Case No. 2007-1832, John and June Roe, Individually and as parents and next friends of Jane Roe, a minor v. Planned Parenthood Southwest Ohio Region, Roslyn Kade, M.D., and John Does 1-6
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Court Asked To Order Disclosure of Medical Records of Minors Who Obtained Abortions
John and June Roe, Individually and as parents and next friends of Jane Roe, a minor v. Planned Parenthood Southwest Ohio Region, Roslyn Kade, M.D., and John Does 1-6, Case no. 2007-1832
1st District Court of Appeals (Hamilton County)
ISSUE: In pursuing a civil lawsuit against a clinic for allegedly failing to obtain parental consent before performing an abortion on a 14-year-old girl and allegedly failing to report known or suspected sexual abuse of a minor to police or a children’s services agency, are the parents of the girl entitled to compel the clinic to provide them with the medical records of all minors who obtained abortions through the clinic during the previous 10 years, with information identifying the patients redacted?
BACKGROUND: This case involves Jane Roe of Cincinnati, a 14 year old who obtained an abortion from Planned Parenthood of Southwest Ohio in March 2004. In subsequent legal filings, Planned Parenthood has stated that Jane told its medical staff she had been impregnated by a school classmate and that her parents knew and approved of her plan to obtain an abortion. The clinic also stated that when its representative called the phone number provided by Jane, an adult male who identified himself as Jane’s father answered and confirmed that he knew about and consented to the procedure.
Within weeks after the procedure was performed, a police investigation revealed that Jane had been sexually abused and impregnated by her 21-year-old soccer coach, John Haller; that the phone number provided to Planned Parenthood by Jane had been Haller’s number rather than that of her parents; and that the man the clinic had notified and from whom it had obtained consent for the abortion was Haller, not Jane’s father. Haller was later convicted on seven counts of sexual battery.
Jane’s parents subsequently filed a civil suit on their own behalf and on behalf of Jane seeking compensatory and punitive damages from Planned Parenthood and the physician who performed the abortion. The suit alleged that Planned Parenthood and the doctor intentionally breached their legal duties to: (1) notify Jane’s parents and obtain their consent before performing the abortion; (2) provide Jane with all the information required by law before obtaining her consent to the procedure; and (3) notify police or a child services agency of a known or suspected case of sexual abuse of a minor. In seeking punitive damages from the clinic and doctor, the Roes alleged that the intentional breaches of legal duties in the clinic’s handling of Jane’s case were part of a “pattern or practice” of similar breaches in other cases.
During pretrial proceedings, the Roes filed a discovery motion demanding that Planned Parenthood provide them with copies of all medical records and sexual abuse reports in its files for every minor who had sought an abortion from the clinic in the preceding 10 years. When the clinic refused to comply, the Roes sought and were granted an order of the Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas ordering the clinic to produce the requested records, with all information disclosing the identity of the other patients redacted (blacked out) from the records. Planned Parenthood appealed the trial court’s discovery order to the 1st District Court of Appeals, which reversed the trial court and invalidated the discovery order for the other patients’ records.
The Roes now ask the Supreme Court to reinstate the trial court’s discovery order. They argue that:
• The court of appeals erred by reviewing the trial court’s order under a de novo rather than a much more deferential abuse-of-discretion standard of review. They assert that trial courts have wide discretion to determine whether and when discovery of requested documents is necessary for a plaintiff to establish his claims, and claim that the court of appeals improperly substituted its judgment for that of the trial court by duplicating a balancing test between the Roes’ need for the requested medical records and the confidentiality rights of the clinic’s other patients, especially in light of the fact that all identifying information from the patient records was to be rendered unreadable prior to disclosure.
• The Roes assert that under R.C. 2151.421, the state law requiring certain professionals to disclose known or suspected child abuse to police or child welfare authorities, a proven claim that the clinic systematically failed to report sexual abuse in this case and other patient’s cases would entitle them to punitive damages, and that they need access to the medical records and abuse reports of other minor patients in order to substantiate that pattern of wrongful conduct.
• They also argue that a state law barring the use of sexual abuse reports in lawsuits against the party filing such reports does not bar them from accessing sex abuse reports filed by Planned Parenthood regarding other abortion patients, because the Roes are not suing the clinic for filing those reports, but rather for its failure to file a report in Jane’s case and other similar cases.
Attorneys for Planned Parenthood respond that:
• The court of appeals properly employed a de novo standard of review in overturning the trial court’s discovery order because the clinic’s appeal was based on a question of law (the privileged status of patient medical records) rather than a question of fact for which a trial court’s discovery rulings are reviewed on an abuse-of-discretion standard.
• They contend that because R.C. 2151.421 created a statutory cause of action that did not exist at common law before the 1851 state constitution was adopted, and the legislature did not expressly state in the statute that violations entitle a plaintiff to punitive damages, plaintiffs suing under the statute are limited to seeking only compensatory damages. In the absence of a right to seek punitive damages for a “pattern or practice” of breaches, they add, the trial court erred in finding that there was a “need” for the Roes to examine the privileged medical records of any patient other than Jane in order to prove their claim that the clinic breached its duties in handling Jane’s case.
• Planned Parenthood also argues that R.C. 2151.421(H)(1) expressly prohibits disclosure to the Roes of information from child sexual abuse reports that the clinic filed regarding any of its other patients, and specifically bars the Roes from using information from such reports “as evidence in any civil action or proceeding brought against the person who made the report.”
NOTE: Numerous amicus curiae (friend of the court) briefs have been filed on behalf of both parties in this case. The full text of those briefs and other filings can be accessed online by searching the Court’s online docket at http://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/Clerk/ecms/default.asp. Click “Go,” and on the search screen enter Case No. 2007-1832.
Contacts
Brian E. Hurley, 513.784.1525, for John & June Roe and Jane Roe.
Daniel J. Buckley, 513.723.4000, for Planned Parenthood of Southwest Ohio.
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