By Cheryl Sullenger
West Philadelphia, PA – The notorious building that once housed Kermit Gosnell’s infamous “House of Horrors” abortion facility will likely go on the auction-block sometime in 2019 to satisfy nearly $50,000 in back property taxes and unpaid utilities accrued since the clinic was shut down in early 2010.
Now, the Mantua/Powelton Village area of West Philadelphia, where Gosnell’s deteriorating 2,700-square-foot brick building is located, is undergoing a renewal of sorts, with more well-to-do younger people moving into the area. Gosnell’s former abortion facility at 3801 Lancaster Avenue in Powelton Village is in the center of this urban rebirth and is a prime location for development, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Gosnell or his representatives may object to the building’s sale at a hearing set for November 27, 2018, but authorities have expressed doubt that any objections will be made. After that hearing, the property will then be scheduled for auction sometime early next year.
Gosnell’s once-grand Victorian home in Manuta, where he famously sat at a piano and played Chopin while investigators searched his flea-infested basement for bodies of additional victims of his grisly crime spree, is already set for auction on January 19, 2018. Today, that property is essentially rotting on its foundations, with an ironic “For Rent” sign still dangling from the porch.
In 2013, Gosnell was convicted of hundreds of criminal counts, including three counts of First-Degree Murder for killing babies born alive during shoddy late-term abortions only to be murdered by a process Gosnell called “snipping.” He would insert scissors in the back of the necks of living infants then cut their spinal cords to end their lives. For these crimes, he will spend the rest of his life in prison. Operation Rescue attended the trial and covered it daily.

But Gosnell was also convicted of Involuntary Manslaughter for the death of one of his abortion patients, Karnamaya Mongar, a 41-year old immigrant who came to America from Bhutan by way of a refugee camp in Nepal. She was overdosed on pain-killers and sedation drugs by Gosnell’s incompetent clinic workers. When Mongar began to suffer respiratory distress during the late-term abortion, Gosnell continued with the procedure without stopping to render medical aid to his dying patient. Paramedics were eventually called, but his filthy clinic was a cluttered maze that made gurney access impossible. The rescuers had to clear an emergency access hallway and break though a locked door to extract Mongar from the facility. She was later pronounced dead at a local hospital.
After Gosnell’s criminal conviction, Mongar’s adult daughter, Yashoda Gurung, took Gosnell to court for the wrongful death of her mother, and was awarded nearly $4 million dollars in compensatory and punitive damages in 2015. However, collecting on that judgment has been difficult.
Despite allegedly owning 20 properties, including the building on Lancaster Avenue, along with amassing a small fortune cutting every corner in his medical practice while exploiting poor women, Gosnell claims he has no assets.
Sadly, it appears that all of the proceeds from the impending sale of his clinic and home will go to the county to satisfy his tax debt, with nothing left to help satisfy the debt owed to Mongar’s family. Nevertheless, Gurung’s attorney, Bernard W. Smalley, Sr., who says that Gosnell “squandered his assets,” continues the long, difficult fight on behalf of the family to collect on the $4 million award.
“It is unfortunate that Karnamaya Mongar’s family will not benefit from the sale of Gosnell’s former office and home. They have lost so much and continue to be hurt by Gosnell,” said Troy Newman, Operation Rescue. “It will be interesting to see what becomes of Gosnell’s old abortion clinic. It would be great if something was done to bring healing to the community, such as a children’s clinic or some such business that will benefit the people. It will really depend on who buys it, and what their motivations are.”
Newman has experience in such matters. In 2006, Operation Rescue purchased a building that housed a failing abortion business in Wichita, Kansas. The business was shut down and the building was rehabbed and converted into Operation Rescue’s national headquarters.
“Today, where babies once died by the thousands, we are working to save innocent lives from abortion. It is a testament to God’s redemptive power to restore and heal communities and people,” Newman said. “We hope that Gosnell’s old clinic can be redeemed in a similar way so that the place where there was so much human tragedy can soon be a place of blessing to the community.”
To learn more about the Gosnell abortion/murder trial, read The Trial of Kermit Gosnell: The Shocking Details and What it Revealed about Abortion in America by Cheryl Sullenger.