Joan Andrews Bell will represent herself during 2nd DC FACE trial

Facing 11 years for non-violent civil disobedience. As per the result of the first trial of five of the rescuers – who were all given 11 year sentences and remanded to jail directly from the court.

Unborn babies 'are being killed without due process of law, without an attorney being by them and without a day in court” said Joan in a Lifesite news interview.

When one of the most renowned and respected leaders in the history of the pro-life movement goes on trial in the United States District Court of Washington, D.C., she will not be represented by an attorney.

75-year-old Joan Andrews Bell waived her right to a court appointed attorney, as has been her practice since first being arrested for pro-life actions at abortion clinics in the 1970s.

“The main reason is the babies.  They are being killed without due process of law, without an attorney being by them and without a day in court,” Bell told LifeSiteNews.

“So I do not want to have any of those things.  I’ll be in court, but I’ll be silent and I’ll represent myself.  I’ll make a statement to the jury in the beginning, but that’s it.  The judge said you can’t bring up anything about the babies in court. I said, ‘Well my silence will represent their silence’.” 

One week after five defendants in the first trial were found guilty on counts of committing conspiracy to violate rights and violating the FACE Act (Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances), Bell was in court today for jury selection in the second trial, before Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, along with co-defendants Jonathan Darnel and Jean Marshall.  A fourth defendant, Paulette Harlow, was judged unfit to stand trial.

Bell, Darnel, and Marshall know they are all in danger of facing the same outcome as the other defendants who were immediately sent to jail to await sentencing. Each is facing a maximum 11-year prison sentence. 

“I think they’re capable of doing anything, to tell you the truth,” said Bell of the judicial system. “They have no morals and no love in their hearts for the babies, and they certainly don’t have love in their hearts for us. I expect the worst.”   

Few are more familiar with the criminal justice system in America than Joan Andrews Bell.  She has been arrested more than 200 times, and once spent two years in solitary confinement for performing rescues at abortion clinics. Joan views it all through the lens of her deep Catholic faith and the meaning of Christian suffering.