Jury Finds Abortion Foes Harmed Planned Parenthood, Awards Over $2 Million
SAN FRANCISCO (CN) – A federal jury found an anti-abortion cohort led by David Daleiden caused substantial harm to Planned Parenthood by infiltrating abortion industry conferences to secretly tape abortion doctors and staff – and awarded punitive damages of $870,000.
David Daleiden, an anti-abortion activist charged with invasion of privacy for filming attendees at National Abortion Federation conferences in California.
Daleiden, who heads the Center for Medical Progress, and his co-defendant Sandra Merritt, posed as human tissue procurers for a fake company called BioMax as part of a hidden-camera investigation into the organization.
The pair attended abortion industry conferences from 2013 to 2015 – posing as exhibitors named Robert Sarkis and Susan Tennenbaum – where they secretly recorded conversations they later posted online. Daleiden also made recordings at Planned Parenthood-affiliated clinics in Texas and Colorado.
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