On January 18, the judge at Poole District Court postponed for a second time the hearing against Adam Smith-Connor, accused of praying silently in a security zone near an abortion clinic on November 24, 2022. The new The hearing will be divided into three days, on September 17, 18 and 19, 2024, two years after the alleged crime. However, this is not a normal postponement of proceedings, but an indication of the importance that the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP) administration is placing on this process. In fact, the reason for the postponement is a request to add another day to the hearing.
As you may recall, Smith-Connor had been fined £100 for violating the area near the abortion clinic with a “silent prayer”, but refused to pay it because he considered it illegal. Initially, the judge had determined that three hours would be enough to decide on the unpaid fine, but on the date of November 16, 2023 everything was postponed to January 18 so that there would be a full day and possibly a second for sentencing. Now, however, the prosecution has even demanded a third day, a request that has been accepted by the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which is defending Smith-Connor.
The prosecution argues that more time in court ensures all evidence is heard. However, the disproportionate amount of time given to this irrelevant accusation makes Smith-Connor's case particularly unique.
First, the case appears to have no merit. Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council (BCP) accuses Adam Smith-Connor of failing to comply with controversial safety zone law banning prayer within 150 meters of an abortion clinic, in November 2022. Adam Smith- Connor, on the other hand, claims he complied with the law because, in an identical situation a week earlier, Bournemouth police officers, when questioning him outside the BPAS clinic on Ophir Road, told him that praying silently alone in England it was cool. In fact, as demonstrated in this videothey specifically stated that “he was not breaking the law” after he explained, “I am silently praying for my son Jacob, who died as a result of an abortion.”
The BCP Board, however, disputes this interpretation of events, arguing that although Mr Smith-Connor returned a week later to pray outside the same clinic, now convinced that silent prayer did not breach the law , he should still have immediately left the area when Community Safety Accredited Scheme (CSAS) officers stopped him on November 24, 2022, telling him he was breaking the law (watch the video here) simply because they told him to leave.
The contradictory interpretation and application of safety zone legislation by two different groups of police officers working for the same municipality is the crux of this case. Smith-Connor is not the first to find himself in this situation. So much so that in September 2023, former Home Secretary Suella Braverman wrote a letter to the British police force asking for changes to policing practice to restore public trust, which was at an all-time low. the times.
“Silent prayer is not, in itself, illegal,” she reminded police after the cases of Isabel Vaughan-Spruce and Father Sean Gough made international headlines for their arrests while praying in a security zone in Birmingham. Police must not behave in a way that “undermines their oath of impartiality” and must make clear that “holding legitimate opinions, even if those opinions may offend others, is not a crime,” she wrote. The reference is explicit to occasions when the police appeared to be “on the side of one group or another in a currently controversial area of public debate”.
But the real indicator of the importance that the BCP Council is giving to this case is demonstrated by the enormous financial investment it is making, despite being on the verge of bankruptcy. According to an article published in the Guardian on January 13, “Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council has run up an overall deficit of around £60 million”. Despite this, the council hired King's Counsel (KC), an elite group of lawyers, the most expensive in the country, to argue its case at taxpayers' expense. Suffice it to say that for criminal law, newly appointed KC lawyers can earn between £200,000 and £425,000 per year. For those unfamiliar with the category, a KC is defined as “a lawyer or attorney of the highest caliber, recognized as an expert and leader in their legal field”, who is typically entrusted with the most complex cases. Considering that the case concerns a small unpaid fine, Adam Smith-Connor commented that the BCP's hiring of KCs “is like arming yourself with a blacksmith's sledgehammer to crack a walnut”.
The point is that on March 1, Parliament passed the Public Order Act, which provides for the establishment of protection zones around all abortion facilities in England and Wales. The law has not yet come into force, but when it does, these cases could multiply. It is expected that the preliminary guidelines The recently approved legislation, written to resolve the issue of how to define “influencing and interfering” behavior outside of abortion clinics, will come into effect in the near future.
All streets leading to these clinics within a 500-foot radius will be marked with a sign warning passersby that they are entering a safety zone that prohibits abortion-related conversations, even consensual (i.e., without stopping people to handing out leaflets or against their will), and prayers: the penalty for violating this rule is a fine of £100 to £1,000.
The BCP Board's determination, therefore, is not a question of money, because a maximum of one thousand pounds — the amount demanded as a penalty for Adam Smith Connor — is a pittance compared to the council's financial difficulties. Instead, what is at stake is the unquestioned dominance of the abortion industry, which prevents any form of pro-life support and charitable acts, including a simple prayer within 500 feet of an abortion clinic. If Smith-Connor is found guilty and the thought crime is enshrined in criminal law, this landmark case will shape future legal disputes over safe zones by introducing unprecedented draconian restrictions whereby police can arbitrarily question citizens about what they are considering or ordering someone to leave a public area without justification.
Patricia Gooding-Williams has a combined BA in English Literature and Economics from Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, an MA in Education from the University of Cambridge and has taught International Education.
©2024 La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana. Published with permission. Original in Italian: “Abortion and death of pregnancies in Inghilterra, all in court”.
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