Two lawyers and their client – an undercover video investigator who repeatedly caught Planned Parenthood and other abortion-industry executives seeking profits from the trade of baby body parts – plan to appeal a contempt-of-court ruling from a judge who has his own Planned Parenthood links but still was allowed to remain on the case.
Judge William Orrick ruled in contempt Monday pro-life undercover video investigator David Daleiden of the Center for Medical Progress along with his two criminal-defense attorneys.
A quick appeal of the order was promised.
Orrick, who directed a community center that advocated for abortion-industry giant Planned Parenthood, issued the ruling regarding the lawyers’ release of video footage Daleiden shot at a National Abortion Federation event.
Daleiden’s other videos, which already have been released, show abortion-industry executives routinely bragged about making money selling the body parts of unborn babies.
One executive infamously told Daleiden she wanted more money so she could buy a Lamborghini.
The lawyers for Daleiden released the video of NAF participants also making such comments because the video was being used as evidence to prosecute Daleiden on a charge of invasion of privacy.
Essentially, Orrick wants the evidence against the abortionists suppressed, even while it is used in a criminal case against Daleiden.
The conversations were recorded in public places, where individuals arguably have no expectation of privacy.
The Thomas More Society has been defending Daleiden in some of the cases filed against its client. Thomas More said the ruling that keeps the undercover video suppressed is being appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court “as an unconstitutional censorship decree and a ‘prior restraint’ on the free speech rights of Daleiden and his company, the Center for Medical Progress.”
Steve Cooley, who for a decade was the district attorney in Los Angeles County, and Brentford Ferreira, who was Cooley’s chief assistant in state office, were represented by Los Angeles attorney Matt Geragos before Orrick.
The lawyers have been representing Daleiden in the criminal case, which was brought by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, well known as a big supporter of abortion.
His original case against Daleiden collapsed.
WND reported earlier on Orrick’s plan to hold Daleiden and his lawyers in contempt.
Daleiden, along with an employee, visited multiple abortion-industry locations undercover to capture abortionists expressing their desire to profit from dead babies.
Daleiden’s defense lawyers argued they had released and published the videos in good faith, “believing the publication was needed to mount an effective defense for Daleiden” against the 15 counts filed by the pro-abortion activist, Becerra.
Becerra claims Daleiden and a partner invaded the privacy rights of “victims” of his undercover videos, in public locations, in violation of California’s eavesdropping law, which bans non-consensual surreptitious recordings of “private, confidential” conversations.
“The defense lawyers argued that they could not adequately defend the charges as the undercover recordings showed that the defendants had numerous conversations with other persons and therefore they could not determine which conversations were pinpointed in Becerra’s felony charges,” the Thomas More organization explained.
Becerra initially filed the charges against Daleiden without providing any information about the complainants.
Moreover, Daleiden’s defenders explained the conversations were in public areas where any number of passersby could have heard the discussions.
Federal suppression of the videos’ contents, they argued, would deprive Daleiden of a fair trial and fatally undermine the entire criminal prosecution.
Orrick has a longstanding board membership with the Good Samaritan Family Resource Center in San Francisco, which for years has had a Planned Parenthood abortion business on its premises.
Tom Brejcha, president of the Thomas More Society, which has been underwriting Daleiden’s and CMP’s criminal defense, said, “Yet another appeal seems in order here, for as the L.A. Times editorialized, California’s felony criminal prosecution of these pro-life undercover journalists was a gross ‘overreach’ as two massive federal cases were already pending against them in Judge Orrick’s federal court.
“The pendency of simultaneous federal civil cases proceeding side-by-side with such a major state criminal prosecution of multiple felonies was bound to breed the most serious and grave complications, not to mention the miscarriage of justice. Must the pro-lifers’ criminal defense lawyers seek prior federal permission before summoning or cross-examining prosecution witnesses, or introducing videos or other documentary evidence into the trial record? Must the state court judge, Hon. Christopher Hite, consult with the federal judge, Hon. William Orrick, before ruling on objections to evidence? And who is actually directing the criminal case, Attorney General Becerra, or the federal civil plaintiffs, the National Abortion Federation and Planned Parenthood Federation of America, who lobbied him and his predecessor, then Attorney General Kamala Harris, to bring these excessive felony charges? We will carry on with efforts to see that justice is ultimately achieved in these troubling cases.”
Life Legal, which also has defended attacks by the National Abortion Federation, Planned Parenthood and others, pointed out that NAF demanded that it be given funds raised for Daleiden’s legal defense for its damages.
“Meaning NAF wants to put donor money in their bloodied pockets,” Life Legal said in a statement.
“The National Abortion Federation did not present sufficient evidence that David was involved in the release of the enjoined videos,” said Alexandra Snyder, Life Legal Defense Foundation executive director. “Derek Foran, lead attorney for NAF, said that the videos were released with the hashtag #PlannedParenthoodSellsBabyBodyParts. He called this a ‘horrendous term.’ I agree. The business of tearing babies apart and profiting from the sale of their parts is horrendous.”
WND reported Orrick ordered media not to post the video in which abortionists joke among themselves about the killing of unborn infants.
Even news outlets not party to the case are barred from posting it.
WND, however, transcribed for its readers the comments of the abortion-industry figures.
Lisa Harris, medical director for Planned Parenthood of Michigan, says in the video: “Our stories don’t really have a place in a lot of pro-choice discourse and rhetoric, right? The heads that get stuck that we can’t get out. The hemorrhages that we manage.”
Susan Robinson of Planned Parenthood of Mar Monte in San Jose, California: “The fetus is a tough little object and taking it apart, I mean taking it apart, on day one is very difficult.’
Talcott Camp, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Reproductive Health Freedom Project: “I’m like, ‘Oh my God!’ I get it! When the skull is broken, that’s really sharp. I get it, I understand why people are talking about getting that skull out, that calvarium.”
Deborah Nucatola, senior director of medical services at Planned Parenthood Federation of America: “You know, sometimes she’ll tell me she wants brain, and we’ll, you know, leave the calvarium in ’til last, and then try to basically take it, or actually, you know, catch everything, and even keep it separate from the rest of the tissue so it doesn’t get lost.”
The video was the work of undercover investigators with the Center for Medical Progress, who since 2015 have released more than a dozen videos of abortionists – mostly from Planned Parenthood – talking about their unborn-baby, body-parts trade, their willingness to adjust an abortion procedure to salvage a particular body part sought by a researcher and more.
Most of the videos have been released to the public, but the National Abortion Federation went to court demanding that videos of its members speaking be removed from the Web.
Orrick was appointed under the pro-abortion agenda of Barack Obama, and remains on the case despite the fact his wife “has also posted public comments, pictured with her husband, that are supportive of Planned Parenthood and critical of these moving defendants.”
A spokeswoman in Orrick’s office, Jean Davis, told WND the judge would refuse to comment on his prior restraint order.
One of the CMP videos showed an official admitting Planned Parenthood sells fully intact aborted babies.
[jwplayer RiJygVb1]
Another has Deborah Nucatola of Planned Parenthood commented on crushing babies.
“We’ve been very good at getting heart, lung, liver, because we know that, so I’m not gonna crush that part, I’m gonna basically crush below, I’m gonna crush above, and I’m gonna see if I can get it all intact,” she said.
[jwplayer 7pzwagZg]
In the second video, Planned Parenthood’s Mary Gatter discussed how her compensation for organs could rise when she said, “I want a Lamborghini.”
[jwplayer vbPjx8h2]
The fifth video released shows Melissa Farrell of Planned Parenthood’s Houston clinic discussing “intact fetal cadavers”:
[jwplayer 6YZC1nO2]
The seventh video has the testimony of a Planned Parenthood worker who tapped an aborted infant’s heart and saw it start beating.
[jwplayer 5wFzwlF1]
