Woman has hysterectomy as part of plea deal

MILWAUKEE - When Michelle LeFeber was rushed to a hospital emergency room on the Fourth of July, 2005, bleeding heavily, she told doctors she was probably passing kidney stones.

As they examined her, however, doctors found evidence that LeFeber had recently given birth. Police never found a baby. But they did find out about a strikingly similar hospital visit the Wrightstown, Wis., woman made10 months before.

Criminal charges in the bizarre case have now been resolved, but questions from it may never be. As part of an unusual plea deal, LeFeber recently had hysterectomy - a procedure her husband thought she underwent years ago. Although doctors and prosecutors believe LeFeber gave birth twice, she hasn't even admitted being pregnant. The babies' whereabouts remain a mystery.

LeFeber was convicted only of three misdemeanors. Door County Assistant District Attorney Joan Korb said she wasn't particularly comfortable with that outcome, but her hands were tied by medical privacy laws.

In addition to being sterilized, LeFeber, 39 and the mother of three teen-agers, must submit to a mental health evaluation and treatment. She also must serve three years' probation and complete 200 hours of community service.

Despite the legal hurdles Korb faced in the prosecution, she said she would not have dismissed a felony charge of concealing the death of a child if LeFeber had not agreed to be sterilized.

"Sometimes drastic cases require some drastic measures to eliminate harm to future victims," Korb said.

LeFeber's attorney, Patrick J. Schott of Brookfield, Wis., said his client was not strong-armed by the state to have the surgery.

"It was a voluntary medical procedure that she underwent for medical reasons," Schott said Wednesday. "Given the motions that were filed in the case, the expense and what occurred in the case, her position is she wanted the matter resolved and put behind her."

According to a criminal complaint filed in Door County Circuit Court, LeFeber first came to authorities' attention in September 2004 after she was admitted to the emergency room at Door County Memorial Hospital with heavy vaginal bleeding. LeFeber said she had been camping with her parents, husband and son outside Sturgeon Bay, Wis., when she awoke in pain. She said she drove to her parents' nearby home, where she began hemorrhaging.

Hospital officials called police four days later, when tests revealed placental tissue from a pregnancy in the third trimester, the complaint says. But by then, her parents' home had been cleaned and the trash collected.

Sturgeon Bay authorities were still investigating the incident when LeFeber showed up at a different hospital in July 2005, the complaint says. This time, paramedics had picked her up at the Bay Shore Park and Campground in Brown County. At the hospital, she delivered a placenta, the complaint says.

"Again, in Brown County as in Door County, doctors were stating that LeFeber had given birth to a baby; however, the whereabouts of the baby were unknown," the complaint says.

Police searched the park and LeFeber's camper, but did not find a fetus or a baby.

LeFeber again denied being pregnant. Her husband, Randy, whom she married in 2001, said she told him she was a cervical cancer survivor and had a hysterectomy before they started dating in 1997, according to the complaint. They never used birth control, he told police.

LeFeber ended up pleading guilty to two counts of neglecting a child and one count of obstructing an officer, a charge based on her statements to police that she was not pregnant. She has never made an explicit admission that she gave birth or described what happened to the babies, according to Korb and court records. In the past 12 years in Wisconsin, at least 14 other women have been convicted in similar birth cases. Their sentences have ranged from probation to life in prison. In all of those cases, however, prosecutors had either a body or an acknowledgment that the woman had given birth.

Korb said she agreed to reduce the charges against LeFeber because the medical evidence of the pregnancies was at risk of being thrown out. A defense motion pending when the case was resolved last week argued that doctors who treated LeFeber violated her privacy when they discussed her medical treatment with authorities. Under state law, such discussions are generally not allowed. The only exceptions are homicide and child abuse, both of which would have been tough to prove without the bodies, Korb said.

"Unfortunately, we were kind of over a barrel," she said.

As a result, Korb said she plans to work with the state bar association, the district attorneys' association and her local legislators to have another exception written into the medical privacy law.

"Who is going to report this other than a medical professional? ... It would be really easy to put another exception into the state statute in regards to concealing a corpse or concealing the death of a child," she said.

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(c) 2006, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service.