Abortion Clinic Photos Posted on Web
July 10 -- When a young woman named Emily arrived at a Denver clinic Tuesday for a scheduled abortion, she was greeted by a crowd of anti-abortion activists, who tried to shame her into changing her mind.
As they followed her along the sidewalk, she repeatedly told them, "It's my choice, it's my decision!"
Once inside the clinic's parking lot, she thought she was free of them. She was wrong.
One of the protesters was taking her picture from atop a ladder that looked over a wall.
That photo may very well end up on a Web site that is using a new tactic in the battle against abortion — posting pictures of patients who walk into abortion clinics.
The Web site is operated by anti-abortion activist Neal Horsley from his home in Georgia.
He says it is a news outlet, with photographers contributing pictures from 24 states.
"The fact is," says Horsley, "that as a journalist, we [sic] have an obligation to report when human beings are being slaughtered."
The photographers who take the pictures cannot distinguish between those women going into the clinic for an abortion and those going in for other reasons, such as counseling, but the protesters say anyone going in is a fair target.
Jo Scott, who was outside the Denver clinic with her photographer husband, said "I wouldn't worry about snaring innocent people. There aren't any, going into a 'death camp.'"
Patients Are Newest Target, Not Doctors
A lawsuit filed by doctors who claimed a similar Web site had put their lives in danger is working its way through the courts. Horsley's "Nuremburg Files" site featured wanted posters of abortion providers, and had Xs through the names of doctors who had been killed. A federal appeals court ruled recently that those elements of the site constituted a "true threat," and Horsley has altered the site some.
Even though Horsley's newer site does not list names and addresses, some of the volunteer escorts who accompany women into the clinics fear for their safety.
