Jury Begins Deliberations in Planned Parenthood Video Journalists Trial

Attorneys for the pro-life undercover journalists who exposed the illegal sales of aborted baby body parts allegedly conducted by Planned Parenthood made their closing arguments Wednesday to the jury in the civil case brought against them by the abortion chain.

The trial has been proceeding in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in San Francisco, with Judge William Orrick III presiding.

As a result of the video series produced by Center for Medical Progress (CMP), Planned Parenthood brought a lawsuit against pro-life activists David Daleiden, Sandra Merritt and their colleagues, accusing them of violating the Federal Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO).

Planned Parenthood initially sought over $20 million in damages from CMP in the case, but those damages have since been reduced to several hundred thousands of dollars, in addition to legal and attorney fees, which could yet run into millions of dollars.

The Thomas More Society has defended Daleiden during the trial, while Liberty Counsel has defended Merritt.

Life News reported that Peter Breen, vice president and senior counsel at the Thomas More Society, told the jury in closing arguments:

[T]his is not a case of fraud or racketeering. This is a case of undercover journalism, and we the people need that information. You need that information. You may not like seeing that information. It may be difficult … but we don’t want to stop the flow of information.

Breen added it was the Planned Parenthood officials who spoke to Daleiden and Merritt about the sales of baby body parts, and about how they altered the abortion procedures in order to harvest the most intact body parts for sales, who injured Planned Parenthood’s reputation, not the undercover journalists.

Let’s see

Christians determine there is evil going on and try to expose it non violently are are sued by the evildoers

What’s wrong with this picture ?

They got the ugly truth out though. That’s what COUNTS

Wiki: On July 31, 2015, Orrick blocked the release of videos of Planned Parenthood, granting the injunction requested by the National Abortion Federation.[10] Because The Center for Medical Progress allegedly illegally recorded undercover videos that plaintiffs claimed were heavily edited to purport to show that Planned Parenthood had been inappropriately selling fetal tissue, Orrick issued a restraining order. He said that he reached his decision due to concerns over the physical safety of the executive leadership of the National Abortion Federation. Orrick wrote, “NAF would be likely to suffer irreparable injury, absent an ex parte temporary restraining order, in the form of harassment, intimidation, violence, invasion of privacy, and injury to reputation, and the requested relief is in the public interest.”[11] He scheduled a contempt hearing for June 14, 2017, for the defendants’ attorneys, due to a violation of his restraining order.[12]

On April 25, 2017, Orrick stayed the implementation of the Trump administration’s Executive Order 13768 to withhold funding from sanctuary cities that limit cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement authorities, saying Trump had no authority to attach new conditions to federal spending.[13][14] On November 20, 2017, Orrick found that Section 9(a) of the Executive Order was unconstitutional on its face and issued a permanent nationwide injunction against its implementation.[15]

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