Man Charged In Abortion Doctor Slaying

Scott Roeder Charged With Murder In Shooting Death Of Dr. George Tiller At Kansas Church

(CBS/AP)  An activist abortion opponent was charged Tuesday with first-degree murder in the death of late-term abortion provider Dr. George Tiller, asking the judge by video when he would see his court-appointed lawyer.

Scott Roeder, 51, was shown via a video link from the Sedgwick County Jail. He fiddled with the charging documents on a podium in front of him, and said "OK," when Judge Ben Burgess read the charges.

Burgess ordered Roeder to be held without bond and said he was not allowed to communicate with Tiller's family. The judge told Roeder that he would be assigned a public defender.

"And I'll obviously be hearing from one of those lawyers between now - or do you know how long it will be before I hear from one of those lawyers?" Roeder said.

Within two days, the judge answered to Roeder's only question in the brief appearance. A preliminary hearing is set for June 16.

Roeder is accused of shooting Tiller to death Sunday at the doctor's Lutheran church in Wichita as he was serving as an usher. Roeder also was charged with aggravated assault for allegedly threatening two people who tried to stop him.

Roeder was arrested about three hours after the shooting near Gardner, about 170 miles northeast of Wichita. His last known address is in Kansas City, Mo.

Roeder's family life began unraveling more than a decade ago when he got involved with anti-government groups, and then became "very religious in an Old Testament, eye-for-an-eye way," his former wife said.

"The anti-tax stuff came first, and then it grew and grew. He became very anti-abortion," said Lindsey Roeder, who was married to Scott Roeder for 10 years but "strongly disagrees with his beliefs." He moved out in 1994, and the couple divorced in 1996. They have one son, now 22.

"He started falling apart," Lindsey Roeder told The Associated Press on Monday. "I had to protect myself and my son."

Roeder's brother said he suffered from mental illness at various times in his life.

"However, none of us ever saw Scott as a person capable of or willing to take another person's life. Our deepest regrets, prayers and sympathy go out to the Tiller family during this terrible time," his brother, David, said in a statement.

Roeder's mental health and anti-government activities were also factors in a custody battle in Pennsylvania, The Kansas City Star reported Tuesday. Roeder sued in 2003 for the right to visit a girl he said was his daughter. The child was born in 2002. But the child's mother fought Roeder's request, saying he would not be a good influence because his association with "anti-government organizations is ongoing."

A 2005 court ruling also said Roeder had been diagnosed with schizophrenia and did not take medication, "which may pose a clear and present danger to the minor child," according to The Star.

Lindsey Roeder said from her home in a Kansas City suburb that the early years of the marriage were good and that Scott Roeder worked in an envelope factory. But she said he moved out of their home after he became involved with the Freemen movement, an anti-government group that discouraged the paying of taxes.

He then became involved with a church based on the Old Testament, but she said she did not know much about its beliefs. She thought it was strange when he showed up Friday to take their son out to dinner and to see the movie "Star Trek."

"That's his Sabbath," she said. "So we wouldn't usually see him on a Friday or Saturday. ... I think now, that he was saying goodbye."

In 1996, Roeder was arrested in Topeka after being stopped by sheriff's deputies because his car lacked a valid license plate. Instead, it bore a tag declaring him a "sovereign" and immune from state law. In the trunk, deputies found materials that could be assembled into a bomb.

He was convicted and sentenced to two years on probation and ordered to stop associating with violent anti-government groups. But the Kansas Court of Appeals overturned his conviction in 1997, ruling that authorities seized evidence against Roeder during an illegal search of his car.

The appeals court ruling appeared to energize him, Lindsey Roeder said.

"When they let him out because of the illegal search that made him even more self-righteous. He would say 'See, I'm right, and you're wrong,'" she said.

He was known by sight and license plate number to workers at a clinic in Kansas City, Kansas, where he had put glue in backdoor locks, most recently on Saturday, the day before Tiller's death, a clinic worker said Monday night.

Tiller's family announced Tuesday that there were no plans yet to reopen his Wichita clinic, despite earlier comments from Dr. LeRoy Carhart, one of four physicians who worked at the clinic.

(Left: Janet FitzGerald holds a sign during a candlelight vigil for Dr. George Tiller at a park in Lawrence, Kan., May 31, 2009.)

Carhart, 67, of Bellevue, Nebraska, had said Monday that the clinic would reopen next week. On Tuesday, he said he apparently misunderstood Tiller's wife, Jeanne Tiller, when she talked to the staff about the clinic's future on Monday. "I hope we can work this out with the Tiller family," Carhart said in a telephone interview from his Nebraska clinic.

Some anti-abortion activists said they were familiar with Roeder. Regina Dinwiddie, a protester in the Kansas City area, said she had picketed a Planned Parenthood clinic with Roeder. She said she was "glad" about Tiller's death.

"I wouldn't cry for him no more than I would if somebody dropped a rat and killed it," she said.

Police said it appears the gunman acted alone, and some anti-abortion groups quickly distanced themselves from the killing. Outside Tiller's clinic, the Kansas Coalition for Life placed signs saying members had prayed for Tiller's change of heart, "not his murder."

Dave Leach, publisher of the magazine Prayer and Action News, said he met Roeder about 15 years ago. A decade ago, Roeder subscribed to the quarterly magazine, which is published in Iowa and has said "justifiable homicide" against abortion providers can be supported, Leach said.

"Scott is not my hero in that sense; he has not inspired me to shoot an abortionist," Leach said in an e-mail. "But definitely, he will be the hero to thousands of babies who will not be slain because Scott sacrificed everything for them."

Some abortion clinics across the country responded to Tiller's death with increased security, while others said they would not discuss their security procedures.

In West Palm Beach, Florida, Monica Reis, founder of the Presidential Women's Center, said clinic staff "will continue to do what we always do, which is to be vigilant, to be aware, to be conscious."

Susan Hill, president of the National Women's Health Organization, which runs the only abortion clinic in Mississippi, said additional security measures have been taken at the Jackson clinic and officials have been in contact with the Justice Department.

"We will have even more security tomorrow," she said.

A funeral service for Tiller was planned for Saturday.

[Aldymac]

When we were under fire with incoming artillary or rockets or mortars, it didn't matter what we were before the attack, we were all praying during the attack. I never heard allahs name mentioned. There were those who said they were athiests but for the times under fire they were praying as well. I was a democrat then and untill people put Clinton in office the second time I was, then I changed.
Ten years after R V W, a poll was taken of MDs, they were asked about the occurance of problem pregnancys that were life threatening, I don't remember how many took the poll but only one dealt with a problem pregnancy. Several of those doctors were retired, seems strange that over a million and half women per year have a problem pregnancy. Booze, drugs, STDs, low life boyfriends who just use the women for their own pleasure then dump them, yes, those are the biggest problems that arise and cause abortions today. There are more but I won't bore you, you know what they are.
If a "child" doesn't go through conception to birth, there won't be a birth, up untill R V W one term for women to say they were pregnant was; "I'm with child", funny what an act of congress can do to change the way we think, EH.
MONEY, is still the bottom line in the abortion debate, wether you like it or not.
I don't listen to Rush or watch Fox, if its as bad as what all you bashers say about it, I can watch CBS and get just as much "truth" as you do, Whooa, wait a minute, some of you are even bashing CBS. Bashing is not much more than a game with some of those on this board, doesn't matter what or who.

[hoofhearted0]

Polititions gave women the "right to kill" their own child for certain reasons, but it all comes down to the bottom line, "MONEY".
Posted by Aldymac at 2:24 PM : Jun 4, 2009
---------------------------------------------------------------

You don't know what you are talking about. No one gave women the right to kill their children.

A child is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty. In the U.S. the legal definition of "child" is a human being under the age of 18; it does not include fetuses.

In the U.S. most states have laws that protect fetuses after 26 weeks of pregnancy.

[galloglaigh]

There were more Christians who died on the battlefield for the freedom of the American people than there were liberals, thats something those who love to bash Christians to think about, if you can.
Posted by Aldymac at 2:24 PM : Jun 4, 2009


What are you saying here? Liberals aren't christians? Or christians aren't liberals? Liberals don't defend American freedoms and christians do? You make no sense.

Having served in the U.S. military for almost 30 years, I know for a fact that the military has the same ratio of liberals/conservatives as does the U.S. population--about 50/50 (depending on who is running for president).

The problem with christians (and conservatives) is that, like islamists, they would like to re-write all the laws in a manner that the laws favor their "restricted" views. Now, when the islamists do that we call them the "taliban." When the christians do it we call them the "christian taliban."

I don't know any liberals who think Tiller is a saint or a hero; he was a doctor who was doing his job saving the lives of women who were in problem pregnancies. You christian extremists always overstate and exagerate the facts and make up stories to enhance you weak positions, like your heros Rush Limpball and Bill O'really.

OBTW: Did you know that most christians in the western hemisphere are "cultural christians?" This includes a lot of conservative christians.

Look it up.

[Aldymac]

Polititions gave women the "right to kill" their own child for certain reasons, but it all comes down to the bottom line, "MONEY". Making it a right just takes away the concequences for the mother through the law, that still doesn't make it, "right".
All the polititions did was cheapen the value of life for a kickback and to spend our hard earned tax dollars.
Those who have never had their own lives at the point of being extinguished in a spilt second or laying in a hospital CCU totally at the mercy of a machine are those who have never come to value life. It's easy for them to agree with abortion, doesn't mean anything to them, it's someone elses pain.
I have been in combat, I have been in a CCU later in life fighting for my life, I have been in a hospital with my wife when she went through an abortion with our first child, Agent Orange made a mess of that child and 'nature' wouldn't let it be born, it still pains us.
Anyone who thinks that life is nothing, and life doesn't begin untill it comes through the womb and breathes it's first breath, are people who still don't know the real value of life.
If your own life didn't begin with conception, then how did you make it here in the first place?
I don't condon the killing of the doctor, Scott Roeder crossed a line when he decided to kill Dr. Tiller, Roeder should get the death penalty, but Tiller was no hero either. For the liberals to treat him as a hero, or a saint is to be expected, after all, they are just liberals.
Islamist terrorists envy people like Dr. Tiller, they would all like to have acomplished as many killings as the good Dr., and they love it when people call christians terrorists, it lets them off the hook and gives the news media another villian. There were more Christians who died on the battlefield for the freedom of the American people than there were liberals, thats something those who love to bash Christians to think about, if you can.

[valentin73]

He wanted to prove to the world just how sick he was by taking an innocent life. And he did! The question: what to do with him now arises.

[hoofhearted0]

Any way you cut it, Roeder is a terrorist. Obviously he was a human bomb waiting to go off. He's been terrorizing clinics for years. If he had a Muslim name he would have been in jail years ago.

Our government has a way of "sweeping" domestic terrorist activity "under the rug," especially if the perps have non-Muslim names.

Is anyone even aware of the largest domestic terrorist arrests since the Oklahoma bombings? Probably not; Homeland Security and the FBI kept it low key.

It happened in "Noonday, Texas" when two locals, a man and his common-law wife, were arrested and nearly two pounds of sodium cyanide, half a million rounds of ammo, and bombs and other weapons, including machine guns, were seized.

LOL. And the guy only got eleven years.

Fortunately, in the Noonday case, the Feds acted in time to prevent any deaths; but they dropped the ball in the case of Roeder. They had plenty of opportunity to "detain" Roeder but they blew it.

[dwilson59]

crickets crickets crickets
Posted by dwilson59
your fear mongering banter is boring and unoriginal
Posted by oneof_many at 4:29 PM : Jun 3, 2009

All I ask for is one thing proof and if I am wrong I will say so.

[dwilson59]

crickets crickets crickets

[dwilson59]

Now they just need to lock up some of the hate mongers on Fox news and on white wing talk radio. These dangerous morons have been inciting the lizard brained reactionary Christian fascists for years.
Posted by noloyalisti at 2:41 PM : Jun 3, 20

Yeppers! I know they can't, but I wish they would charge Rush, Falwell, the Christian Coalition, and Fox News all as accessories to murder.
Posted by bong-refuge at 2:52 PM : Jun 3, 2009

OK just give me one time Ruch Falwell or the Christian Coalition and Fox news incited violance.

Just one time just show me

[dwilson59]

Now they need to shut down the hate mongers on News for Dumb Fox. I don't favor censorship but these white wing wackos are responsible for countless violence and death in the US and across the world by their hate speech, complicity and support of Christian fascists.
Posted by noloyalisti at 10:57 AM : Jun 3, 2009

You have the far Right and the Far Left both are bad. What is Hate Speech does it only come from Christian Fascists you know and I know that is not true.

[dwilson59]

I mean these are mostly right wing wackos who support war and torture and the GOP, the party of death.
Posted by noloyalisti at 3:20 PM : Jun 3, 2009

Yes I Do Thank You

[noloyalisti]

Hey Bong, I like your handle. That's what some of these uptight right wing reactionaries should do, smoke some. Maybe then they would not be trying to justify murder and terrorism because of their shallow, fake and hypocritical religious beliefs. I mean these are mostly right wing wackos who support war and torture and the GOP, the party of death.

[noloyalisti]

Now they just need to lock up some of the hate mongers on Fox news and on white wing talk radio. These dangerous morons have been inciting the lizard brained reactionary Christian fascists for years.

[noloyalisti]

Now they need to shut down the hate mongers on News for Dumb Fox. I don't favor censorship but these white wing wackos are responsible for countless violence and death in the US and across the world by their hate speech, complicity and support of Christian fascists.

[freespeech101]

I think Billo got a call from the FBI/Eric Holder's office. He is running scared now. We need to keep the pressure on these people who hide behind free speech and use their position in the media to incite the nutcases to do their dirty bidding by their toxic rhetoric over the air waves that incite these people to commit murder against those who do not hold their point of view. I hope that Dr. Tiller's family go after Billo and FOX News.

I saw a video clip where Billos people were harassing Dr. Tiller to the point where he could not get into his car and he had to call 911 and tell them that Billos people were preventing him from getting into his car and going to work, after the call the guy moved out of Dr. Tiller's way and allow him to get into his car.

The way how Operation Rescue and Billo stalk and harass Dr. Tiller and his family and staff, to the point of his assassination, some one needs to go to prison other then the guy who pull the trigger. This is America, we cannot endorse this kind of behavior. The Dr. was operating lawfully.

[blog_fever2]

Lord help this man... we are not judges, just fruit inspectors. God help our nation.

[scyouth]

Thanks for the math professsor green teeth.
Posted by oneof_many

If I'm a math professor I'm obviously not "(In my) mothers basement and (in need of) a job am I?. You people are so much fun to play with, but for now I've got to sign off. TTFN.

[darwufche]

Execute the idiot to give him his own medicine. He'll understand that.

[scyouth]

Why not all the unwanted kids in this country??? Well buffon there is an immediate chance of death for babiies outside the counrty, agency requiremnts,along with a host of other reasons, but to think that "All" of anything is naive ignorance. Black families are helped because the exchange rate to the dollar is good. How retarded are you?
Posted by oneof_many

I'll ignore you're awful spelling. "Well buffon there is an immediate chance of death for babiies outside the counrty," and there's not for the kids on the streets in this country? And as for your exchange rate statement - I have no clue what that has to do with anything.

[scyouth]

Ok Conspiracy Brother , what is the percentage .0000000000001?
Posted by oneof_many

Your %age is 1 in 10(power 13). Theres only 6 x10(power 9) people in the world. I'd say you're off a little in your estimate.