Dr. Caitlin Bernard, the physician who performed an abortion on a 10-year-old rape victim and was subsequently attacked by conservative officials, is suing the Indiana attorney general who branded her an “abortion activist acting as a doctor.”
Bernard was initially accused by some commentators of making up the horrific story of the girl who had to travel from Ohio to Indiana after her home state barred abortions in the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade.
Then, after a 27-year-old man was arrested for the rape, Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita went on Fox News to attack Bernard, claiming she wasn’t qualified as a doctor and suggesting she didn’t report both the rape and abuse as required under Indiana law.
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“And then we have this abortion activist acting as a doctor with a history of failing to report,” Rokita said in the interview with Jesse Watters. “We’re gathering the evidence as we speak, and we’re going to fight this to the end, including looking at her licensure. If she failed to report it in Indiana, it’s a crime for—to not report, to intentionally not report.” During the interview, Fox News flashed a photo of Bernard and a caption that said, “Doc Failed to Report Abortion of Abuse Victim.”
A day later, media outlets obtained records from the state Department of Health showing that she did, in fact, report the abortion and abuse as required by law.
Furthermore, a “simple check” of state licensing records shows that, as of July 13, Bernard’s doctor’s license is “active with no disciplinary history,” her lawyers wrote in a tort claim notice issued Tuesday.
“Thus, Mr. Rokita’s statements that Dr. Bernard was an ‘abortion activist acting as a doctor’ with a ‘history of failing to report’ were false,” the notice says. “Mr. Rokita either knew the statements were false or acted with reckless disregard of the truth or falsity of the statements.”
The tort claim notice is the first step required by law in Indiana before a plaintiff files a defamation suit. It triggers a 90-day investigative period for the state to settle the claim, after which a full defamation suit can be filed, her lawyer Kathleen DeLaney said.
The notice says Bernard intends to seek damages from the state for “security costs, legal fees, reputational harm, and emotional distress.”
It also alleges that the defamation is ongoing as Rokita still has a statement up online saying that he is waiting for proof that Bernard reported the abuse and the abortion, and that she didn’t violate HIPAA. (Her employer, Indiana University Health, debunked that last allegation on July 15 by confirming she did not violate the patient’s privacy.)
