A Maryland judge has let off a violent offender with just misdemeanor charges after a brutal, unprovoked attack on two elderly pro-life sidewalk advocates, raising serious concerns about bias in the state’s judiciary and the growing double standard when it comes to protecting constitutional rights.
According to reporting from LifeNews, 2023 surveillance footage showed Patrick Brice violently assaulting 73-year-old Dick Schaefer and 80-year-old Mark Crosby as they peacefully prayed outside a Planned Parenthood in Baltimore.
Brice, whose attorney never contested his guilt, punched both men so severely that Schaefer was knocked unconscious and Crosby suffered facial fractures and temporary blindness.
Earlier this year, a jury found Brice guilty of two counts of misdemeanor second-degree assault.
But prosecutors also sought a felony conviction for first-degree assault in the attack on Crosby.
That case resulted in a mistrial after jurors failed to agree, prompting a second trial that concluded this past week.
Incredibly, Judge Yvette Bryant found Brice not guilty of felony assault. Instead, the court reaffirmed only the misdemeanor charges.
Brice now awaits sentencing in August, but many expect a light punishment. He has again been released on his own recognizance.
“The State of Maryland continues to blatantly discriminate against pro-life speech,” said Laura Bogley, Executive Director of Maryland Right to Life. “This Court has a duty to apply justice blindly and Judge Bryant has failed in her duty to the citizens and the Constitution.”
Bogley also criticized Baltimore prosecutors for refusing to file hate crime charges. “This was a violent hate crime and an attack on Catholics and religious freedom everywhere,” she said.
“It was a clear violation of the FACE Act, which protects pro-life advocates as well as abortion workers.”
This ruling comes just weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear a case challenging Maryland’s unconstitutional gun ban. That decision upheld a law barring law-abiding citizens from owning AR-15s and other semi-automatic rifles.
Justice Clarence Thomas called the lower court’s ruling a distortion of Second Amendment precedent and warned that Americans’ right to self-defense was being treated as a “second-class right.”
In Maryland, that warning is no longer hypothetical. A man who peacefully protests abortion outside a clinic isn’t just denied the right to defend himself; he’s left completely vulnerable to violent attacks.
And now, the attacker walks away with what amounts to a slap on the wrist.
By contrast, pro-life advocates in states like South Carolina are seeing real victories. In Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, the Supreme Court upheld South Carolina’s right to cut off Medicaid funding for abortion providers.
As reported by the Daily Signal, Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote that Medicaid’s legal structure does not give individuals the right to sue states over such decisions.
That ruling empowers states to reflect the values of their citizens, especially when it comes to protecting life and opposing the abortion industry.
Meanwhile, in Maryland, state leaders have been largely silent. Neither Governor Wes Moore nor Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott has condemned the 2023 assault, even after widespread calls from Maryland Right to Life.
Their inaction sends a dangerous message: attacks on Catholics and pro-life Americans are somehow more tolerable than assaults on other groups.
Mark Crosby, however, refuses to be intimidated. “It’s just a wonderful feeling when we’re in front of Planned Parenthood and a mother with a baby comes up to us and says, ‘Thank you for ministering to me and that I didn’t have to murder my baby,’” he said.
He and Schaefer continue to pray and counsel outside clinics, encouraging others to join them.
If Judge Bryant and Maryland officials hoped to silence pro-lifers through legal maneuvering, they may have underestimated the strength of the movement. “Real action is necessary,” Crosby said, not just to save unborn lives, but to defend free speech and religious liberty from a justice system that seems increasingly politicized.
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