The anti-abortion activist whose home in Washington, D.C., officials carted five fetuses out of last week has pleaded not guilty to federal civil rights violations stemming from a separate incident. Lauren Handy, 28, is one of nine people indicted over an alleged breach of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act after a 2020 incident when their anti-abortion group allegedly blockaded and invaded a D.C. abortion clinic. The same day the ring of anti-abortion protesters was charged over the incident, the Metropolitan Police Department received a tip that fetuses were being stored in Handy’s Capitol Hill rowhouse basement, a spokesperson said. Though they initially believed the fetuses came from illegal abortions, district officials have since said it appears as though they had been aborted in line with state law. It remained unclear Monday how Handy, who has not been detained, got the fetuses. “We’re not going to rush to judgment,” D.C.’s police chief said. Handy has thus far declined to comment on the incident to the media, but told WUSA9 as they stood outside her home last week, “People will freak out when they hear.”
