Edelin Resumes Witness Stand Today

Dr. Kenneth C. Edelin will resume the stand in his own defense today in Suffolk County Court, after delivering testimony Friday disputing key prosecution allegations in the manslaughter case against him.

Prosecutor Newman A. Flanagan, assistant district attorney, will continue his cross-examination of Edelin which he began late Friday.

Edelin testified under direct examination that on October 3, 1973, the date of the hysterotomy operation for which he was indicated, the clocks in the Boston City Hospital where he was operating were broken.

The prosecution had produced eyewitness testimony that during that operation. Edelin stood looking at a clock on the wall for a period of at least three minutes, while he kept his hand motionless within the uterus of the patient.

Flanagan alleged that during that period. Edelin allowed a "male child" to "suffocate" within the uterus.

Under examination by defense attorney William P. Homans Jr. '41. Edelin said. "My memory is that the clocks were not functioning or may even have been removed for repair."

Photographs

Homans sought to establish, through the presentation of photographs of the operating room, that Edelin could only have been facing away from the two clocks in the room during the operation.

Despite Flanagan's objection. Homans brought Edelin to the defense table and had him stand over it with his head craned in the other direction, in an apparent effort to demonstrate the difficulty of the act Edelin is charged with.

Homans stared at his watch for three minutes while Edelin stood reddened and contorted, with his neck twisted awkwardly backward.

When Edelin returned to the witness stand, Homans asked. "Did you look at the clock for any period of time?" Edelin said, "No."

Earlier in the day Edelin described in detail the "abortion by hysterotomy," in which he performed an abdomenal in- cision on the 17-year-old patient to expose the uterus and remove the fetus

Edelin said that he decided on October 2, 1973, to perform the hysterotomy operation after two unsuccessful attempts to abort the fetus by injection of saline solution into the womb.

Bloody Tape

In those efforts, Edelin said, he inserted a long needle through the abdomen and into the uterus to withdraw a quantity of the amniotic fluid that surrounds the fetus, but than these "taps" produced bloody fluid.

Edelin said that all his actions were in accordance with "accepted medical procedure."

He also said that the decision to "go ahead with the hysterotomy for the purposes of abortion" was approved by Dr. James F. Penza Jr., then associate director of the Boston City Hospital obstetrics and gynecology department.

Penza testified under prosecution examination in early January that the extent of his involvement with the patient during her stay at Boston City Hospital was in regard to the saline infusion attempts.

Flanagan said during a recess Friday, "Somebody isn't telling the truth."

Penza could not be reached for comment yesterday.

Edelin testified Friday that in the course of the hysterotomy operation, the amniotic sac that surrounds the fetus "unfortunately" broke, and that this rupture made it "difficult" to extract the fetus.

He said that from the point of incision of the uterus to removal of the fetus, the operation took "a couple of minutes."

Edelin said that he sought to determine whether the fetus's heart was still beating before handing the fetus to in nurse, by placing his finger on the chest of the fetus.

Heartbeat

He said that he observed no heartbeat.

Homans established that obstetrics and gynecology department regulations, set up by Edelin as chief resident in 1973, dictated that if a "live" fetus was delivered in the course of an attempted abortion by hysterotomy or saline infusion, it was to be taken immediately to the new-born nursery.

Homans concluded his examination of Edelin, before 3:30 p.m. Friday.

Flanagan opened his cross-examination by questioning the medical sources Edelin said he relied on in performing abortions.

The prosecutor cited three texts and asked Edelin if say book allowed for abortion on fetuses of over 20 weeks gestational age.

The prosecution alleges that the involved fetus was between 24 and 28 weeks old. The defense claims that it was between 20 and 22 weeks old.

Edelin acknowledged after skimming passages from the tests that he could not find references to abortions in excess of 20 weeks fetal age, but that none of the books "set an upper limit" on abortion