USA: Controversy surrounds trial of man who killed Dr George Tiller

A judge in Kansas has sparked uproar by permitting Scott Roeder to argue that he was justified in killing the abortion doctor. 

Scott Roeder, 51, an airport shuttle bus driver with a history of schizophrenia, admitted that he shot George Tiller in the head at the start of a church service in Wichita in May.

Roeder claimed that the killing was justified because Dr Tiller was one of only four doctors in America willing to perform late-term abortions, The Times (London) reports.

In court papers filed on 12 January defence lawyers said: ‘In the mind of Mr Roeder the victim presented a clear danger to unborn children.’

Roeder was due to go on trial on 11 January on a charge of premeditated first-degree murder, which carries a mandatory life sentence. But the case was thrown into disarray when the judge ruled that Roeder could argue that he killed Dr Tiller to save unborn children.

The decision opened the way for Roeder to claim that the shooting amounted to voluntary manslaughter, a crime that could bring a prison term of less than five years. Kansas law defines voluntary manslaughter as intentional killing committed ‘upon an unreasonable but honest belief that circumstances existed that justified deadly force’.

Abortion rights groups protested that the ruling could bring more violence against doctors. ‘We’re greatly concerned. A voluntary manslaughter verdict would be catastrophic. It’s like putting a target on the back of abortion providers,’ Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation, said.

Radical anti-abortionists welcomed the chance for Roeder to state his case. The Rev Donald Spitz, a spokesman for the Army of God anti-abortion group, said: ‘Pro-lifers have been convicted unjustly for years in the court systems because they have not been allowed to state why they took their actions against abortion mills or against baby-killing abortionists.’

Judge Wilbert postponed jury selection in the trial until today to hear legal arguments on his decision. The prosecution said that there could be no question of involuntary manslaughter because there was no evidence that Dr Tiller posed an imminent threat at the time of the shooting.

‘The state encourages this court to not be the first to enable a defendant to justify premeditated murder because of an emotionally charged political belief,’ the prosecution wrote. ‘Taken to its logical extreme, this line of thinking would allow anyone to commit premeditated murder but only be guilty of manslaughter, simply because the victim holds a different set of moral and political beliefs.’

Mark Rudy, for the defence, said that there was an imminent threat, adding: ‘There was a state-licensed facility operating ... It assumedly had a schedule of pending abortion procedures.’

Scott Roeder tells court: I was justified in killing abortion doctor. The Times (London), 13 January 2010

Also read:

Commentary: One family’s tragedy, not a political indicator, by Jennie Bristow. Abortion Review, 2 June 2009