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CA Court Tosses Out 14 Charges Against Pro-life Journalist Who Exposed Planned Parenthood’s Baby Part Market

CA Court Tosses Out 14 Charges Against Pro-life Journalist Who Exposed Planned Parenthood’s Baby Part Market

14 down, 1 to go

In March, California’s Attorney General slapped David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt, with a whopping fifteen felony charges.

Daleiden and Merritt, by way of the Center for Medical Progress (CMP), released several horrifying undercover videos exposing Planned Parenthood officials negotiating the price of aborted baby parts.

I discussed those charges at length and concluded the only charge that might have some legitimacy was the last charge which addressed Merritt and Daleiden’s use of an expired employee ID to login to the Stem Expresses system.

Wednesday, San Francisco’s Superior Court dismissed the first fourteen charges against Merritt, finding them legally insufficient.

Life News reports:

The San Francisco Superior Court on Wednesday dismissed 14 of 15 criminal counts but the pair are still charged with one count of conspiracy to invade privacy. However the court dismissed the charges with leave to amend — meaning Becerra could re-file the charges with additional supposed evidence against the pair.

The court ruled that counts 1-14 were legally insufficient. The state has the opportunity to amend if it can plead a more legally sufficient and specific complaint. The California’s Attorney General filed 15 criminal counts against Merritt, with counts 1-14 for each of the alleged interviews and count 15 for an alleged conspiracy. San Francisco County Superior Court Judge Christopher Hite gave the state attorney general’s office until mid-July to file a revised complaint.

It’s worth reiterating that California’s Attorney General, Xavier Becerra, has received hefty donations from both Planned Parenthood and NARAL.

Life News continued:

In a statement to LifeNews, pro-life attorney Mat Svaer of LibertyCounsel, representing Merritt, said, “This is a huge victory to have 14 criminal counts dismissed.”

“We will now turn our attention to dismissing the final count. Sandra Merritt did nothing wrong. The complaint by the California Attorney General is unprecedented and frankly will threaten every journalist who provides valuable information to the public. This final count will also fall,” said Staver.

Liberty Counsel argued that the criminal complaint for illegally recording supposedly “private” conversations (in restaurants, hotel lobbies and other public places) – the first ever filed against undercover journalists – was legally deficient for numerous reasons, not the least of which was the Attorney General’s decision to prosecute Merritt in secret proceedings, without identifying even the names of her accusers or purported “victims.” The complaint did not provide Merritt with the minimum notice required by the Constitution and California law as to what she supposedly did wrong, so that she can mount a proper and vigorous defense. The complaint was also vague and full of inconsistencies.

“Today we asked the San Francisco Superior Court to dismiss these outrageous and baseless charges against Sandra Merritt, and the court agreed to dismiss 14 of the 15 counts” said Horatio Mihet, Liberty Counsel’s Vice President of Legal Affairs and Chief Litigation Counsel, who appeared with Sandra in court today. “Sandra did not break any law and the criminal complaint against her is legally deficient, vague and full of inconsistencies. No other citizen journalist or organization has ever been charged with a crime for undercover recordings,” said Mihet.

Similar charges filed against Daleiden in Texas were dropped last summer.

Follow Kemberlee on Twitter @kemberleekaye

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Comments

Progress. Positive progress.

The existence of abortion chambers, and clinical cannibalism specifically, is a human rights issue, which should not be swept under a political rug.

Interesting concept, the act of using alien body parts medically as a form of cannibalism. The alien tissues become incorporated into the body over time. Would that be a type of consumption?

    n.n in reply to NoFlow. | June 22, 2017 at 12:01 am

    Consumption is not limited to ingestion nor must it result in integration.

    That said, I would distinguish between clinical cannibalism as a segue from elective abortion and other circumstances that do not derive from involuntary exploitation of a human life.

Becerra is another radical from Stanford, trying hard to out-liberal Kamala Harris in California

Imagine a judge in San Fran who is the opposite of Roland Freisler?

Too bad we can’t say the same for the corrupt prosecutor in the pocket of the ghoulish baby-parts industry.

Roland Freisler and Nazi Sham Trials:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKiqHpbFz68

Every time I see any news article stating “Planned Parenthood DONATED…” I burn. If you’re rent seeking for government money and to keep your business running, you have no business IMHO giving any of it away to ANYTHING. And none of that crap ( not that anyone here would give it) that they are giving away the money they earned not the money they got from the government. Money is fungible. A dollar is still a dollar, no matter what ‘buckets’ you think they are ‘segregated’.