RICO - No!

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Rochester Area Right To Life

RICO not valid against abortion protesters

The Supreme Court has finally ruled that the RICO laws cannot be used against abortion protestors.

These laws were originally intended to protect businesses and individuals from racketeering and extortion by organized crime, where the weapons used by organized crime included all kinds of violence including murder against the intended victims of extortion or against their families.

Protesting groups of many kinds, not just abortion protesters, have long said that the law was not intended to dampen free speech and should not be used to do so.

The Supreme Court has now agreed. Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, writing for the majority, said that since the protesters did not "obtain property" they could not be charged with extortion. They may have broken other laws. "But even when their acts of interference and disruption achieved their ultimate goal of 'shutting down' a clinic that performed abortions, such acts did not constitute extortion,'' he wrote.


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