Ariel Knights: Mother Sues Abortion Clinic After Birth Of "Miracle Baby"

22-year-old Ariel Knights and her fiancé consider their healthy, 7-month-old daughter their “miracle baby” after the child survived a failed abortion last March and was carried through to term.

“That’s a sore subject to think about,” Knights said in an interview with the Akron Beacon Journal on March 15. “It’s hard thinking she’s here and thinking, if they would have done their job … It’s just something I don’t like to think about.”

Their adoration for their daughter, however, did not stop the Ohio couple from filing a malpractice lawsuit against the Akron Women’s Medical Group last month, seeking unspecified damages of at least $25,000 for the pain, suffering, and emotional distress Knights said the failed abortion caused her.

The decision to abort last spring was based off the advice of doctors who told Knights that both her pregnancy and her life could be threatened because the fetus was carried in an unstable uterus, due to her genetic condition, uterine didelphys, which results in a double uterus with individual cervices.  

Knights, a dental technician from Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, was already mother to her preschool-aged son at the time, and felt that the risks involved in her second pregnancy were too great to endure.

“I was put in jeopardy,” Knights said to the Journal. “And I have a son that I am supposed to be taking care of.”

After undergoing the procedure at the Akron Women’s Medical Group, Knights was told by the doctors that the operation had been successful. But for days afterwards she was in constant pain. A week later she visited the ER, where she learned that she was still pregnant.

Knights allegedly called the Akron clinic and was referred to their office in Cleveland, but declined to visit. After attempting to make an appointment with another clinic that said it would not treat her for “somebody else’s mistake,” Knights decided to go through with the pregnancy, which included multiple trips to the ER, four hospital admissions, each lasting three to five days, and biweekly visits with a doctor who specializes in high-risk pregnancies. She says the fear for her life and her baby’s life never left her mind.

The mother of two is now seeking answers and hopes that the case will shed light on what really happened at the Ohio abortion clinic one year ago. The lawsuit filed on March 4 has been assigned to Judge Amy Corrigall Jones, and will make its way through the Summit County Common Pleas Court of Akron, Ohio.