Mary Roeteens, 1970s, california, hemorrhagedeathSUMMARY: “Mary,” age 19, bled to death around 1971 from an abortion performed in a California hospital.

“Mary” is one of the women Life Dynamics identifies on their “Blackmun Wall” as having been killed by a legal abortion.

Some time before 1973, 19-year-old Mary was admitted to a Los Angeles women’s hospital for a safe, legal first trimester abortion. Abortion was legal in California at that time as long as it was performed in a hospital. Entrepreneurs opened abortion hospitals specifically for that purpose.

The doctor performed a D&C abortion under general anesthesia. During the abortion, Mary began to hemorrhage. The doctor couldn‘t locate the source of the bleeding, so he sutured her cervix and administered two units of blood.

Mary was discharged from the hospital. Eleven days after her abortion, she returned to the hospital due to heavy bleeding. Life Dynamics doesn’t record what treatment, if any, was given to Mary during this visit.

Mary returned to the hospital yet a third time. A doctor performed another curettage and put in some more sutures. She continued to bleed, was given more blood, and her uterus was packed with gauze. Still, Mary continued to bleed.

Her doctors brought her back into surgery to find the source of the bleeding. Before administering anesthesia, they removed the gauze from Mary‘s uterus. Mary lost a lot of blood and went into cardiac arrest.

A hysterectomy was performed, but ten hours later Mary went into convulsions and died.
After Mary‘s death, it was determined that the ascending branch of Mary‘s uterine artery had been cut. This had been the source of her bleeding.

LDI Sources: “Laceration of the ascending branch of the uterine artery: A complication of therapeutic abortion,” Lowensohn, Hibbard, American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, 118:1, January 1, 1974, 36-8

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1. 1900s
2. 1910-1919
3. 1920s
4. 1930s
5. 1940s
6. 1950s
7. 1960s
8. 1970s
9. 1980s
10. 1990s
11. 19th century
12. 2000-2009
13. 20s
14. 30s
15. 40s
16. NAF
17. abortifacient
18. abortion
19. abortion mill
20. abortion mortality
21. abortionists
22. abortionists — female
23. abortionists — male
24. alabama
25. anesthesia
26. arizona
27. black women
28. botched abortion
29. california
30. chicago
31. colorado
32. connecticut
33. cover-up
34. death
35. deaths
36. deception
37. delay in transport
38. delay in treatment
39. district of columbia
40. dumped body
41. ectopic
42. embolism
43. falsifying forms
44. fetal indications
45. florida
46. former criminal abortionist
47. george tiller
48. georgia
49. hemorrhage death
50. hospitals
51. illegal – doctor
52. illegal – midwife
53. illegal – nurse
54. illegal – paramedical
55. illegal – post roe
56. illegal – unknown
57. illegal – untrained
58. illegal abortion
59. illinois
60. inadequate documents
61. inadequate equipment
62. inadequate resuscitation
63. incomplete abortion
64. indiana
65. infection
66. kansas
67. legal abortion
68. llinois
69. louisiana
70. maryland
71. massachusetts
72. maternal indications
73. maternal mortality
74. michigan
75. mills
76. missouri
77. mortality
78. national abortion federation
79. new jersey
80. new mexico
81. new york
82. north carolina
83. ohio
84. oklahoma
85. pennsylvania
86. planned parenthood
87. pre-roe legal
88. previous misconduct
89. prostaglandin
90. quackery
91. questionable stories
92. ru-486
93. rupture
94. saline
95. secret abortion
96. self-induced
97. suicide
98. teens
99. texas
100. wisconsin