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Christian Group Sues Greensboro and Guilford County Over Abortion Foe Arrests

WFDD/FILE PHOTO

A conservative Christian nonprofit group is suing Guilford County and the City of Greensboro. This comes after four abortion protesters were charged under the city's stay-at-home order.

The federal lawsuit was filed by Alliance Defending Freedom. The group argues that four anti-abortion protesters were arrested “for engaging in peaceful prayer outside an abortion facility.”

But police say the four were charged because they were violating local and state orders that require people to stay home except for essential activities and prohibit gatherings in large groups.

The News & Record reports that Alliance Defending Freedom is seeking to stop the stay-at-home order from being enforced on the grounds that the protesters were engaged in constitutionally protected activities.

A separate federal lawsuit was filed last week against Mayor Nancy Vaughan and Greensboro Police Lt. Dan Knott. That suit, filed on behalf of four other anti-abortion protesters, claims that city officers threatened to arrest them for violating COVID-19 rules.

Greensboro City Attorney Chuck Watts has defended those arrests, saying that protesters traveling from Davie County to Greensboro posed health risks to the people they encountered.  

For the most up-to-date information on coronavirus in North Carolina, visit our Live Updates blog here. WFDD wants to hear your stories — connect with us and let us know what you're experiencing

Neal Charnoff joined 88.5 WFDD as Morning Edition host in 2014. Raised in the Catskill region of upstate New York, he graduated from Sarah Lawrence College in 1983. Armed with a liberal arts degree, Neal was fully equipped to be a waiter. So he prolonged his arrested development bouncing around New York and L.A. until discovering that people enjoyed listening to his voice on the radio. After a few years doing overnight shifts at a local rock station, Neal spent most of his career at Vermont Public Radio. He began as host of a nightly jazz program, where he was proud to interview many of his idols, including Dave Brubeck and Sonny Rollins. Neal graduated to the news department, where he was the local host for NPR's All Things Considered for 14 years. In addition to news interviews and features, he originated and produced the Weekly Conversation On The Arts, as well as VPR Backstage, which profiled theater productions around the state. He contributed several stories to NPR, including coverage of a devastating ice storm. Neal now sees the value of that liberal arts degree, and approaches life with the knowledge that all subjects and all art forms are connected to each other. Neal and his wife Judy are enjoying exploring North Carolina and points south. They would both be happy to never experience a Vermont winter again.

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