74-Year-Old Scottish Woman Arrested for Protesting Near Abortion Provider
A 74-year-old Scottish woman was arrested for standing near a hospital that performs abortions with a sign that read: “Coercion is a crime, here to talk, only if you want.” The woman’s protest was in violation of an “exclusion zone” law, which bans anti-abortion protests or prayer vigils within a 200-meter radius of a facility that provides abortions.Â
“I was approaching no one on that day. I wasn’t calling out. I was standing quietly by the roadside,” Rose Docherty, told The Free Press reporter Madeline Kearns. “I am worried about a society that’s willing to lock up a 74-year-old grandmother for offering consensual conversation.” Docherty says she held the sign for about 90 minutes before two police officers approached, handcuffed her, and took her to the police station where she was fingerprinted, swabbed for DNA, and had a mugshot taken.
“It was a surreal experience,” Docherty told Kearns. “I just thought, I’m a 74-year-old elderly woman—what are you afraid of that you feel that you want to handcuff me?” I
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