The week at a glance...United States

Muskegon, Mich.

Miscarriage lawsuit: The American Civil Liberties Union filed a negligence lawsuit in federal court last week on behalf of a woman who suffered a dangerous, prolonged miscarriage after being turned away from her local Catholic hospital. Tamesha Means, 30, rushed to Mercy Health Partners—the only hospital within 30 miles of her home—when her water broke 18 weeks into her pregnancy. According to the suit, even though doctors at the hospital would have known her fetus was doomed and that a termination was necessary to avoid the risk of a dangerous infection, Means was denied appropriate medical treatment on religious grounds; she was instead given Tylenol, and was sent home twice in “severe, unnecessary pain.” The ACLU filed its suit not against the hospital, but against the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which sets directives for Catholic hospitals, including the prohibition of abortion. Catholic hospitals account for approximately 15 percent of U.S. hospitals.

Detroit

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Bankruptcy granted: Detroit this week officially became the largest municipality in U.S. history to enter bankruptcy, as part of a precedent-setting ruling that may allow other cash-strapped cities to slash public pensions. “This once-proud city cannot pay its debts,” said Bankruptcy Judge Steven Rhodes as he declared that Detroit had met the legal criteria needed to receive Chapter 9 protection. Public unions had sued to block bankruptcy, claiming that emergency manager Kevyn Orr’s plan to cut the city’s $3.5 billion unfunded pension liability violated Michigan’s Constitution. But Rhodes, citing the city’s $18 billion debt, said that pensions had to be cut in order to provide residents with basic resources, such as emergency services. Rhodes’s decision strengthens the case for other bankrupt cities that want to cut retirement benefits, including San Bernardino, Calif.

Akron

Amish family flees: A 10-year-old Amish girl with leukemia has gone into hiding with her parents to avoid chemotherapy, the family’s attorney revealed last week. Sarah Hershberger’s family has been in a lengthy legal battle with doctors at Akron Children’s Hospital. The doctors say Hershberger’s disease is treatable and that she’ll die within a year without chemotherapy, but her parents favor herbs and vitamins over that treatment. “We’ve seen how sick it makes her,” said her father, Andy Hershberger, in August. “Our belief is the natural stuff will do just as much as that stuff if it’s God’s will.” The family fled their small Amish community in rural northeast Ohio in October, just days before a state appeals court appointed a guardian to make medical decisions on Sarah’s behalf. They traveled to a natural cancer treatment center in Central America but have since returned to the U.S.

Washington, D.C.

Porn surveillance: The National Security Agency apparently collected evidence of the pornography consumption of six Muslim “radicalizers” in a bid to harm their reputations, according to a document leaked by whistle-blower Edward Snowden. The official document, dated Oct. 3, 2012, lists the ways the NSA can exploit the “personal vulnerabilities” of the targets—none of whom are accused in the document of being involved in terror plots—in order to “call into question” their “devotion to the jihadist cause.” Such vulnerabilities included the sexually explicit material they’d viewed online and the sexually explicit language they’d used when communicating with “inexperienced young girls.” The document doesn’t indicate whether the NSA carried out its plan to discredit the men, all of whom apparently currently reside outside the U.S.

Washington, D.C.

Gun bill: Amid worries about new 3-D-printed plastic guns, the House of Representatives this week overwhelmingly approved a 10-year extension of a law requiring all guns to be detectable by metal screening machines. The legislation, however, has a significant loophole: Though it mandates that all guns include at least one metal part detectable by screeners used at airports, government buildings, and schools, the part can be removable and not necessarily required for the successful operation of the weapon. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said he would try to pass legislation in the Senate requiring such weapons to have at least one irremovable metal component. He said if he couldn’t get the necessary support for closing the loophole by Dec. 9, the day the legislation expires—and the day the Senate returns from recess—then the Senate would have to pass the House bill as is, loophole and all.

New York City

Train crash: A train driver was reportedly “nodding off’’ when he allowed his commuter train to barrel at 82 mph into a sharp, 30 mph curve this week, causing a derailment that killed four people and injured 67. Engineer William Rockefeller told his union representative he fell asleep “and caught himself too late’’ when the train crashed in the Bronx, sending its cars tumbling over and coming to a stop just short of the Harlem River. Passengers were flung about inside the cars, with some being ejected through shattered windows. Some of the injured suffered serious injuries, including spinal cord fractures. National Transportation Safety Board member Earl Weener said that the brakes were applied about five seconds before the crash—“very late in the game” to handle such a curve. Rockefeller, said to be distraught and cooperating, could face criminal charges.