear that they hope the trial will focus less on who killed Dr. Tiller than why — in essence, an effort to send the jury on a broader examination of abortion and the practices of one of the few doctors in the country who was known to provide abortions into the third trimester of pregnancy.

The judge in the case, Warren Wilbert of Sedgwick County District Court, has said he will not allow the case to be transformed into a trial on abortion. But he also indicated late last week that he might allow jurors to consider a defense theory by which Mr. Roeder could be convicted of voluntary manslaughter if jurors were to conclude that Mr. Roeder had, as Kansas law defines it, “an unreasonable but honest belief that circumstances existed that justified deadly force.”

It was that ruling that led prosecutors to file their last-minute challenge over the weekend, arguing that voluntary manslaughter ought not be considered in killings involving premeditation and that the circumstances laid out by the state’s manslaughter statute must involve some “imminent threat,” not a long-term, future concern.

Earlier, Judge Wilbert rejected Mr. Roeder’s efforts to present a so-called necessity defense, pursuing an acquittal on the basis that he was justified in his actions to prevent some greater harm. Still, the possibility now that jurors may be allowed to consider voluntary manslaughter, which carries a far shorter sentence than the life imprisonment he could face if convicted of first-degree murder, was seen as a victory for Mr. Roeder and a chance for his public defenders to lay out his views on abortion at the trial.

Advocates of abortion rights said that even allowing the argument to be presented in court was appalling and dangerous. In a statement, Katherine Spillar, executive vice president of the Feminist Majority Foundation, said allowing such a defense would “embolden anti-abortion extremists and could result in ‘open season’ on doctors across the country.”

For the city of Wichita, the prospect of Mr. Roeder’s trial, which may last as long as three weeks, represents an anxious final chapter in a fight that some residents said they wished had never begun. The conservative city of 357,000 has found itself at the volatile center of the abortion debate for three decades, in large part because of opposition to Dr. Tiller’s clinic, which has closed since his death. Over the years, there were protests, violence (including a 1993 shooting that wounded Dr. Tiller in both arms) and trials, including one in early 2009 in which Dr. Tiller was acquitted of misdemeanor violations of the state’s late-term abortion law. Mr. Roeder, 51 and a regular protester at clinics near his home in Kansas City, Mo., had attended part of that trial.

In one indication of the level of tension now, court officials announced late Friday that jury selection, now set for Wednesday, would be closed from public view. Even audio recordings of the proceedings will not be provided to the news media, a statement issued by the court said, “based on concerns over the chilling effect this might have on juror candor in the case.” Prospective jurors are expected to be asked about their views on abortion, and religion, and their knowledge of Dr. Tiller, lawyers involved have said.

Security is expected to be tight, and some among those who could be ordered to attend the trial include figures well-known in the abortion fight here. Prosecutors have drawn up a list of hundreds of potential witnesses, including Shelley Shannon, who was imprisoned for the earlier shooting of Dr. Tiller. Among those subpoenaed by the defense is Phill Kline, the former attorney general of Kansas and a vehement abortion opponent who had vigorously investigated Dr. Tiller.

The case is certain to underscore divisions among some opponents of abortion — like those between Mr. Newman, of Operation Rescue, and Ms. Dinwiddie, who says she supports a “Defensive Action Statement,” a 1990s-era public declaration in support of those who have committed violence against abortion doctors, arguing that such violence can be justified by the lives saved.

For his part, Mr. Newman discounts those opponents, describing their numbers as minute (a “handful of people,” he says) and them as “loons” and “wing nuts” whose outlier views flatly conflict with advocacy of life.

Ms. Dinwiddie, meanwhile, calls anti-abortion leaders who, like Mr. Newman, denounce Mr. Roeder “abortion profiteers” who are “running like roaches” away from a crucial trial of their own cause. “He didn’t murder the mailman,” Ms. Dinwiddie said.

Dave Leach, an abortion opponent from Des Moines who drafted a new “Defensive Action Statement” in connection with Mr. Roeder’s situation and has sought people willing to back it publicly, says he, too, hopes to attend Mr. Roeder’s trial to offer his support. (He says about 20 people have signed on to his statement.)

Mr. Roeder’s supporters tried to raise money for his defense with an auction of anti-abortion materials, including a Bible once owned by Ms. Shannon, but eBay would not allow it.

Mr. Leach said he talked to Mr. Roeder by phone from jail once or twice a week.

Mr. Newman said he, too, had heard from Mr. Roeder, in a letter from jail. “He was rebuking me for not being supportive, for ‘being a hypocrite,’ ” said Mr. Newman, who said he had met Mr. Roeder before the shooting but barely knew him.

Mr. Newman said he had forwarded the letter to the prosecutor.