Wisconsin Planned Parenthood Arson Suspect: "I Lit Up The Clinic"
By Chuck Sudo in News on Apr 5, 2012 3:30PM
Francis Grady, the suspect in Sunday's attempted arson of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Grand Chute, Wisc., is loudly and very publicly taking responsibility for his actions.
Grady, whom Daily Kos called a "'pro-life' terrorist," asked U.S. Magistrate Judge James Sickel if he could simply do away with the formality of an arraignment and plead guilty.
"At one point, Grady interrupted [Sickel] to ask, 'Do you even care at all about the 1,000 babies that died screaming?'"Grady told his lawyer, public defender Tom Phillip, he was fired for interrupting Sickel, prompting a woman from the back of the courtroom to call out, 'Shut up, Frankie.'
“'My sister told me to shut up,' Grady said to Phillip.
"Phillip later explained Grady couldn’t fire him, that he was appointed by the court and therefore could only be removed from the case by court order.”
Grady later clarified to reporters outside the courthouse that he didn't bomb the clinic. "There was no bomb it was gasoline." He also allegedly admitted to police, "I lit up the clinic."
The criminal complaint against Grady alleges he used a hammer to break a window in the clinic and poured gasoline from a plastic bottle to start the fire, which burned itself out and caused minor damage to an examination room.
Though it seems Grady's arson plan is as half-baked as his facts on Planned Parenthood, the incident has prompted the Obama administration to take the case seriously and led the FBI to reaffirm its position to protect public access to women's reproductive healthcare facilities.