BALTIMORE (Reuters) ? A New Jersey doctor facing murder charges stemming from the alleged abortion of late-term fetuses will be extradited to Maryland in the coming days, a New Jersey court spokesman said Wednesday.
Steven Chase Brigham, 55, who is charged in Maryland with five counts of first-degree murder and other charges, waived his right to an extradition hearing, said Jason Laughlin, a spokesman for the Camden County, New Jersey, prosecutor's office.
He was arrested on December 28, and his case could be the first to test Maryland's fetal homicide law.
The investigation into Brigham and an employee, Nicola Riley, who is charged with one count of first-degree murder, began in August 2010 following a botched abortion in Elkton, Maryland, where Brigham and Riley were present, police said.
Officers who searched the Maryland clinic during an ensuing investigation found 35 fetuses in a freezer, a source said.
Maryland prosecutors have declined to comment on how the murder charges are tied to the botched abortion or the frozen fetuses.
Maryland criminal law states that people can be charged with murder if they "intend to cause the death of the viable fetus." Its state law defines a fetus as "viable" if "there is a reasonable likelihood of the fetus' sustained survival outside the womb."
Brigham provided abortions to five patients ranging from 18 to 33 weeks pregnant, according to a report by the New Jersey State Board of Medical Examiners.
The report said Brigham started the five late-term abortion cases in his New Jersey clinic, giving patients injections that either softened the cervix or caused "fetal demise."
The patients then traveled to Maryland where the abortions were completed, the report said.
Brigham completed some abortions himself and Riley completed others under Brigham's supervision, the report said.
Brigham's New Jersey medical license was suspended in October 2010 and he had received a cease-and-desist warning in Maryland a month before that.
Brigham argued to the board that the procedures in New Jersey were only preliminary to an abortion and that he only consulted doctors at the Maryland clinic.
Brigham has been held in a Camden County jail on $3 million bond since his arrest at his home in Voorhees, New Jersey.
Elkton police have ten days to pick up Brigham and take him to Maryland and typically the process is completed in a few days, Laughlin said.
Ellis Rollins III, the Cecil County State's Attorney in Maryland, where Brigham will be prosecuted, did not return calls seeking comment. Brigham's lawyer in Maryland, C. Thomas Brown, also did not return calls seeking comment.
Riley was arrested in Salt Lake City. A bond hearing will be held on January 9, when extradition proceedings to Maryland may be determined. Riley is in custody on a no-bond warrant.
(Editing by Ellen Wulfhorst and Peter Bohan)
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