Others Question Claims by PAAU Members, Who Face Federal Charges
The medical-waste company says it doesn’t handle any type of human remains and denies that its driver gave any box to a third party. A police spokesperson says the five fetuses “were aborted in accordance with D.C. law.” He adds, “There doesn’t seem to be anything criminal in nature right now about that, except for how they got into this house.”
Laura Meyers, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington, says PAAU members regularly intimidate patients trying to enter health-care clinics. “I wish that they behaved with more compassion and less judgment,” she says. Other abortion supporters decry PAAU’s use of “lurid imagery,” calling its press conference a stunt and a “distracting sideshow.”
Also last week, nine people with ties to PAAU were indicted for violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act. In October 2020, Handy allegedly posed as a patient at Washington Surgi-Clinic, and fellow defendants conspired to block access to employees and abortion-seekers.
The Trump administration didn’t enforce the FACE Act, signed by President Bill Clinton in 1994. But current Attorney General Merrick Garland says he’ll use it to protect anyone seeking or providing reproductive-health services, especially as more states tighten abortion laws.
