PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Dr. Kermit Gosnell, an abortion clinic doctor who was serving a life sentence for killing three babies born alive, died in a Pennsylvania hospital earlier this month, prison officials said Monday.
Gosnell’s seedy West Philadelphia clinic was known as the “House of Horrors.” Former employees testified that he often performed illegal abortions beyond Pennsylvania’s 24-week limit, delivered babies that were still moving, crying or breathing, and that he and his assistants disposed of the newborns by “snipping” their spines, as he put it.
Department of Corrections spokesperson Maria Bivens said Gosnell, 85, died March 1 at a hospital outside the prison system. He was most recently incarcerated at Smithfield State Correctional Facility, about 60 miles (96.5 kilometers) south of Pittsburgh. The cause of death was not disclosed.
Gosnell has portrayed herself as an advocate for poor and desperate women. In addition to three counts of first-degree murder, he was convicted of multiple other crimes, including violating Pennsylvania abortion laws.
Conditions at his clinic became known during a 2010 investigation into prescription drug trafficking. Investigators described a stinking place that contained bags and bottles containing fetuses and jars containing body parts, as well as blood-stained furniture and filthy medical equipment.
By the time Gosnell’s facility was raided, state authorities had failed to conduct routine inspections of all its abortion clinics for 15 years. Two top state health officials were fired and Pennsylvania imposed stricter rules on clinics in the wake of the scandal.
Gosnell did not testify at the 2013 trial, but his defense attorneys argued that none of the fetuses were born alive and that any movements were postmortem convulsions or spasms.
