Fri Mar 3, 2023 – 7:40 pm EST
AUSTIN, Texas (LifeSiteNews) – In a major First Amendment victory, the Texas Supreme Court unanimously ruled February 24, 2023 that pro-life advocate Mark Lee Dickson was expressing a constitutionally protected opinion – and therefore cannot be sued for defamation – when he called pro-abortion groups “criminal organizations” that “murder unborn children.” Dickson’s attorneys included Jonathan Mitchell, Martin Whittaker, Briscoe Cain, Former Texas Solicitor General, and Tom Brejcha, President and Chief Counsel of the Thomas More Society.
The director of Right to Life of East Texas and founder of Sanctuary Cities for the Unborn Initiative, Dickson was sued in two separate lawsuits by The Lilith Fund for Reproductive Equity, the Afiya Center, and Texas Equal Access Fund for defamation after he made statements accusing the pro-abortion groups of participating in the “murder of innocent unborn human beings.” Right to Life of East Texas was a co-defendant in the 2020 lawsuits. In addition, Dickson had been the only non-government defendant in a federal lawsuit challenging the 2021 Texas Heartbeat Act, which allows private citizens to file civil suits against abortionists and others who aid and abet in abortions after the
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