“This bill should provide protection for Kansas citizens from the application of foreign laws,” said Stephen Gele, spokesman for the American Public Policy Alliance, a Michigan group promoting model legislation similar to the new Kansas law. “The bill does not read, in any way, to be discriminatory against any religion.” According to the Associated Press. However,  the alliance website does state that it wants to protect Americans’ freedoms from foreign laws and legal doctrines, “especially Islamic Shariah Law.”

Muslims organizations including the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) claim they will most likely challenge the law in court because supporters of the law often speak concern about Sharia law specifically. They argue the law could cause discrimination. “If he claims it has nothing to do with Shariah or Islamic law or Muslims, then he wasn’t paying attention.” CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper said of Governor Brownback.

Although there are no known cases of Kansas courts deferring to Sharia law, it would appear they don’t want it to become an issue.  There is a pending case were a man is attempting to divorce his wife and seeing the property be divided in accordance with Sharia law.

House Substitute for SENATE BILL No. 79 will take effect July 1st.

Howe explained to Judge Stephen Tatum that former Attorney General Steve Six had destroyed the copies of Termination of Pregnancy (TOP) forms obtained through subpoena under former Attorney General Phill Kline. The destruction took place after Kline had filed the charges and while the case was under appeal. Howe indicated that the destruction of the evidence by Six “may have violated their own retention policy.”

Last month, Howe stunned pro-life supporters when he told Judge Tatum that the original TOP forms submitted by Planned Parenthood to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) had been destroyed in 2005 “for reasons still unclear.”

The forms were critical evidence since a copy of the forms were supposed to be maintained in the patient files. However, when Kline received the patient files after three years of legal wrangling, it was discovered that the forms submitted to KDHE and the forms in the patient records did not match. Judge Richard Anderson had the forms analyzed by police handwriting evidence and determined that the forms in the patient filed had been manufactured. (View copies of one set of these forms.)

Operation Rescue received documents via an open records request that shows on August 10, 2005, Planned Parenthood’s Sheila Kostas made an e-mail request for information on all the TOP forms submitted by their organization for the years 2000-2004. The Kansas Supreme Court was set to hear oral arguments just a few weeks later on September 5, 2005, concerning weather Planned Parenthood and abortionist George Tiller would have to comply with subpoenas for patient records. (Note: On September 2, 2005, Operation Rescue documented the shredding a huge number of documents in the parking lot of Tiller’s Wichita abortion clinic.)

The records show that KDHE’s Greg Crawford complied with Kosta’s request the following day. Information supplied by Crawford could have easily been used by Planned Parenthood to fill out bogus TOP forms and insert them into the patient files to cover up for the fact that they had not maintained the records as required by law.

Without the original forms or the copies obtained by Kline, Howe told the court that he was left with an incomplete set of copies and cannot establish a chain of custody for them, making the legal hurdles in continuing the prosecution of the felony charges “insurmountable.”

Howe did express that he is proceeding on the remaining 58 criminal counts. The next hearing in the case was set for February 22, 2012.

“Steve Six must be held accountable for this destruction of evidence and obstruction of justice,” said Operation rescue President Troy Newman, who was present at the hearing. “What we have is a conspiracy to destroy evidence in order to protect Planned Parenthood. The more we learn, the more apparent it becomes that former Gov. Kathleen Sebelius is at the heart of this political corruption. She appointed Six and controlled him and the KDHE under her administration. We must have an aggressive investigation of this scandal.”

Later today, Attorney General Derek Schmidt, who defeated Six in his 2010 bid for re-election, asked the Shawnee County Sheriff’s Office to conduct an full and independent investigation into the destruction of evidence against Planned Parenthood.

“We hope this investigation will be done impartially and without the political bias that tainted the Sebelius administration,” said Newman. “While we are disappointed and troubled that the felony charges cannot proceed, we are pleased that 58 very serious counts related to illegal late-term abortions are moving forward. There is still some hope that a small measure of justice can still be achieved.”