Several doctors who care for pregnant women in Atlanta worry they may have been targeted for burglaries because they expressed concerns about a bill in the General Assembly that would have banned abortions after 20 weeks.
Police say burglars bypassed other valuables and seemed to know what they were looking for when they swiped laptops from two obstetric/gynecology offices and from the Georgia OB/GYN Society, a professional organization for obstetricians and gynecologists.
There were no overt signs that the thieves were politically motivated, and police say they have not determined a motive.
But doctors at all three offices had appeared to testify or to witness legislative hearings about a so-called "fetal pain" bill that stoked passions on both sides of the abortion debate, according to Pat Cota, executive director of the Georgia OB/GYN Society. Another doctor who testified about similar legislation last year has also received threatening phone calls.
"This is getting a little bit scary," Cota said.
The bill died on Tuesday, but it is likely to be resurrected again next year.
Dr. Richard Zane, whose Atlanta Women's Health Group clinic in Sandy Springs was burglarized March 4, said he went to the House to listen to the presentation of the bill a few weeks ago. Days later, someone broke a window at the clinic and stole two laptops. The computers did not contain patient or personnel data, he said.
On March 17, someone pried open the door to the OB/GYN Society of Georgia office in unincorporated Suwanee. The thief passed up three other laptops and took only two laptops in the executive director's office, Cota said.
The OB/GYN Society of Georgia had been spearheading opposition to the bill, which their member physicians said conflicted with patient care standards and guidelines that had been in place for decades.
There was also a third break-in at around the same time at another Atlanta-area OB/GYN office, according to Cota. She declined to name the clinic because she said the doctor is afraid to come forward.
Gwinnett County Police spokesman Cpl. Jake Smith and Sandy Springs police spokesman Lt. Steve Rose said there are no suspects in the burglaries. Detectives in Sandy Springs were able to collect a blood sample from a shattered window and a bloody shoe print left at Atlanta Women's Health Group.
Zane said he has no doubt the motive was to intimidate doctors who expressed concerns about the bill.
"If they keep doing this, people won't want to talk," Zane said.
A spokesman for doctors who deal with high-risk pregnancies said data in the computers stolen from the OB/GYN Society of Georgia could contain confidential information about doctors who perform abortions, and possibly put them in danger.
"They didn't steal this information to send these doctors a Christmas card," said John Walraven, executive director of the Perinatal Infertility Coalition of Georgia.
The physicians who were victims of the burglaries do not perform abortions, and neither does the OB/GYN Society of Georgia, Cota said.
She said the physicians had concerns about HR 954 because they said it conflicts with standards and guidelines for care that have been have been in place for decades.
- Staff writer Kristina Torres contributed to this story.
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