United States Sixth Circuit

A judgment upholding two provisions of an Ohio law regulating abortions is reversed in part as to a provision which limits minors seeking a judicial bypass of a statutory parental-consent requirement to one petition per pregnancy, which is facially unconstitutional since it fails under Casey's large-fraction test. Nevertheless, the single-petition rule is severable from the remainder of the statute, and the judgment is affirmed insofar as it found to be constitutionally valid a provision which requires women seeking abortions to attend, for informed-consent purposes, an in-person meeting with a physician at least twenty-four hours prior to receiving the abortion.

Appellate Information

• Decided 11/13/2006
• Published 11/13/2006

Judges

• Before COLE, GIBBONS, and ROGERS, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Sixth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• ARGUED:  Alphonse A. Gerhardstein, Gerhardstein & Branch, Cincinnati, Ohio, for Appellants.  Diane Richards Brey, Office of the Attorney General of Ohio, Columbus, Ohio, for Appellees.   ON BRIEF:  Alphonse A. Gerhardstein, Jennifer L. Branch, Gerhardstein & Branch, Cincinnati, Ohio, David A. Friedman, Fernandez Friedman Grossman Kohn & Son, Louisville, Kentucky, for Appellants.  Diane Richards Brey, Stephen P. Carney, Douglas R. Cole, Office of the Attorney General of Ohio, Columbus, Ohio, Anne Berry Strait, Tracy M. Greuel, Office of the Attorney General, Charitable Law Section, Columbus, Ohio, for Appellees.