Supervisors to Consider 20-foot Buffer Zone,
County to maintain the murder of children?
The Sacramento County Board of Supervisors will consider a no-protest buffer zone around abortion clinics and medical offices at its Tuesday meeting. Supervisors Roger Dickinson, Illa Collin and Muriel Johnson have expressed their support for the proposed ordinance. It would create a 20-foot buffer area around abortion clinics where anti-abortion advocates could not protest. The ordinance would apply to all abortion clinics and medical offices that perform abortions in the county. There is a precedent for the ban. Last July, a Sacramento Superior Court judge issued an order for a 20-foot protest-free zone around the Women's Health Specialists Clinic in the Arden-Arcade area of Sacramento County (map). San Francisco, San Jose and San Diego have passed similar buffer zone ordinances.
Prosecution Concludes in Waagner Case
Federal prosecutors finished presenting their case yesterday in the trial of Clayton Lee Waagner, accused of capitalizing on the 2001 anthrax scare by mailing hundreds of phony anthrax-threat letters to 250 clinics nationwide. Waagner, 47, who is representing himself, spent most of yesterday's trial session questioning James P. Fitzgerald, the FBI's lead agent in the investigation, trying to elicit information supporting his unusual defense: That he duped the FBI. Waagner has told the jury that, although he was dedicated to stopping abortion, there was no evidence proving he mailed the two waves of bogus anthrax threats.
Waagner claims on FBI Tape
to be a Nonviolent Terrorist
PHILADELPHIA - While he was on the run, anti-abortion extremist Clayton Waagner was a living terror to people who worked in women's clinics, prosecutors say. For months he threatened to bomb their offices, poison them with anthrax and follow them home and kill them, authorities said. Now, Waagner is trying to persuade a jury that it was all an act.
States' Right to Regulate How People Murder Children
Weighed in federal appeals court
Whether states have the right to regulate abortion clinics is the focus of a case out of Arizona to be heard by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals — the same court that found the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional. Arizona regulations, passed after a woman died at a clinic that was found to offer inadequate medical care, require clinics to meet basic health and safety standards and holds abortionists accountable for the health of their clients. Similar restrictions in other states have withstood legal challenges — and Arizona's should as well, according to Cathi Herrod, director of policy for the Center for Arizona Policy.
Abortion-Clinic Boycott Ignites Battle Royal
The grit of Central Texas builders opposed to the construction of a Planned Parenthood facility has the national abortion provider on the defensive and concerned the defiance could be replicated across the country. "Help us counter an outrageous episode of anti-choice intimidation now taking place in Texas," reads an "urgent alert" posted on Planned Parenthood's website. "Anti-choice fanatics across the country are watching closely. ... Right now they are preparing to export this blackmail scheme to other areas of the country. This is a chilling development that has the potential to seriously disrupt the delivery of reproductive health care."
Father Charged With Shaking Infant Son
BROCKTON, Mass. -- A judge on Monday set bail at $1 million for the Brockton man accused of shaking his infant son so violently that the child may not recover. Shawn Hudson, 21, was arraigned in Brockton District Court on a charge of assault and battery on a child resulting in serious bodily injury. He was arrested Friday in the Boston hospital room where 8-week-old Aidyn Casey Hudson has been since Nov. 21.
Abortion Booklet Available Online
AUSTIN- A color booklet describing the stages of fetal development and abortion procedures and their risks has been developed by the Texas Department of Health under a new state law that will require women to wait 24 hours before getting an abortion starting Jan. 1. The material was required to be available for distribution Monday under the new "Woman's Right to Know Act" but a resource directory that was to list programs to help women during and after pregnancy was not available, a concern raised by one anti-abortion advocate. Joe Pojman, head of the Texas Alliance for Life, said the resource directory is important because it shows women that they have options. (Read: Christians Murdering Babies)
Florida's Bush gets report on Schiavo
An independent guardian appointed to review the case of Terri Schiavo has given his recommendations to Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, under a special law rushed through by the Legislature to keep the brain-damaged woman alive. Details of the report will be made public Tuesday morning, after Bush's attorneys read it and edit out any sensitive material, a Bush spokesman said.
Peterson Faces Arraignment, Date for Murder Trial
Scott Peterson's trial date is expected to be set Wednesday after he is formally arraigned on charges he murdered his wife and unborn son.
But whatever date is picked could be pushed back for any of a number of reasons, including hearings on moving the trial to another county because of massive publicity. Peterson, 31, faces his second arraignment in the case after Stanislaus County Superior Court Judge Al Girolami last month upheld the charges following a 12-day preliminary hearing.
Newborn Found Dead at Church was Delivered Alive
Marine Park -- There was a gruesome discovery in Brooklyn on Sunday. Someone left a newborn baby's body at the entrance to a church in Marine Park. Now the medical examiner says the child was born alive. An autopsy on the baby girl's body was not conclusive, though. It'll take more tests to determine if the newborn was murdered, and if homicide charges could be involved. The hours old infant was found dead in a bag left at the front door of the Resurrection Church in Gerritsen Beach Sunday morning. The usher of the Resurrection Roman Catholic church made the discovery and called police.
High Court Orders British Police
to Investigate Late-Term Abortion
Police in Britain have been ordered to investigate the abortion of a six-month-old fetus after a Church of England ministerette asked the High Court to reopen the case. Initially, West Mercia police had refused to investigate the incident when asked to do so by the Reverendette Joanna Jepson, now a curate at St. Michael's Church in Chester, northwest England.
Infant's Death Examined
RAEFORD - Hoke County sheriff's deputies are investigating the death of a 6-week-old boy. The baby, Nasir Jones, was pronounced dead at Cape Fear Valley Medical Center in Fayetteville on Monday afternoon.
"We are treating it as a homicide," said Sheriff Hubert Peterkin. "There were some signs of injuries throughout the body." He declined to give more details about Nasir's injuries or to say if there are any suspects in the child's death. No one has been charged.
Abortion Nurse Wants Job Back
Groblersdal - An Mpumalanga nurse who was struck off the nurse's roll last year following a humiliating TV exposé that showed her mishandling abortion patients, hopes to return to work next year. Sewela Ramaboea, 35, said this week that she was under severe stress at Mpumalanga's biggest hospital, Philadelphia, at the time of the exposé and that there was no support from health authorities.
Baby Girl Found Hurt, Malnourished
GARY — A 7-week-old baby girl was airlifted to a University of Chicago Hospitals facility on Sunday where she is being treated for head injuries and possible malnutrition. Police began an investigation into what caused the child’s condition late Monday after learning about the case. Lt. Roger Smith said the police department had not been contacted by The Methodist Hospitals in Gary, where medics brought the child Sunday morning.
Father Jailed, Suspected in Son's Death
OMAHA, Neb. -- An Omaha man is behind bars after his infant son died of what police say were severe head injuries. Omaha police say 22-year-old Edward Boston called emergency responders Saturday night to report that his 2-month-old son was not breathing. Boston was taken to police headquarters for questioning and later arrested on suspicion of felony child abuse resulting in death.
Bush May Let Morning-After Pill Over-the-Counter Sells
President Bush's health officials are debating if it's time to put emergency contraception - also called the morning-after pill - on pharmacy shelves right next to the aspirin, available without a prescription. Proponents say such a move would increase women's ability to get the pills in time to prevent pregnancy: preferably within 24 hours but no more than 72 hours after rape, contraceptive failure or just forgetting birth control. The Food and Drug Administration says emergency contraception is safe, but question whether [women are so stupid they will not understand how and when to take it without professional advice]. Already, five states allow women to buy the morning-after pill directly from certain pharmacists without a prescription. Now the maker of one emergency contraceptive brand, called Plan B, has asked the FDA to go further and allow the pills to sell over-the-counter nationwide, as in numerous other countries.
New Birth Control Options Hitting Market
From chewable flavored tablets to birth control pills that limit menstrual periods to four a year, the world of contraception has a variety of new options for women. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved Ovcon 35, a spearmint-flavored chewable birth control pill. November also marked the drugstore debut of Seasonale, a continuous oral contraceptive approved by the FDA in September that cuts menstrual periods from 13 to four a year. They join the patch, the NuvaRing and the Mirena intrauterine device as recent developments in birth control.
Strings Attached to Tax-Funded Subsidies,
Church says law advocates sinning
SAN FRANCISCO -- If you don't believe in the law, do you have to follow it? That's the question before courts in New York and California, which are being asked to exempt branches of the Catholic Church from state laws requiring contraceptives be included in employee prescription drug plans. Under church doctrine, contraception is a sin. "The Catholic Church explicitly teaches that artificial contraception is morally unacceptable and, if knowingly and freely engaged in, sinful," Catholic Charities of Sacramento attorney James Sweeney said. After California's law was enacted in 2000, the group unsuccessfully sought a court ruling to bar the law from being enforced on the church's charity outreach programs. A state appeals court also denied the church relief. Now the California Supreme Court is set to hear the case Dec. 2.