Wichita ? A Sedgwick County grand jury found no criminal conduct in the death of a mentally retarded woman who suffered a massive infection after a late-term abortion.

Dist. Atty. Nola Foulston said Monday that the grand jury was dismissed without returning an indictment in the death of 19-year-old Christin Gilbert, a Texas woman with Down syndrome.

An autopsy report showed Gilbert died in January 2005 of complications from an abortion at Women’s Health Care Services.

The grand jury had heard testimony since May, after anti-abortion advocates presented a petition with more than 7,700 signatures to the clerk of Sedgwick County District Court calling for a grand jury investigation.

Abortion opponents contended Gilbert did not have the mental capacity to consent to sex or an abortion. They also wanted Dr. George Tiller, who owns Women’s Health Care Services, charged with offenses such as involuntary manslaughter, mistreatment of a dependent adult and failure to report abuse of a child.

Tiller, one of the few doctors in the country who specializes in late-term abortions, was cleared in December of any wrongdoing by the Kansas Board of Healing Arts. But anti-abortion advocates were able to take advantage of a 1970 state law that allows the public to petition for a grand jury.

Gilbert was 28 weeks pregnant when she was brought to Wichita from Texas for a late-term abortion at Tiller’s clinic. She died three days later from a fungal infection that caused her internal organs to fail.