Medic cleared over abortion claim

Dr Akinrolabu is a senior house officer at St Richard's

A doctor has been cleared of offering to carry out an illegal abortion on his married lover in a Sussex bedsit.

All other charges against Dr Richard Akinrolabu, 42, a senior house officer at St Richard's Hospital, Chichester, were also dropped.

They had included acting indecently, inappropriately and unprofessionally.

A General Medical Council panel found that the woman, known only as Mrs A, gave a version of events that was littered with "inconsistencies".

Allegation 'improbable'

Other witnesses who appeared before the four-day tribunal also threw doubt on Ms A's version of events, the panel found.

The panel heard she panicked after discovering she was pregnant in February last year.

And the hearing heard Nigerian-born Dr Akinrolabu had the surgical instruments for the abortion laid out on the top of his microwave at his flat on St Valentine's Day 2005.

Panel chairman Dr Harvey Marcovitch said: "The panel considered it improbable that a doctor experienced in gynaecology, who therefore knew the possible complications, would be prepared to undertake a termination with the instruments described in an unusual setting and without any analgesia."

The doctor admitted having had an affair with the woman since December 2004.