Pro-Life Activists Arrested Outside DC Planned Parenthood Clinic for Chalking Pro-life Messages

SFLA student leader Erica Caporaletti being arrested
Photo Credit: SFLA

Update: Washington DC Metropolitan Police spokeswoman Alaina Gertz told the Daily Caller that the activists were arrested for “the defacing of private/public property,” and were “both citation released.” This hypocritical statement shows that Mayor Bowser is only allowing protestors she agrees with to use street painting as a method of political protest.

On Saturday, August 1, pro-life activists with Students for Life of America were arrested in front of a Washington D.C. Planned Parenthood clinic for chalking pro-life messages on the sidewalk. Students for Life claims that the organization had obtained a permit to paint "Black Preborn Lives Matter" on the road using temporary paint, but pro-life activists were met with police threats when they arrived at the clinic.

“After applying and receiving our permit for this event today, after being told by the Metropolitan police that the Mayor has… ‘opened a Pandora’s box’ by painting public streets, we arrived to find six police cars threatening to arrest our team and students if they painted, even using the [temporary] paint we bought that the Police Department specifically requested,” said SFLA President Kristan Hawkins. “When we asked if we could at least use sidewalk chalk to chalk our anti-violence message on the streets, the police threatened to arrest us.”

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser “will be hearing from Students for Life’s attorneys about these unconstitutional efforts to limit speech to government-approved topics.”

Students for Life of America (SFLA) Strategic Partnerships Advisor Warner DePriest and SFLA student leader Erica Caporaletti from Towson University were arrested for chalking pro-life messages on the sidewalk in defiance of police requests.

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