The Misdemeanor Charge Against Anti-Abortion Activist David Daleiden Was Dropped

In a twist for the Texas Republican leaders who had ordered an investigation based on the allegations from Daleiden’s group, the grand jury in January cleared Planned Parenthood of wrongdoing and indicted video makers Daleiden and Sandra Merritt. In a statement, the Center for Medical Progress applauded the ruling, calling the charge against Daleiden “bogus”.

On Tuesday, the Harris County District Attorney’s Office said they will not fight the judge’s decision and will instead focus on prosecuting the felony charge.

The “swift dismissal” of the charge against Daleiden is evidence that “the indictments from a runaway grand jury in Houston were a politically-motivated sham all along”, the statement went on to say.

A Texas judge on Tuesday dismissed one of the charges brought up against pro-life activist David Daleiden, who spearheaded the undercover video investigation into Planned Parenthood’s alleged fetal parts trafficking operation. He is accused of using a fake California driver’s license to enter the Planned Parenthood facilities where he recorded staff discussing the costs of providing fetal tissue for research.

In her ruling, Judge Diane Bull said her court lacked the jurisdiction to take up the case because of a technical problem with the indictment filed by prosecutors.

Attorney General Anderson has defended her indictment of Daleiden – despite the fact that a board member of the Planned Parenthood abortion mill works as a prosecutor in her office.

“The dismissal of the first indictmen [on Monday] sends a strong message to Planned Parenthood and their political cronies that colluding to suppress the First Amendment rights of citizen journalists will never work”.

“We were called upon to investigate allegations of criminal conduct by Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast”, Harris County District Attorney Devon Anderson said at the time.

Here’s where it gets more ironic: Judge Bull reasoned that the indictment was defective because prosecutors did not list an “exception” to the criminal charge-essentially, prosecutors didn’t list a few scenarios in which the defendants’ actions would in fact be legal. He remains charged with a felony indictment of tampering with a government document. The Texas investigation into Planned Parenthood is still ongoing, and they are still under investigation.

The selectively-edited video suggested that Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest provider of contraceptive and abortion services, profits off the sale of “baby parts”, which the organization denies.