Prisoners for God's Precious Infants

Linda Gibbons and Amnesty International

Priests for Life Newsletter | Pro-Life Rosary Novena | St. John Chrysostom

Amnesty International

I know that thousands of people have written to the Judge and the Governor of Pennsylvania on behalf of Joan, I am now asking you to write to Amnesty International, inviting them to take up Linda Gibbons' case. The appropriate addresses are below.

Linda Gibbons -- Prisoner of Conscience

As some of you may already know, in the summer of 1994 the Canadian Province of Ontario obtained a temporary injunction banning any pro-life activity within a specified distance of an abortion clinic in Toronto. This is of course unconstitutional and pro-life lawyers in Canada are firmly of the opinion that the injunction will be struck down as soon as someone is charged with violating the injunction.

The uninformed would imagine this to be easy. All you have to do is go along to the abortuary, hand someone a leaflet, and ask them to consider the alternatives to abortion. The police will then arrest you, charge you with violating the injunction, and you will get your day in court.

Unfortunately it's not that simple. Linda Gibbons, a grandmother of four, has now been arrested ten times, has spent a total of 1,522 days in prison, and has not once been officially charged with breaking a Court Order. What actually happens is that the police arrest her and charge her with 'obstructing a police officer', or 'failing to comply with a probation order'.

This is of course a serious abuse of the legal process, but it is difficult to see what we in this country should be doing to help Linda Gibbons. Having been in jail since last September she was released at the beginning of March after being found not guilty of obstructing a police officer, but may be back in jail by the time you read this. My information comes from the internet at http://www.lifesite.net/gibbons.

You might consider following this pattern:

  1. E-mail to your National Branch office. The address is on http://www.amnesty.org/aisect/email.html

  2. Snail mail to your National Branch office. The address is on http://www.amnesty.org/aisect/contacts.html.

  3. If you don't receive a reply within a week or so, try ringing your National Branch office to check if your letter has arrived and to make sure you are sending it to the right place. If the Branch office tells you that your letter hasn't been received, send the letter Registered Mail to your National Branch office, or wherever they have told you it should be sent.

  4. Finally if you get no response send your letter Registered Mail to:
    International Secretariat *
    1 Easton St,
    London
    WC1X 8DJ,
    ENGLAND
    Tel: +44 (171) 413 5500
    Fax: +44 (171) 956 1157
*NOTE: if you live in the UK this is NOT the national branch address.

If you receive a reply please let me know what they say.

If you don't receive a reply please let me know where you sent your letter.

We wrote to Amnesty about Joan in January 1998. Their reply, the following September, speaks for itself.

We also wrote about Linda Gibbons at the begining of this year. The reply to this letter - though not so long in coming - once again speaks for itself. Taken together they make interesting reading.

The bottom line is that they will help anyone - except pro-lifers. This is an important message which I think should get out to the Church and the pro-life community. If enough people write to them they may just be forced to think about their policies.

If anyone would like a hardcopy of these letter I will be happy to fax it to them.

God Bless,

Liz Toolan.




email to Liz Toolan | Pro-Life Links | Toolan homepage


Web Page by Toolan Computer Services Ltd. Email for details