Lacking a valid case against investigators David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt, corrupt Harris County D.A. Devon Anderson’s office has dropped the second and final charge against the Center for Medical Progress.
Houston, Texas – July 26, 2016: Center for Medical Progress investigators finally secured justice today when the Harris County D.A.’s office dropped sham felony charges against the Pro-Life undercover investigators who exposed Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast’s illegal and inhuman involvement in the sale and trafficking of human body parts. Today, David Daleiden called the indictments, “bogus, politically-motivated charges from the very beginning.”
With a sordid history of failure to hold abortion industry cronies responsible for shocking breaches of the law and basic human decency, District Attorney Devon Anderson has been under scrutiny by Pro-Life Texans for years. Anderson’s indictment of CMP leader David Daleiden and his colleague Sandra Merritt were the latest in a disturbing trend underscoring anti-Life corruption and abortion industry collusion in the Harris County D.A.’s office.
Charges were initially brought against Daleiden and Merritt in January. The D.A. issued a misdemeanor charge of intent to buy and sell fetal tissue, and a felony charge related to the IDs the pair used when they were invited to Houston by Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast to discuss the lucrative opportunity of selling the body parts of children killed in their abortion mills. The misdemeanor charge was dismissed on a filing technicality earlier this summer. Today, after a fifteen-minute proceeding in Downtown Houston, the felony charges were also dismissed.
The Center for Medical Progress issued a statement calling dismissal of the felony charge “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.”
Indeed, there is legion evidence that Planned Parenthood’s bigwigs maintained hands-on involvement in the case which culminated in the indictment of the Pro-Life journalists. “Planned Parenthood tried to collude with public officials to manipulate the legal process to their own benefit,” the statement continues, “and they failed.”
Texas Right to Life spoke with Center for Medical Progress leader David Daleiden after the felony charge was dismissed. Daleiden encouraged Pro-Life advocates to take heart in today’s victory, but “get right back on the offensive” to hold Planned Parenthood accountable for the countless violations of human dignity the abortion behemoth continues to commit.
Daleiden noted that the interim update two weeks ago from the Select Investigative Panel on Infant Lives provided further evidence of Planned Parenthood’s despicable behavior right here in Texas with new proof of a relationship between the abortion giant and Baylor College of Medicine through 2015 – even after the release of the CMP’s undercover videos. Planned Parenthood, Daleiden said, “is not above the law.”