I haven’t spent any time writing about the misleading attack videos on Planned Parenthood being put out by yet another shadowy anti-abortion group, so let me dispense with this.
Right there with them
Harris County District Attorney Devon Anderson said Wednesday her office has begun a criminal investigation into the Houston branch of Planned Parenthood after the release earlier this week of a video showing an agency executive discussing the preservation of organs of aborted fetuses.
Anderson, who described the video as being “disturbing,” said she has reviewed it, as have prosecutors and investigators in her office.
The video was the fifth to be released by the California-based Center for Medical Progress, an anti-abortion group whose activists in April secretly recorded Melissa Farrell with the Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast. She discusses how to preserve aborted fetuses for research purposes as well as the different types, methods and costs of fetal tissue harvesting. The videos are part of the group’s campaign to show that Planned Parenthood illegally sells fetal tissue to scientists.
Anderson said the first step in the investigation process is to obtain the complete, unedited video to make sure they know the context of all of Farrell’s statements. She said an investigation is “warranted at this time,” but added it is “premature” to say what crimes, if any, the branch has committed.
“We won’t know until our investigation is complete,” Anderson said. “So for that reason I will not speculate on which laws have been violated or any possible resulting sentences. Our investigation could reveal state as well as federal law violations, or no violations at all.”
Go ahead and investigate away. As was the case with the state of Indiana, I seriously doubt there will be anything to find. That’s what one should expect when a group of fundamentally dishonest people with ties to violent extremists engage in a dishonest campaign to elicit a political reaction. They got their reaction, but that doesn’t mean anyone should trust a word they say. I fully expect the investigation here to come up empty as well. On the plus side, KUHF notes that Anderson “will also look for evidence of any laws being broken by the anti-abortion group”, so maybe something positive will come out of this. That would be ironic, and richly deserved if it happens. My money is still on this being quietly dropped as a nothingburger, though.
“Anderson “will also look for evidence of any laws being broken by the anti-abortion group””, I’ll believe that when it happens. I have a bad felling about this. It’s not like Harris county has sterling reputation of fair treatment from the DA office. I see some comment from PP being taken out of context and charges trumped up against them.
Hard to investigate an organization for something they don’t do. Would really appreciate the DA investigating, you know, crime.
How in the world could Planned Parent Hood ever do anything wrong? They are incapable of it. Just like the Republican Party. All perfect people each and everyone of them. They should spend their time getting real criminals. I agree