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Planned Parenthood Partners Admit To Liability For Selling Baby Parts

REUTERS/Carlos Barria

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Amber Randall Civil Rights Reporter
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Two organizations that worked with Planned Parenthood to distribute the parts of aborted fetuses to researchers admitted to breaking fetal tissue laws in a lawsuit settled with the Orange County District Attorney’s office Friday.

DV Biologics and DaVinci Biosciences, two sister companies, agreed to a settlement that comes with an admission of liability after the district attorney’s office brought a civil  lawsuit against the companies in 2016, prosecutors announced.

The settlement terms dictate that the two companies must close and stop operating their businesses in California within a two to four-month period. The companies also must pay out $7.8 million in the form of donations and biological materials to a medical school’s scientific teaching institution as well as paying $195,000 in civil penalties.

The DA said the settlement seized all profits from DV Biologics and DaVinci Biosciences, which they got by illegally selling fetal tissue.

“These companies will never be able to operate again in Orange County or the State of California,” District Attorney Rackauckas said in a statement.

The settlement came from a 2016 lawsuit that alleged DV Biologics and DaVinci Biosciences had partnered up to obtain fetal tissue from Planned Parenthood and other clinics to sell the fetal tissue at a profit.

The two companies worked as the go-between between abortion clinics and scientists who wanted to use the fetal tissue to help with their research, according to the lawsuit. They sold fetal tissues for up to a $1,100 per vial between 2009-2015, prosecutors added.

“The companies also regularly offered ‘sales’ pricing promotions, including, for example, a ‘25% off’ summer sale and ‘25% off’ fall promotion in 2013.  Sales staff was given wide flexibility in using discounts in order to close a sale, because they all knew they still ended up ‘on top,'” prosecutors said.

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