Remember our old pal, Lauren Handy, who was arrested by the FBI for terrorizing abortion clinics and patients, and who kept five fetuses in their home that had to be removed by the DC Police? Well, your C&L gal here has a little update.
I want you all to rest assured that they did not keep five fetuses at her home. I promise. Completely untrue.
They kept 115 fetuses at their home.
One-hundred-fifteen. Fetuses.
We now, allegedly, have their answers to some of the questions I asked in my previous post, but color me skeptical as to their veracity.
At a predictably maudlin, performance-art-filled press conference on Tuesday, Handy, Randall Terry (founder of Operation Rescue) and Terrisa Bukovinac (founder and ED of Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising) appeared with some others of their ilk to put their spin on the events surrounding Handy's arrest and discovery of the fetuses.
Guess who watched the whole damn thing for you? *I* did. You're welcome. I won't link to it, but if you feel you deserve some kind of punishment, you can find it on PAAU's Facebook and YouTube pages.
Here's the timeline, according to them:
March 25: Handy and Bukovinac were terrorizing protesting outside Washington Surgi-Center, when they saw a truck driver from Curtis Bay Medical Waste Disposal loading boxes into his truck. They asked him if he knew what was inside. He didn't. They told him "Dead babies." They asked if he would get into trouble if they took one of the boxes, and he asked what they were going to do with them. They told him they were going to bury them. He let them take one of the boxes.
This is all SUUUUPER believable so far, right?
Then, THEN, they made an UNBOXING video. That's right, kids, they videoed themselves opening the box and cutting open bags to find the remains of not five, but 115 fetuses. This video is extremely graphic, and they showed it at the press conference.
What do they claim happened between March 25 and March 30, when DC police removed five fetuses from Handy's home? They claim they had a naming ceremony for the 115 with a Catholic priest (whom they refused to identify,) and buried the 110 which were aborted early in pregnancy - at a cemetery (which they also refused to identify.)
(I could go on for days about the outrageous invasion of privacy, blatant Christofascist nature of holding a religious ceremony for someone else's dead fetus, naming it, and giving it a Christian burial in a secret location, without the parent's knowledge or permission, but honestly, no one wants to see that smoke from me right now.)
They claim to have spent three days "searching for a private pathologist" to examine the larger five fetuses, to see if those abortions were performed illegally according to federal law. But, golly gee, they couldn't find one! Go figure! So, they just proceeded with holding a funeral mass at her apartment and burying the 110 early-pregnancy fetuses, holding on to the larger five.
nOrMaL.
March 29: Bukovinac claims she and Handy "coordinated with attorneys to alert the DC homicide unit of the location of the five larger [babies] and request investigations into their deaths." They waited for DC police to show up, but when they didn't, they went back to Bukovinac's apartment.
March 30: They got a call letting them know the FBI was making arrests for the 2020 clinic invasion (which Bukovinac called a "rescue.") They rushed back to Handy's apartment, where Handy was arrested. Only a few hours AFTER Handy's arrest did the homicide unit of the DC police show up to recover the five fetuses from their apartment.
Got it? All make sense now? See, THEY'RE the real victims in this. Not only that, they used the press conference to make demands of the Department of Justice. Demands, I say! Investigations into the deaths of the five fetuses they stole from an abortion clinic operating legally in Washington, DC. Demands for a proper burial for these five fetuses post-autopsy!
Randall Terry claimed it's the DOJ that should have custody of the fetuses, not DC police, because DC's laws on abortion are so lax, they won't prosecute. Of COURSE they won't think anything illegal will have taken place regarding the abortions! You can't trust Washington, DC!
DC police did, indeed, decline to prosecute the doctor. They said there was no evidence the abortions were performed illegally, though they're still investigating how Handy got the fetuses.
Contradicting his own narrative, later on, Terry cast similar aspersions on the DOJ, claiming they only indicted Hardy on the 2020 clinic invasion because this administration is so "pro-abort" they decided to "dig up" old investigations that the Trump administration had decided let slide.
As for Handy, they bizarrely referred to the five days the fetuses were in their apartment as being under their "stewardship." As if placing them in their freezer and leaving for five days constitutes careful watchfulness and guidance over their...what? Souls? Whatever.
After their carefully edited abortion porn video was presented, Terry took the opportunity to appropriate the trauma of both Black people and Jewish people by dramatically asking what we would think of journalists who saw slavery in the 1850s, or Auschwitz during WWII and didn't tell the world what they saw.
"Woe to you! Remember!" Terry said, sternly warning journalists not to become "collaborators with the killers! That is what has become of so much media in America today. Collaborators! By hiding the truth! It is repugnant! It is an offense against God and a treachery against these victims! So, now," he said, smiling, "we will take questions."
Oy.
There were various and sundry questions regarding timeline clarifications, which Handy and Bukovinac answered, while Terry would interject with emotional soliloquies about how disingenuous it is to question any of their integrity when the real crime is that bAbyZ R dEd and being burned by Curtis Bay to light homes in Baltimore City (oh, forgot to tell you about that little nugget - they're accusing Curtis Bay of burning remains of fetuses to power the City of Baltimore.) How DARE anyone act like they have done anything wrong when this HOLOCAUST of ABORTION MILLS is taking place?
Interestingly, one reporter asked if they had video footage of their conversation with Curtis Bay's driver and him allowing them to take the box, and awwww...they don't!
If THEY didn't record the alleged transaction, you know who did? The cameras on the building that houses Washington Surgi-Center. For security purposes, those cameras are likely in the alleys and behind the building, too. I wrote to the DC Police to ask if they had such video in their possession, and they responded, "Due to the ongoing nature of this investigation, we are unable to discuss specifics such as this. This case remains under active investigation." This is what I expected, but Curtis Bay, and their driver categorically deny that this conversation took place, and they claim all three boxes arrived at Curtis Bay.
According to the New York Times,
“On March 25, a Curtis Bay employee took custody of three packages from the Washington Surgery Center (Washington Surgi-Clinic) and delivered all of them to Curtis Bay’s incineration facility,” the company said in a statement. The driver did not hand packages over to the protesters or anyone else, it said. “Any allegations made otherwise are false.”
The company, which said it was cooperating with the police, added that its client agreements prohibit customers “from disposing of fetuses and human remains” using its services.
Footage from security cameras would likely confirm which story is correct.
Meanwhile, Randall Terry is very concerned about the state of our media, and how this is being reported, saying any journalists who portray Handy and Bukovinac as "villains" should be "ashamed of themselves!"
"We've seen stories come out over the last few days from left-wing, crazy RAGS! They would be FUNNY! It would be like the Onion was writing them, except they're so grotesque!" he exclaimed.
Heh. Oopsie.
Finally, around 46 minutes into this sh*tshow of a presser, a reporter asks the magic question:
"As you point out, DC has very few restrictions on abortions. How can you be certain that these fetuses were not terminated based on medical need, and/or to save the woman's life? How can you be certain that wasn't the case?"
DING DING DING
Bukovinac said, "Well, an autopsy would help reveal that. We know from the small amount of statistics that we do have on the topic that the majority of even late-term third-trimester abortions are done for elective reasons. But the reality is, we don’t know, which is exactly why we contacted the police asking them for an autopsy."
Actually, an autopsy on a fetus would NOT help reveal anything about the health of the pregnant person, other than possibly a genetic component to the fetus' death. Furthermore, the statistics on abortions later in pregnancy (after 21 weeks) show nothing of the sort about the majority being elective. Very limited data exists on these kind of abortions because so few are done. Fewer than 1% of abortions occur after 20 weeks. So for her to claim that the majority of them are "elective" is complete and utter horsesh*t.
According to Kaiser Family Foundation, "Almost half of individuals who obtained an abortion after 20 weeks did not suspect they were pregnant until later in pregnancy, and other barriers to care included lack of information about where to access an abortion, transportation difficulties, lack of insurance coverage and inability to pay for the procedure." Barriers put in place, mind you, by Republicans. Add to this the number of fetal anomalies or health dangers to the pregnant person that don't even present themselves until the second trimester, and already you know Bukovinac is talking out of her a$$.
There you have it. Christian extremists steal 115 fetuses, force names and religions on them, claim to have buried 110 of them, get caught with the last five, then claim they are the ones who have been wronged at a dramatic, heavily scripted press-conference filled with stern directives for journalists and a firehose of propaganda from the criminal, misogynistic forced-birther terrorists.
I'll try to make the next update a little shorter. I'm hoping it doesn't involve a press conference. Let us pray.
