Kansas City Star: Anti-Choice Extremists Plan to Use E-Bay To Raise Money for Tiller's Assassin
by Jodi Jacobson, Editor in Chief, RH Reality Check
October 26, 2009 - 9:58am (Print)
Writing in the Kansas City Star, Judy L. Thomas, the reporter who has most closely followed Dr. George Tiller's murderer Scott Roeder, details efforts by anti-choice extremists to raise funds for Roeder by auctioning items on eBay. Roeder, charged with first-degree murder in the May 31 shooting of Tiller, is scheduled to go to trial in January.
An Army of God manual. A prison cookbook compiled by a woman doing time for abortion clinic bombings and arsons. An autographed bullhorn.
These are among the items that abortion foes plan to auction on eBay and other Web sites in a fundraiser for Scott Roeder, the Kansas City man charged with killing Wichita abortion doctor George Tiller.
Other items to be included in the auction include three drawings she received in the mail Wednesday from Roeder. Two drawings were done by another inmate at his direction, but Roeder autographed all of them.
"This is unique," Regina Dinwiddie, a Kansas City anti-abortion activist who will sign the bullhorn told Thomas.
"Nobody's ever done this before. The goal is that everybody makes money for Scott Roeder's defense."
One abortion-rights leader called the auction deplorable and said it could lead to more violence.
"The network of extremists promoting and defending the murder of doctors is contributing to escalating threats against clinics and doctors across the country," said Kathy Spillar, executive vice president of the Feminist Majority Foundation.
Thomas writes that Dave Leach, an Iowa abortion opponent who is organizing the auction effort, said he was aiming for a Nov. 1 launch.
Thomas reports that an eBay official said the auction was unusual.
"A lot of times people will raise money for charities and that type of thing," said spokeswoman Alina Piacentino. "But rarely is it a controversial kind."
The company would not reveal whether eBay would permit the auction to launch.
"EBay does not allow listings that promote or glorify violence, hate, racial or religious intolerance, or items that encourage, promote, facilitate or instruct others to engage in illegal activity," the company said in a statement.
Follow Jodi Jacobson on Twitter, @jljacobson
"Reporting policy violations
If you see a listing that violates eBay policies, please report it by clicking the Report item link in the listing, or by clicking the Report link or Contact Us button located on most of our help pages. When a policy violation occurs, we email the seller and the bidders or the buyer to let them know that the listing has been removed from eBay."
Anybody who has some spare time might want to spend a little of it searching eBay items for "Roeder" in the listing texts and reporting the item as violating policy.
Ebay has decided not to go through with this as it is indeed in violation of their TOU.
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