WICHITA, Kansas - Media reports say that abortion provider Dr. George Tiller has been shot and killed at his Wichita church.
Tiller has been among the few U.S. physicians performing late-term abortion. His clinic has repeatedly been the site of protests for about two decades.
The Wichita Eagle was reporting on its Web site, Kansas.com, that Tiller, 67, was shot just after 10 a.m. at
Reformation Lutheran Church, where he was a member of the congregation. The newspaper reported that witnesses and a police source confirmed Tiller was the
victim.
There was no information about whether a suspect was in custody.
Tiller had been acquitted in March of misdemeanor charges stemming from procedures he performed, but moments after the verdict the state's medical board announced it was investigating allegations against him that are nearly identical to those the jury had rejected.
Prosecutors had alleged that Tiller had in 2003 gotten second opinions from a doctor who was essentially an employee of his, not independent as state law requires, but a jury took only about an hour to find him not guilty of all 19 counts.
Claimed prosecution was politically motivated
Tiller, who could have faced a year in jail for even one conviction, stared straight ahead as the verdicts were read, with one of his attorneys patting his
shoulder after the decision on the final count was declared. His wife, seated across the courtroom, fought back tears and nodded. The couple had declined to
speak to reporters afterward.
Tiller had claimed that the prosecution was politically motivated. An attorney general who opposed abortion rights began the investigation into Tiller's clinic more than four years ago, but both his successor, who filed the criminal charges, and the current attorney general support abortion rights.
Tiller had been a favored target of anti-abortion protesters, and he testified that he and his family have
suffered years of harassment and threats. His clinic was the site of the 1991 "Summer of Mercy" protests marked by mass demonstrations and arrests.
His clinic was bombed in 1985, and an abortion opponent shot him in both arms in 1993.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31029377/
