By JOHN HANNA ~ Associated Press

TOPEKA (AP) – A prosecutor who’s still pursuing a criminal case against a Kansas City-area abortion clinic says he’s standing by statements he made in court that led to the dismissal of some of the criminal charges.

Johnson County District Attorney Steve Howe said Friday that he has evidence that records that could have been important evidence in his case against a Planned Parenthood clinic in Overland Park were destroyed by the Kansas attorney general’s office.

After he made a similar statement in November, a judge dismissed 49 of 107 criminal charges against the clinic.

The attorney general’s office sought an outside investigation.

On Friday, Shawnee County District Attorney Chad Taylor said that while abortion-related records were destroyed in April 2009, none of them were connected to the Planned Parenthood
case.