But Pescatore wasn’t leading a seminar on the morality of abortion. She wanted the jury to focus on the legal requirements for abortion providers in Pennsylvania. “The number one thing is the twenty-four-hour waiting period,” she told them. “It’s not like you can walk in and say, ‘I want an abortion,’ and you get it. A woman has a right to go in and be counseled before she has an abortion.” But Gosnell had flatly ignored the twenty-four-hour waiting period. He ignored the law, Pescatore said, out of simple greed. “Money. That was the only law that Dr. Gosnell knew,” she said. “You went to 3801 Lancaster Avenue where no laws were followed. None, zero.” The facts would show that Gosnell didn’t do “normal, legal abortions” largely because it was both cheaper and easier for him to induce labor, wait for the woman to give birth, and then kill the baby outside of the womb with scissors.
~ Ann Mcelhinney
