Police confiscate pro-life sign outting abortion clinic manager
On June 17 pro-lifers who protest at the Hillcrest Women’s Medical Center abortion mill in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, began holding a sign naming the manager, Amy Giambilis.
The clinic is part of a chain owned by abortionist Earl McLeod, who has been involved in the deaths of at least 2 patients. Giambilis has reportedly worked at Hillcrest for over 10 years. Her connection to the mill is easily accessible on the Internet.
Amy Giambilis doesn’t like pro-lifers. They get under her skin, to the point that she was caught on video in 2008 telling a pro-lifer, “I’d like to kill you.”
So Giambilis didn’t take kindly to the pro-lifers outting her on June 17 and called the police.
Harrisburg Officer John Salvadia, stating he was on orders from the district attorney, defied the pro-lifers’ First Amendment rights and confiscated the sign, adding that the legality of what he was doing was “something for the courts to decide.” Ok, I hope the pro-lifers take it to the courts, and I hope the pro-lifers also sue the city’s butt.
Here’s video of the entire debacle…
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkGTYy6bOW0&feature=related[/youtube]
Here’s that video of Giambilis in 2008 giving pro-lifers the finger and saying, “I’d like to kill you, that’s what I’d like to do”…
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CBvVUNXcb0&feature=related[/youtube]
[Thanks to Andy Moore for video editing; photo of Giambilis comes via her Facebook page, where she vaguely states she works “in the medical field” and where she notes her favorite tv shows are Dirty Jobs and Trauma: Life in the E.R. Creepy.]
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Harrisburg Officer John Salvadia, stating he was on orders from the district attorney, defied the pro-lifers’ First Amendment rights and confiscated the sign.
Not sure how it works in the police office world, but in the defense world, military members have an obligation not to follow illegal orders. In this case, if the officer knew the order was illegal, he would have an obligation not to follow it and the DA would have to prove the order was legal, ie pointing to some form of statute. Otherwise it is cowardly to say, “I did this because my boss told me.”
Wow. It’s getting to a point where you can’t even stand outside a person’s place of employment holding up a sign intended to intimidate and harass them. What is this country coming to?
Joan, the First Amendment would be easy if it only applied to free speech you like, wouldn’t it?
Obviously at least one person with a law degree apparently didn’t feel that this action was “free speech”.
Law degrees don’t matter very much to people unwilling to follow the law. Knowing the law doesn’t mean you’re going to follow it.
The new media once again helps the pro-life movement. What a blessing in disguise that someone called the police on this pro lifer. She was very well informed, kept her cool and now many more people know about this incident. Had the police not been called, only the people who travelled along that road would have seen the sign.
Just as I thanked the deathscort who posted the video of the sidewalk counseling a few weeks back, thank you to the person who called the police.
We have nothing to fear when the truth is on our side.
She should have demanded to know the specific law she was violating. I probably would have been calmer and less explanatory (mouthy) about it all. I would have kept it to a simple, “No, you aren’t taking my sign. I have 1st Amendments rights. Show me the law I have violated.” Repeating it if necessary. I would have said nothing else except those words. I may have gone to jail over my refusal to give up the sign, but then the city would have an unlawful arrest on their hands too. Hmmm… Maybe I should see how this turns out and replicate it here in my city….
ah – and since this woman is identified publicly as working at the clinic – why is one form of public knowledge ok and another not? Can’t pick and choose first amendment rights ….
I would have liked it better if that woman had let the officer speak instead of all that info on the offense. I find it’s better to let them speak first and get their take on things…. a little honey goes a long way! ;)
How nice of the clinic worker on the earlier taping to cuss out that guy and make threats. How come the police were not called then? That guy could have made a complaint against the clinic worker…
The police here are great – and our city’s council ruled in our favor with the signs, which made the clinic people very mad. We used saw-horses to holdup our signs on public property. The clinic people are still upset – taking pictures of us and our signs, despite a new sign on their building prohibiting the taking of pictures.
I guess they only want other to follow their rules, not themselves. funny how that works.
I hope they she sues the city. Unbelievable. thanks for posting, Jill!
The right of free speech is not intended to protect speech that is universally accepted and uncontroversial, it is designed to protect offensive speech.
As for a Law Degree, that has nothing to do with the heart behind that degree. Knowledge can be used for many purposes. In many cases nowadays, the law is used to tear down the rights that we have and deny the truth. ”It depends on what your definition of ‘is’ is…..” That would be the perversion of the law down into semantic parsing, with a twisting of meaning. This type of law is practiced when you pervert the purpose of law from a focus on truth and justice, to the type that is administered today: That truth is whatever argument that can be constructed and supported by convoluted logic. (Perhaps I mean “Tortured” logic.)
Joan, you should be able to recognize it. It’s the same tortured logic that is used to create an artificial boundary at various stages of the development of a human being. It’s the same logic that justifies killing one day, where the next would be infanticide. It’s the same logic that cries out that a human’s life should be taken once it passes some artificial threshold of “usefulness”.
Joan, it shouldn’t matter how offensive people find free speech, unless it is excessively obscene or advocating for violent actions. For example, almost everyone finds the Westboro Baptist Church horribly offensive, but we should all agree they have the right to say what they want. You can’t start ripping away constitutional rights if you don’t agree with someone.
Joan @ Wow. It’s getting to a point where you can’t even stand outside a person’s place of employment holding up a sign intended to intimidate and harass them. What is this country coming to?
Wow. It’s getting to the point where they can’t dismember and behead pre-born babies without someone complaining about it. What is this country coming to?
“giving pro-lifers the finger”
OMG it’s so upsetting! The vulgarity of it all!!
Also, the fact that she has her name listed next to her job on the Internet doesn’t mean a thing. Sometimes information is put online against a person’s will…you have no idea if she posted that or not. Clearly she feels threatened and afraid for her life at her job and after 10 years of harassment at work wouldn’t you feel angry enough to flip someone off?
Jane@ If I were to be killing babies for a living I would expect harassment to come with the territory. I wonder if she considers that?
I would expect intolerance and uneducated judgement on the part of pro-lifers, but her job is legal, and she does not deserved domestic terrorism.
Jane, legal protest isn’t terrorism. You can’t take away First Ammendment rights without just cause. Btw, I don’t care that she flipped anyone off. It really doesn’t matter.
And while we’re at it, let’s discuss the fact that you find her two favorite shows “creepy.”
They’re on TLC and Discovery channel for pete’s sake…she works in healthcare and enjoys a show about the ER…how is that creepy??
You people, I swear.
Her job is legal but not moral and furthermore it is only legal because of a bunch of unethical legal shenanigans by a bunch of immoral lawyers and politicians. And the legality of it does not change the fact that she is killing babies for a living therefore moral people are going to complain about it, educated or not. Also, I would hate the day that I became so educated that my education overrode my morals to the point that I killed for a living. AND FYI- Free speech is not domestic terrorism.
Jack, I don’t care that you don’t care…? I was just saying that Jill stanek seems to take offense to someone harassing someone at their workplace being flipped off.
And as far as protest rights, they appeared to be on clinic property, which I would consider trespassing and harassment. Pro-life protests tend to veer into terrorizing very easily, because once a person feels terrorized or unsafe/intimidated, they’ve crossed the line
Legal shenanigans??? It’s a decision made by the SUPREME COURT.
How can you justify the legality of the first ammendment while denouncing the legality of another issue? You can’t pick and choose. Pro-lifers have a right to free speech and American women have a right to safe legal abortion
Seriously? The guy showed her a picture of a born BABY and said “this baby was saved from your clinic” and she feels threatened by THAT? That is “unsafe and terrorized”? Absolutely absurd!
Jane @ Legal shenanigans??? It’s a decision made by the SUPREME COURT.
Yes, based on a bogus case that a woman was tricked into signing on to. Yes, it was legal and political shenanigans. No doubt about it.
“How can you justify the legality of the first ammendment while denouncing the legality of another issue? You can’t pick and choose. Pro-lifers have a right to free speech and American women have a right to safe legal abortion”
Because Free Speech doesn’t hack little pre-born babies into pieces…abortion does…big difference there!
The sidewalk and past is public property where I live, I have no idea what the laws are in PA. Still free speech. Someone can come picket my work if they like, on public property. We might feel intimidated but they have the right if they aren’t threatening anyone with violence.
I only mentioned that I don’t care what she did, because I find the offense about her flipping the protesters off kinda silly.
How would you like it if I showed up at your work with a picture of aborted fetus and the words THIS IS EVERY WOMAN’S RIGHT? and screamed at you and followed you from your car to the door of your building? And then me, and a bunch of my pro-choice friends got together to yell at the people entering your office. Would you feel a little bit threatened? Maybe just a litle bit?
Day in and day out, I’d be there with my sign and my yelling, hoping to scare you and make you feel bad and hoping to make your neighbors hate you? Every day for 10 years.
How do you feel now
Honestly? That would suck. But just because I disagree with it doesn’t make it illegal or worthy of prosecution. I am not a fan of protesting by the way, I just don’t want to infringe on anyone’s free speech. I find all kinds of protests and demonstrations personally infuriating and unethical, but people can say what they want.
People can say whatever they want but they can’t infringe on my sense of personal safety.
My neighbor in my old apartment was a huge white supremacist birther, awful person. He made me feel personally threatened. I don’t support taking away his right to say what he wants, however disgusting and insulting it was.
I would love it because if pro-aborts ever picked up a pic of an aborted baby and yelled that they had the right to do that it would be the beginning of the end for “choice.” Why do you think they hate the pics so bad? It’s because it’s TRUTH and they want to hide behind euphemisms so that the average Joe doesn’t know the truth about what goes on in those places. So, go ahead, get the signs out and be sure and write “Women have a right to do this” in huge letters dripping with blood to make it more realistic.
As I said, killing for a living- by nature- comes with certain “side issues”. Protests being one of them. If she doesn’t like it she should try NOT killing for a living and see how it goes.
@Jane, have you actually heard pro-lifers yelling at people entering abortion clinics in real life? I’m curious because I’ve been to a few abortion clinics and have never heard the pro-lifers yelling.
Sorry, racist speech isn’t covered under the first amendment, it’s considered hate speech. No one should ever support a person’s “right” to disparage a group on their ethnicity or race.
YES, as a clinic escort I have often heard protesters screaming at women entering the clinic.
Please also look up videos of the (inappropriately named) “summer of mercy” on YouTube.
Earlier this year at the walk for choice, I did just that. I co-opted those stupid anti-abortion posters and wrote “this is my legal right.”
I’m proud that I live in a country where abortion, free of any euphemism, is legal, and I will fight to keep it that way
Jane, laws preventing hate speech are unconstitutional except in cases of obscenity, defamation, incitement to riot, or fighting words. My neighbor can dislike my ethnicity and say so and say that Latinos aren’t really American, blah blah blah, but he can’t advocate attacking me or otherwise harming me. It’s hideous, but legal.
Of course you have the right to advocate for that Jane, and others have the right to disagree. If someone threatened your life or tried to incite violence against you, that isn’t free speech, that’s a crime.
What they “yell” is “please don’t kill your baby” and “let us help you” unless it’s someone on the fringe yelling ‘murderer” although that is the truth I really don’t think it is effective.
Somehow “please dont kill your baby” and “this baby was saved from your clinic” are ugly things to say to someone walking into a place to kill their kid and to the people doing the killing.
Jane@ Earlier this year at the walk for choice, I did just that. I co-opted those stupid anti-abortion posters and wrote “this is my legal right.”
I would love to see pics of that! A pro-abort advertising for dead babies!
@Jane; Seeing as how Mr. Borsch isn’t an abortionist and doesn’t work at an abortion clinic, your point is moot and if you did what you propose it would just make you look like an idiot.
Try again.
No way, they yell things like “whore” and “baby killer” and their intent is to intimidate, not education. It’s very very scary
Deanna- I hope you can join us for our next walk for choice!
Mike- it shouldt be ok at anyone’s place of work, so your point is moot. Try again.
…they can’t infringe on my sense of personal safety.
The judicial system has routinely decided no one can infringe on a reasonable person’s sense of personal safety. Feeling threatened by speech with which one disagrees or doesn’t want to hear is a personal problem, not a crime.
“it shouldt be ok at anyone’s place of work, so your point is moot. Try again.”
So you are in favor of suppressing free speech. Only those opinions that you disagree with or all forms of controversial speech?
I’m not against free speech, I’m against the intentional repeated intimidation that clinic workers and clinic patients endure all the time.
Jane@ Thanks for the invite but I would hack my own legs off first before I would ever join in on the quest to kill babies!
While you are marching along think about how all of those freak pro-lifers were advocating for YOUR life when you were pre-born and how we were asking women way back when not to kill you and all your buddies marching.
Also the next time you got to Wal-mart or to the grocery and you see a baby in a buggy think about the fact that just a few short months before that baby could have been sliced up and sent to a lab so they could pick through his parts and sell the ‘valuable” pieces and throw the rest of him in the “medical waste” bucket all because you marched and “fought’ that it could be done to him. Imagine him in that bucket and imagine that you fought for him to be there because that’s exactly what you do.
If a clinic protester harms you, incites others to harm you, threatens your life, incites a riot, or something of that nature, then you have a point. Yelling out opinions that you don’t agree with is protected. It’s the way that free speech laws work. You can’t outlaw a protest because it is controversial.
And it has nothing to do with the fact that I disagree with the things the protestors are saying.
In the 60’s, students at berkley protested and intimidated people entering an army recruitment station. They screamed “KILLER” and “YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO THIS” etc etc, and it wad a disgusting show of intimidation and aggression. The vietnam war was a disgusting atrocity and should never have happened, but I don’t support people harassing other people doing something legal (leaving for Vietnam, getting an abortion, etc)
Funny thing is, Jane, I don’t agree with those displays either. I am not willing to overturn the First Amendment on my personal opinion, however. Right to assemble and petition is not dependent on how you or I feel about how the protesters go about it.
Deanna, hack your own legs off? I could only hope!!
And L O L like I would ever set foot in walmart- why would I want to join in on the effort to kill the environment, small business, and communities?
Well, I don’t know Jane, you join in on the cause to kill babies, why not the environment, small business, and communities?
And why would you want my legs hacked off?
Jane says:
No way, they yell things like “whore” and “baby killer” and their intent is to intimidate, not education.
_______________________________________________________________________
I find that very hard to believe. I looked up summer of mercy on Youtube and could only find a group of teens sitting around a table talking. Any chance you can provide a link?
I’m sorry that you have too much faith in your anti-choice peers. “whore” And “baby killer” are very often used by the anti-choicers at the clinic I help at. Go google “summer of mercy Kansas” for videos, I don’t have the capabilities on this phone to look
….speaking about killing the environment – do you know that all those birth control pills are polluting the environment? Most waste-treatment plants do not detect or treat for urinated hormones – and all that is going into the ground, our environment and into the water. That surely affects the environment. So much for keeping our environment pure.
And Jane – I find it really ironic that you are worried about ‘efforts to kill off the environment, small business and communities’ and yet will will continue to ‘fight’ for legal abortion. Save the baby humans? If you will fight to save the environment, wildlife (I am assuming) then why not try to save the baby humans?
Is it progressive to be against your own nature? Your own people? The most defenseless among us?
I googled and you tube searched for summer of mercy and didn’t find the video to which Jane was referring. When you get back to a computer a link would be appreciated. I tried, but I know my search wasn’t exhaustive.
Are you referring to the 1991 Summer of Mercy? It’s fine if you were, evil words are still evil even if they are twenty years old. However, evidence from this century is necessary if you wish to have any credibility when speaking about pro lifers.
Jane:
You are even more uneducated than we all thought. “Racist” speech is a first amendment issue, too. It is covered under the First Amendment. It doesn’t say “except things we don’t like.”
I was watching the History Channel the other day, and the KKK groups were having a gathering with microphones, in their white pajamas and saying – ahem – yelling: WE HATE JEWS! WE HATE N*GGERS! WE HATE SPICS! WE HATE THEM JUST BECAUSE THEY BREATHE! etc. etc. etc.
Westboro says : God hates fags…and that they love that our soldiers are dying.
So…yes you can be as REPREHENSIBLE as they are (or your love for abortion), and they can still say what they want.
PLEASE stand up with a group of aborted babies, and say we love this choice. THAT is more of a truth than your cutsie pink signs.
@Michelle, I told her that hate and racist speech is protected as well, and she never answered that. I doubt she will answer you either.
Jane said, “Deanna, hack your own legs off? I could only hope!!”
Good thing you don’t support reprehensible, intimidating speech, Jane.
Jane, did you even notice from the video above that Giambilis said “I’d like to kill you” to that man with the picture of a baby? He didn’t seem to be yelling anything, or using “reprehensable, intimidating speech”, he wasn’t even in her space. Is a picture of a living baby that reprehensable to her? She’d rather see that baby and that man dead?
Wow, she’s just the person I’d want to get healthscare from. Yikes.
Exactly Michelle. The US Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Nazis to march through Skokie, IL in the ACLU vs City of Skokie case.
Before anyone throws Roe V Wade in my face, we all agree that abortion is legal. The Supreme Court said so.
Jane does have the right to fight to overturn ACLU vs City of Skokie, just as we fight to overturn Roe v Wade, but to say the law doesn’t exist just tells us that someone wasn’t paying attention in High School Social Studies.
Eric- she fake offered it up, so I fake accepted
The Harrisburg incident will surely go to court. I hope they sue the city of Harrisburg and the HPD for clearly violating her constitutionally protected 1st amendment free speech rights. $53 million sounds about right.