Pro-Life News

Pro-Life Minister With Permit Barred From Parade

Anti-Abortion Minister With
Permit Barred From Parade
A Baptist minister arrested last year when he and his followers jumped into a Halloween parade to display anti-abortion photographs reluctantly stayed out of this year's parade _ even though his group had a permit _ because authorities refused to allow members to show the same graphic pictures. The Rev. Jim Grove, who was acquitted of disorderly conduct and other charges in connection with the 2002 incident, was asked by a city official to remove three color photographs of a dismembered fetus from a van carrying 15 of the preacher's followers. Grove refused. "Why am I the only one being restricted?" asked Grove, pastor of Heritage Baptist Church in Springfield Township.

“It’s unbelievable” alright!
ACLU Says Pastor Had Right to be in Parade
York solicitor Donald Hoyt was clearly out of line in forbidding the Rev. Jim Grove and his group from displaying large photographs of bloodied fetuses and other dead bodies while marching in Sunday’s York Halloween Parade, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. “It’s unbelievable,” said Paula Knudsen, the ACLU’s staff attorney for central and northern Pennsylvania. Knudsen said the city’s actions are especially troubling because Grove followed the city’s protocol by getting a permit.

Rudolph Defense Seeking FBI Files on Jewell
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - Lawyers representing Eric Rudolph in an Alabama abortion clinic bombing have asked the government for information on security guard Richard Jewell, who was investigated but never charged in the 1996 Olympic bombing in Atlanta. Rudolph is charged with the Olympic bombing as well as the bomb that killed a police officer and critically injured a nurse at a women's clinic in Birmingham. Court documents made public Monday show Rudolph's attorneys are seeking government documents about Jewell as they try to show someone other than Rudolph is to blame.

Judge Tosses Out Six Charges Against Finkel
Just hours before closing arguments began Monday, a controversial abortion doctor on trial over allegations he fondled or sexually abused his patients scored a victory when a judge dismissed six of the 67 counts against him for lack of evidence. The ruling cheered Dr. Brian Finkel. Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Cates issued the ruling on a day when Finkel went back on the stand to answer questions from jurors.

Finkel faces 54 counts of sex abuse, six of those for sexual assault, and still the national media ignores this case!

Prosecutor Wraps Up Abortion Doctor Case
They can't all be wrong, a prosecutor said Monday of the 35 women who testified that they were sexually abused by a high-profile abortion doctor in Phoenix. Cindi Nannetti, a deputy county attorney for Maricopa County, urged jurors to focus on the actions of Dr. Brian Finkel, not his denials. "His actions included strumming, pinching, flicking, caressing and rubbing" the women's genitals and breasts, Nannetti said during closing arguments in Finkel's nearly three-month trial. She said the women's testimony offers "an abundance of evidence to convict. Finkel faces 54 counts of sex abuse and six of the more serious sexual assault charges.

Finkel’s Sex-Abuse Trial Begins Final Days
The long line of women who testified that a Valley abortion doctor sexually abused them are believable because they had the courage to make their private decision to seek an abortion public in a court of law, a prosecutor said Monday in closing arguments at the doctor’s trial. Prosecutor Cindi Nannetti said the women’s testimonies are bolstered by accounts from Dr. Brian Finkel’s medical assistants and by the similarities of their stories.

GOP Targeting Abortion?
WASHINGTON - Flush from victory after passing a ban on late-term abortion, Senate Republicans hope to push through two more bills affecting pregnant women in the coming weeks, a top GOP leader pledged yesterday. "Will there be other legislation? At least under this leadership. We value life and the sanctity of life," said Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) on "Fox News Sunday." Frist said Republicans will first try to pass the Unborn Victims of Violence Act - inspired by the Laci Peterson murder - which would pin a federal rap on killing a fetus during a violent crime.

GOP Surrenders 'Pro-Life Principle'
Some groups have gone astray as well
Pro-Life Action Must Originate from Principle
By Rep. Ron Paul, MD
The worst offender of federalism is the so-called Unborn Victims of Violence Act, which not only indirectly surrenders the pro-life principle but actually directly undercuts the right to life by granting a specific exemption to abortionists! This exemption essentially allows some to take life with the sanction of federal law. By supporting this legislation, pro-lifers are expressly condoning a legal exemption for abortionists – showing just how far astray some in the pro-life community have gone. Even the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act, which is an integral part of the current pro-life agenda, presents a dilemma.

Mother Pleads Guilty After Newborn Found in Trash
With Plea Bargain She 'May' Get Jail Time
A Camden County, NJ teenager faces sentencing in December after pleading guilty to two charges relating to discovery of the body of her baby in a trash bag. Testimony was already underway in the case when Judge Angelo DiCamillo summoned both attorneys to his chambers. Shortly thereafter, eight charges had been reduced to two and the matter was settled. The defendant, now 15, has pleaded guilty to illegal concealing of human remains and endangering the welfare of a child. With the plea bargain, she still faces the potential of jail time at sentencing, scheduled for December 5th. In the meantime, she's on electronic monitoring and will have a new psychiatric evaluation.

Woman Awaits Trial For 2001 Death Of Newborn
A Kentucky woman accused of murder in the death of her newborn awaits trial Monday. Kathy Harless, of Grayson County, also faces charges of tampering with physical evidence, concealing the birth of a child and abuse of a corpse. The baby's body was found submerged in sewage inside an outhouse at a flea market in 2001.

Meth Mom Prosecution Raises Questions
As Hawai'i's war on ice demands solutions, City Prosecutor Peter Carlisle is vigorously pursuing a manslaughter conviction against Tayshea Aiwohi, a 31-year-old Kane'ohe woman whose newborn son died in 2001 from alleged crystal meth poisoning. Aiwohi is accused of using ice in the final days of her pregnancy. Her trial is expected to begin in December, and she faces a maximum prison sentence of 20 years.

14 Years After Baby's Death, Dad Is Arrested
Rebecka Anne Dunn, a 7-week-old Glendale girl, died Oct. 27, 1989, under puzzling circumstances. Did she simply stop breathing? Or could she have been the victim of shaken baby syndrome? For years, the questions haunted police and the girl's mother. On Monday, 14 years to the day of the baby's death, Glendale police announced they have arrested the girl's father. Leroy Clyde Dunn, 32, a truck driver, was booked on counts of first-degree murder and child abuse, said Detective Brian Wilkins, a Glendale police spokesman.

Testimony in Bullock Case Ends
WILKES-BARRE - Jurors are expected to decide today whether Matthew Bullock is guilty of killing his girlfriend and her fetus. Testimony concluded Monday afternoon, with prosecutors and defense attorneys calling a few last rebuttal witnesses. Jurors will return today to hear closing arguments before retiring to deliberate.

Accused Spouse Heads Back To Spotlight
SAN FRANCISCO -- Almost from the moment Laci Peterson vanished, police and the public fingered her husband, Scott. When Laci’s body and the body of her unborn son washed up in San Francisco Bay four months later, he was charged with a crime that had become a national fixation. Even California Attorney General Bill Lockyer fueled the widespread belief that Scott Peterson was guilty by calling the case a "slam dunk." Now comes Peterson’s first chance to punch holes in that perception.

Three Infant Bodies Discovered in
Garbage Bag in Rural Texas Home
BROWNWOOD, Texas -- A family renovating a rural home they had lived in for three years found an old trash bag in an attic crawl space containing the mummified bodies of three infants. Authorities said Sunday they were investigating the deaths as homicides. "One baby was wrapped in a towel, one baby was in a blanket, and the baby we originally found was wrapped in a sheet inside a paper sack," said Chief Deputy Mike McCoy of the county sheriff's department. McCoy said authorities were searching for the home's prior occupants and no arrests had been made.

Woman Charged After Baby Bite Attack
A Croatian woman has been charged with negligence after a 13-month-old toddler was bitten dozens of times by other babies at a kindergarten. The attack occured when the woman, who has not been identified, allegedly left 14 children alone while she changed a nappy in another room. While she was gone, one of the babies France Simic, received 30 bite wounds all over his body as the other children set upon him, police said. Police said investigations were underway but it is not clear what prompted the babies to attack.

Abortion Activists Look West
Opponents of the state's parental notification law, which goes into effect in two months, are exploring whether they have grounds to challenge the law. "We are currently looking very closely at what constitutional flaws and problems with implementation might give rise to a lawsuit that could prevent the law from taking effect in its current form," said Jennifer Frizzell, a spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood of Northern New England.

Actor Reeve: States Will Lead Stem Cell Research
WASHINGTON -- While the federal government continues to restrict research on stem cells taken from embryos, states are trying to create legal loopholes for scientists to continue what could be life-saving experiments, actor and activist Christopher Reeve said on Monday. So far, only California has passed a law that allows the use of state funds for research into harvesting and using stem cells from any source, including embryos. But other states are moving in that direction, Reeve said.

Will Russia Ban Abortions?
Up to 60% of Russian pregnancies end in abortions, and 10% of the women who have them are below the age of eighteen. Russia has more than 500 family planning centres. A federal target programme is well underway, and sex education centres to help young people are becoming more widespread. Despite all these efforts, the country remains a world leader in terms of abortion rates. For every 100 women of childbearing age, there are 60 abortions in Russia.

Posted by Editor at October 28, 2003 09:45 AM