WASHINGTON — Anti-abortion activists are responding for the first time after DC police found the remains of five human fetuses inside a Capitol Hill apartment.
WUSA9 was there exclusively when police pulled a cooler and bio-hazard bags out of the basement unit.
The activists claim the fetuses were from late-term abortions and say they alerted MPD that they were there. Police, however, say the fetuses appear to have been aborted "in accordance with DC law" and do not see anything illegal with that aspect.
Police have not commented on the claims stemming from the group regarding who called in a tip to MPD.
The group also hinted that the fetuses are connected to a DC clinic they're charged with invading. That claim is also not corroborated.
What is known is the home where the fetuses were found is connected to Lauren Handy, one of nine people indicted March 30 on federal felony charges from an incident where they allegedly chained themselves inside Washington Surgi-Clinic on F Street in 2020.
Handy is director of activism for a group called Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising. On Facebook, the group now claims the fetuses are the "bodies of five babies killed in late-term abortions." PAAU says that it held a "funeral Mass" and "naming ceremony" for the fetuses. The group also claims that one of the defendants in the federal case arranged for DC homicide detectives to pick up the fetuses.
Police on March 30 said that based on examination of the remains, there doesn't appear to be anything illegal with how the fetuses were aborted, but didn't explain why they were in Handy's home.
"There doesn't appear to be anything criminal in nature regarding that (method of abortion). Except for how they got into that house. And so we're continuing to look at that," said Executive Assistant Police Chief Ashan Benedict.
Anti-abortion activists have focused for years on a DC ob/gyn at Washington Surgi-Center. A group called LiveAction.org even secretly recorded the doctor talking about what the doctor would do if an aborted baby was delivered alive.
A woman who answered the phone at Washington Surgi-Clinic hung up after calls from reporters on Thursday and Friday.
The activists now promise to explain everything at a news conference Tuesday. PAAU says the defendants in the federal clinic invasion case and the people who obtained the fetuses will be there.