He found him on Friday, January 10, at about 7:30 p.m. Keester went to the hotel, where Rena was in bed, and examined her. He told Mike that Rena needed care or she would die. He sent Mike to get a fountain syringe, then used some instruments and the syringe on Rena without sterilizing them.

Dr. Van Deventer was summoned on January 23, and he and McGrew examined Rena. They found her in grave shape, and summoned Dr. Snyder. Snyder performed surgery on January 31, with Dr. McGrew assisting with anesthesia, to try to save Rena’s life. McGrew testified later that Rena’s abdomen had been full of abscesses. Rena’s condition continued to deteriorate. On February 4, she was given a blood transfusion. On the evening of Feb 5 or 6, she asked everybody but her stepmother to leave the room. She said, “Mother, I am going to die. What Dr. Keester did to me is going to kill me.” She then told of the trip to Wichita and the abortion. On February 12 Rena became irrational, but she continued to linger until her death on February 28.

According to court documents, “The defense was the stock defense of the practitioner of abortion — the girl did it herself, and then went to a doctor for help.”

Keester was asked if he routinely left the exam room door open so as to allow people to listen in on private consultations with his female patients. He said, “I did it that time.”

Keester said the only examination he made of Rena was to take her pulse, which was 128, and her temperature, which was 102 — clear criteria to immediately hospitalize a patient, which of course Keester had failed to do. He said he asked Rena what the trouble was, and she said, again in hearing of the men in the reception room, that she was pregnant and had attempted a self abortion. He said that the girl didn’t give her name as being Mike’s wife, nor that she was from Ponca City, as Mike supposedly had said. Keester said that he told her he was suspicious, told Rena, “Your story don’t jibe,” and sent her away and never saw her again.

If true, this would still make Keester complicit in Rena’s death, because if he did what he claimed, he abandoned a patient who was in critical condition, allowing her to die.

The men that Keester said had been in the reception area testified that they heard Keester tell the girl “I can’t do anything for you.” The office worker testified that Rena had said, “I fear I have made a serious mistake, and the doctor has refused to do anything for me whatever.” One of the men in the reception area testified to having heard a similar statement from Rena. But he testified that the private office door was closed while Rena was in there with Keester.

Keester also tried to counter Mike’s story that he had cared for Rena at the hotel on January 10th by bringing his wife and other relatives and friends to testify that he had been at home with them, celebrating his wife’s birthday. These relatives said, along with Keester, that they remembered the date well because another woman’s birthday was January 9, and that for five years she and Mrs. Keester had celebrated their birthdays together, choosing to do so on the 10th, Mrs. Keester’s birthday, that year. However, Mrs. Keester’s birthday is January 28, not January 10, as the prosecution was easily able to document.

Keester’s story evidently didn’t convince the jury. He was convicted of manslaughter in Rena’s death, and his appeal was denied.