News

By Hilary White
 
  DUBLIN, July 20, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Charges have been dismissed against two pro-life demonstrators in Dublin who were arrested for displaying signs depicting aborted babies at a picket. The two were charged in April with provoking a breach of the peace.
 
  According to the charges made by the arresting Gardai, Donal O’Driscoll and Colm Callanan had displayed “… a visible representation which was threatening, abusive, insulting or obscene with intent to provoke a breach of the peace…”
 
  The placards read: “There are no nice pictures of an abortion,” and included a photo of a baby of viable gestational age killed by abortion. If upheld, punishment could have been a fine and/or three months imprisonment.
 
  The protest they were attending was against a court decision in 2003 that granted the Midland Health Board permission to allow a teenager who became pregnant in its care to travel to Britain for an abortion.
 
  Donal O’Driscoll, editor of the conservative Irish Media Review, opined that the picketers were doing the job of the police in attempting to do “the job of the Gardai, which is to defend life as well as property.”
 
  The Midland Health Board scandal caused a furor in Ireland where abortion remains illegal.