To the editor:

In his March 2 column, Mike Hoeflich wrote that Atty. Gen. Phill Kline’s “attempt to subpoena the medical records of patients who underwent late-term abortions are troubling to me on other grounds.” Hoeflich criticized Kline’s action because it puts “doctor-patient confidentiality” at great risk.

Many have joined Hoeflich in condemning Kline’s investigation. Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, a Topeka Democrat, has said it’s “completely inappropriate” to demand access to medical records, Peter Brownlie of Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri said his organization would “resolutely oppose” any attempt to gain private medical records of any patient, and the Los Angeles Times editorialized on March 3 that Kline “refuses to acknowledge constitutional guarantees of privacy.”

An item in the March 4 issue of the Journal-World noted that DNA samples were used to capture BTK suspect Dennis Rader. According to the article, “investigators had obtained DNA before Rader’s arrest from a tissue sample that came from his 26-year-old daughter’s medical records. They took it without her knowledge.”

If Hoeflich, Hensley, Brownlie, the Los Angeles Times and other critics of Kline’s efforts to investigate statutory rape cases do not also criticize the violations of doctor-patient confidentiality and constitutional guarantees of privacy regarding the medical records of Rader’s daughter, readers might reasonably conclude that their criticism stems from their support for abortion rather than a genuine concern for privacy issues.

Kevin Groenhagen,

Lawrence