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Hope Remains for Pro-Life Group Despite U.S. Supreme Court Refusal of Appeal

By Gudrun Schultz

WASHINGTON, United States, May 2, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The American Coalition of Life Activists (ACLA) appeared to have lost a 10-year legal battle yesterday when the Supreme Court refused to take up the group’s appeal, but the Thomas More Law Society suggests there may still be hope of winning the case.

The confrontational anti-abortion group was sued by Planned Parenthood and a coalition of abortionists after they posted “wanted” crime posters of known abortionists on a website. The initial ruling by an Oregon circuit court in 1999 ordered ACLA to pay $108 million in damages, after the group was found guilty of inciting violence under a racketeering law and the 1994 Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.

That amount was reduced to $4.73 million by a California appeals court in 2005, which stated that the punitive damages were excessive. A second appeal to further reduce damages was refused by the Supreme Court on Monday.

Attorney Thomas Brejcha, chief counsel of the Chicago-based Thomas More Society Pro-Life Law Center, told LifeSiteNews a recent Supreme Court victory for a pro-life group charged under the racketeering law might have an impact in the Oregon case.

Brejcha led a twenty-year legal battle against charges of racketeering brought against pro-life leader Joseph Scheidler, which ended in a final victory for Scheidler in the Supreme Court this past February.

The National Organization for Women, a radical feminist organization, brought extortion charges against Scheidler under the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) law, for picketing outside abortion facilities, the same law invoked against the ACLA.

Since Scheidler vs. NOW was a certified national class action case representing by default all health centers providing abortion services (unless they specifically opted out), the plaintiffs in the Oregon case would fall within that ruling. Once a case has been lost, it is not permissible under law to launch a second case naming additional defendants. “You have to plead the wealth of your case at once,” Brejcha explained.

Although he was careful to say reversing the decision remains a “possibility,” the fact that the Oregon plaintiff’s would by default have been included in the Scheidler case would potentially preclude their winning final judgment in the case against ACLA.

ACLA has not yet said if the organization will pursue further legal action in the case.

See related LifeSiteNews coverage:

Joe Scheidler Wins Unanimous Supreme Court Ruling against N.O.W.
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/feb/06022804.html

US SUPREME COURT ASKS GOVERNMENT FOR VIEWS ON ABORTION FREE SPEECH CASE
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2002/dec/02121604.html

Court Reduces Penalty in Anti-Abortion Web Site Case
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/sep/05090706.html

Court Hears Arguments For Reversal of $120 Million Jury Verdict Against Abortion Opponents
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/jul/05071209.html

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