Chico Feminist Women's Health Center v. Butte Glenn Medical Society

OPINION AND ORDER

The Chico Feminist Women’s Health Center [“Center”] is a non-profit clinic located in Chico, California, which offers a broad range of health services to women in Northern California, Southern Oregon and Western Nevada. Included among those services is the provision of elective vacuum aspiration abortions. Lorene Reed is a Butte County resident who sought and obtained an abortion at the Center.

On January 22,1981, the Center and Lorene Reed filed suit against the Butte Glenn Medical Society, Drs. Jerome Weinbaum, William Reed, Dennis Dalisky, Joseph Brooks, Homer Heath, Thomas Lorenz and Dale Ritter [hereafter collectively referred to as “BGMS”], Dr. Stephen Cowdrey, Joanne Cowdrey, N.T. Enloe Memorial Hospital [“Enloe Hospital”] and Norcal Mutual Insurance Company [“Norcal”]. The complaint alleges: (1) restraint of trade and monopolization in violation of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1 and 2; (2) violations of federal constitutional privacy, due process and equal protection rights, 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983 , 1985(3), U.S. Const.amend. XIV, § 1; (3) violation of California’s constitutional right of privacy, Cal. Const, art. I, § 1; (4) violation of Cal.Ins.Code §…