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Sunday, February 24, 2019

California Judge Refuses Attorney General Request to Seal Planned Parenthood Baby Parts Video During Preliminary Hearing


By Dave Andrusko
National Right to Life

Citizen journalists David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt, who have been under siege by the attorney general of California for their undercover work exposing Planned Parenthood , received good news Thursday.

In his decision, Judge Christopher Hite of the San Francisco Superior Court “denied the requests of California Attorney General Xavier Becerra and his abortion allies to seal and shield from public viewing the video evidence to be shown in the courtroom during Sandra Merritt’s upcoming preliminary hearing, scheduled for April 22 to May 3, 2019,” according to Liberty Counsel. Liberty Counsel is defending Ms. Merritt against 15 felony charges brought against her by Becerra “in connection with her undercover journalism work which exposed Planned Parenthood’s trade in baby body parts.”

However Judge Hite also said he “will seal the video evidence after the hearing,” 

Liberty Counsel said. “He will also allow Merritt’s accusers to continue to press their charges anonymously, under ‘Doe’ pseudonyms.”

As NRL News Today previously reported, Daleiden and others from the Center for Medical Progress posed as buyers of “fetal tissue” (an umbrella term that includes intact hearts and lungs and pancreas and brains), and asked the kinds of questions someone who is the middleman would ask of the abortion industry. The CMP’s series of 14 videos were incredibly shocking.

Horatio Mihet, Liberty Counsel’s Vice President of Legal Affairs and Chief Litigation Counsel, said of Judge Hite’s decision, 
“Attorney General Becerra’s attempt to shield from the public the very same videos upon which he bases his political prosecution of Sandra Merritt is truly astonishing.”
Mihet added, “The only reason the attorney general wants to have these videos sealed and kept from the public eye is because the videos themselves provide damning evidence that these allegedly confidential conversations were not in fact confidential. The videos themselves put the lie to the Attorney General’s case and reveal it for the fraud that it is.”
Judge Hite wrote in his 24-page decision, 
“The Attorney General has failed to rebut the strong presumption in favor of open public trials in this instance.”
National Right to Life continues here


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