LOS ANGELES -- Hundreds of human fetuses, some possibly in the sixth month of development, were found stacked in a large shipping container picked up behind the home of a medical laboratory owner, police said Friday.
Detective Roland Drouin said the fetuses were preserved in formaldehyde in plastic white containers. Medical records also found in the container indicated that some of the fetuses had been aborted as long ago as 1979.
Drouin said police turned over the investigation to the coroner's office and county health officials and said coroner's investigators would determine at what point in development the fetuses had been aborted.
A county Health Department spokesman said his office will determine whether the fetuses were improperly disposed of. He said regulations require that fetuses be disposed of within days of an abortion.
The fetuses were discovered after the owner of the 20-foot crate repossessed it from Mel Weisberg, owner of Medical Analytic Laboratory Inc. in suburban Santa Monica, because of his failure to make a $1,700 payment.
'The company picked it up and brought it back to their company,' Drouin said. 'They noticed it was quite heavy and when they opened the doors they observed the container was full of cardboard boxes.
'They unloaded a box and dropped it and saw a little fetus. Some were the size of an egg and some looked like they would be five to six months old.'
Nick Martin, who opened the storage container, said there was also a putrid smell.
'They say they're just fetuses,' he added, 'but they sure looked like humans to me.'
Lab specimens and name tags were also stored in the container. Authorities said all of the boxes had not yet been opened.
California's abortion law does not place any limit on the stage of pregnancy at which an abortion may be performed, but allows them to be done only by licensed physicians. Most doctors are reluctant to perform abortions in the final three months of pregnancy unless a fetus is believed defective or the mother's health is endangered.
