One after another, potential jurors told a judge they donated to Planned Parenthood. They shared how they attended historic abortion rights protests and marches in the nation’s capital. Others said abortion is akin to killing a person, citing their religious beliefs.
This was the reality playing out in a federal courtroom as jury selection heads into a fourth day Monday for a trial that focuses on the blockade of an abortion clinic in the District by a group of antiabortion protesters in 2020. The trial, which is expected to last three weeks in U.S. District Court in Washington, will center on access to abortion and whether those on trial violated the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, a 1994 law that prohibits threats to and obstruction of a person seeking reproductive health services or providers.
More than a year after the Supreme Court overturned the fundamental right to abortion established in Roe v. Wade, it became clear in this federal courtroom how difficult it is to find jurors who say they can put strong feelings on abortion aside and fairly evaluate a case. Jury selection has also been further complicated after the lead defendant made news last year for obtaining fetuses from the driver of a medical waste disposal truck in D.C. — an account the waste company denied — and storing them in a Capitol Hill rowhome. Jury selection started Wednesday and once a jury is selected, prosecutors and defense attorneys will make their opening statements.
It was so tense in the courtroom at times that a defense attorney alleged a potential juror got into a screaming match with antiabortion activists outside the courthouse. An antiabortion supporter allegedly distributed leaflets outside the courthouse that the judge said was meant to influence the jury. Another defense attorney unsuccessfully argued that working for a Democratic congresswoman would disqualify a juror and a potential juror said she had negative opinions of the lead defendant from reading previous media coverage.
Yeah because it’s not an issue you can have a middle ground on. You either support a woman’s freedom to choose or you don’t. Any middle ground would just be supporting the woman’s right to choose.
“wHy cAn’t wE FiNd pEoPlE WhO ArE ImPaRtIaL On hUmAn rIgHtS!?”
The headline makes it sound like someone is on trial for abortion, despite this quote in the article:
“It is not about abortion itself,” U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly emphasized during jury selection. “It’s about access.”
Still, an interesting read
This is the best summary I could come up with:
This was the reality playing out in a federal courtroom as jury selection heads into a fourth day Monday for a trial that focuses on the blockade of an abortion clinic in the District by a group of antiabortion protesters in 2020.
It was so tense in the courtroom at times that a defense attorney alleged a potential juror got into a screaming match with antiabortion activists outside the courthouse.
During the Trump Administration, the FACE Act was “largely ignored,” said Mary Ziegler, a legal historian of the antiabortion movement at the University of California at Davis.
The case gained additional notoriety when, the same day a federal indictment was announced against the defendants, D.C. police discovered five fetuses in a Capitol Hill rowhouse basement where Handy had been staying.
When asked if he could push that information aside to independently hear this case, the potential juror replied: “It would be difficult to go past that.” He was excused.
Upon hearing about this antiabortion flier, and its contents, Kollar-Kotelly told the defense on Wednesday she was putting them “on notice.” She later said the literature was clearly intended to influence jurors.
I’m a bot and I’m open source!
