“She has no idea long how they had been there and no idea why he put them there,” said Chicago attorney Kevin Bolger, according to the report. “Nobody knows.”
The attorney said the family has been cooperating with investigators since his wife found the remains. Bolger said the garage was stacked “floor to ceiling.”
He also said the doctor’s wife didn’t use the garage, nor was she aware how long the fetal remains may have been stored there.
In an earlier statement, the sheriff’s office said there was no evidence that any medical procedures were conducted at the property.
Abortion Clinics Closed
Klopfer had three abortion clinics in Indiana—in Gary, South Bend, and Fort Wayne—which had been shuttered. The last one closed in 2015.“Failed to ensure that abortion patients signed consent forms 18 hours in advance of their procedures being performed,” it stated, adding that he also “failed to ensure that abortion patients received counseling from a physician, a physician assistant, an advanced practice nurse, or a midwife prior to an abortion being performed.”
Right to Life
Pro-life groups reacted to the findings of the fetal remains at Klopfer’s home.“We are horrified by the reports of over 2,000 fetal remains being found on the property of Dr. Ulrich Klopfer, a man who operated abortion facilities in Gary, South Bend, and Fort Wayne,” Mike Fichter, president of Indiana Right to Life, said in a statement.
“These sickening reports underscore why the abortion industry must be held to the highest scrutiny. We are calling on Indiana authorities to join in the investigation to determine if these fetal remains have any connection to abortion operations, or personnel, in Indiana.”
Former Planned Parenthood director Abby Johnson said that the findings highlighted the darkness of the industry.
“This abortion doctor died not long ago ... and look what they found,” she said in a statement.
Missouri’s Last Abortion Clinic Stays Open
Missouri’s last remaining abortion clinic, in St. Louis, lost its license to perform abortions on June 21, over patient safety concerns. But it will remain open, at least temporarily, under a judge’s order on the same day.Stelzer—an appointee of then-Gov. Jay Nixon, a Democrat—said during a brief hearing on June 21 that a preliminary injunction he previously issued that keeps the clinic open would remain in place until then.
The fate of the St. Louis clinic has drawn national attention because Missouri would become the first state since 1974 without a functioning abortion clinic if it closes. Just one year prior, in 1973, the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion had become effective nationwide.