"A year after the release of
the undercover videos, the ongoing nationwide investigation of Planned
Parenthood by the House Select Investigative Panel makes clear that
Planned Parenthood is the guilty party in the harvesting and trafficking
of baby body parts for profit." -David Daleiden
(Houston, TX)—[LifeSiteNews]
All charges have been dismissed against Center for Medical Progress
investigators David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt, multiple sources have
confirmed to LifeSiteNews. (Photo via LifeSiteNews.com)
Prosecutors with the Harris County District
Attorney's office dropped the charges before the pair could pursue their
legal motion to quash the charges at a hearing at 9 a.m. Central time,
according to the Houston Chronicle.
This morning, CMP project lead David Daleiden
called the dismissal of the charges "a resounding vindication of the
First Amendment rights of all citizen journalists, and also a clear
warning to any of Planned Parenthood's political cronies who would
attack whistleblowers to protect Planned Parenthood from scrutiny."
"Planned Parenthood tried to collude with
public officials to manipulate the legal process to their own benefit,
and they failed," Daleiden said. "A year after the release of the
undercover videos, the ongoing nationwide investigation of Planned
Parenthood by the House Select Investigative Panel makes clear that
Planned Parenthood is the guilty party in the harvesting and trafficking
of baby body parts for profit."
"The indictment was politically-motivated
and should never have been filed in the first place," said Mat Staver,
the founder of Liberty Counsel, who represented Merritt. Peter Breen of
the Thomas More Society represented Daleiden in the Harris County
courtroom this morning.
Texas prosecutors agreed with his attorneys
that the grand jury, which was called to investigate charges against
Planned Parenthood, had been wrongly held over to indict the pro-life
advocates instead.
The two faced up to 20 years in prison for a
felony count of tampering with a government record for using false
identification to gain access to Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast (PPGC),
which is based in Houston.
Daleiden posed as "Robert Sarkis" and Sandra
Merritt as "Susan Tennenbaum," employees of the fictitious biological
company Biomax, seeking unborn babies' body parts for experimentation.
There,
they recorded officials discussing how they obtained "intact" fetal
cadavers, used budget line items to dress up the remuneration Planned
Parenthood received for aborted babies' organs and tissue, and filmed
the dissection of a child. (Screengrab via CMP)
Dropping the felony counts means that all
charges have now been dismissed in Texas. Harris County Court at Law
Judge Diane Bull dismissed a misdemeanor count of trafficking in human
organs against Daleiden onJune 14.
That charge stemmed from an e-mail Daleiden
sent PPGC, offering to purchase human organs as part of a 30-month-long
nationwide sting investigation that infiltrated the highest levels of
Planned Parenthood. A string of undercover videos exposed the
little-known practice, which Planned Parenthood refers to as its "fetal
tissue donation" program, to a national audience, triggering
investigations in multiple states, as well as the U.S. House of
Representatives.
Although initially called to investigate
PPGC, the Harris County grand jury indicted Daleiden and Merritt for
using false identification, a felony, and a misdemeanor charge of
attempting to purchase human organs, onJanuary 25.
The defendants turned down offers of a plea
bargain that would result in probation instead of risking decades in a
Texas prison, confident they would prevail.
In April, their attorneys asked a judge to
dismiss the charges, because District Attorney Devon Anderson's office
colluded with Planned Parenthood. PPGC's attorney, Josh Schaeffer, told
the media that from the outset of the potential charges, he "explicitly
pushed prosecutors" to turn the investigation against the
whistleblowers, rather than his clients.
Anderson confessed in a May court brief that
her office may have skirted legal prohibitions barring such an
incestuous relationship between accuser and accused, but the lawbreaking
was "minor and harmless." She further dismissed her office's wrongdoing
as a "mere technical, inconsequential violation of" the law and...
Continue reading here.