Grandmother Sentenced to 24 Months for Blocking Abortion Clinic Door

WASHINGTON—Pro-life activist Heather Idoni had been in federal prison for nine months, awaiting the first of what will likely be several sentences for conspiracy and violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act.

She wore a bright orange prison uniform and had a COVID-19 mask on, as required in the Washington courtroom on May 22, when U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly sentenced Ms. Idoni to 24 months in federal prison, with credit for the months already served.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) recommended up to 41 months in prison, which is three years and five months.

“The law does not protect violent conduct. That is what you are being punished for,” Ms. Kollar-Kotelly said, making a point to say that pro-life people have a right to protest.

“This was not justice,” Ms. Idoni’s attorney, Robert Dunn of Bay City, Michigan, told The Epoch Times after the sentencing in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

“Was there a technical violation of the FACE Act? Yes, there was. But that isn’t what got the big sentence. It was this fictitious conspiracy that they dreamed up. … These people are not terrorists. But the terrorists go around smashing property, smashing people, burning buildings down, and the federal government did nothing to them.

“All the people in the summer of 2020 that burned all those buildings? Very few of them ever got prosecuted.”

The FACE Act, which was seldom used before the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 2022 Dobbs decision overturned Roe v. Wade, prohibits intimidating or interfering with any person obtaining an abortion. After the Dobbs decision, the DOJ clamped down on pro-life activities at abortion businesses, retroactively charging people for incidents that occurred years earlier.

Ms. Idoni found herself charged with FACE Act violations for multiple incidents, including in Tennessee, where she was found guilty and awaits sentencing. In that case, she and her co-defendants were charged after Tennessee changed its law, and the abortion clinic where the incident occurred went out of business.

Before the sentence was read, Ms. Idoni was given a chance to speak.

“I have respect for this court, and I do submit to this court,” Ms. Idoni said.

“This time in prison has really changed my life. I see how prisoners are treated.”

She told the court that the federal prison in Washington is one of the worst for its treatment of prisoners, and even more so for how guards treat fellow guards there.

“My body will be placed wherever you place it. My spirit and my heart belong to the Lord. That cannot be imprisoned, and that brings me great joy,” she said.

Ms. Idoni will go on trial again this summer in Michigan, along with co-defendants, in another FACE case.

Altogether, she is facing a maximum combined sentence of more than 50 years, possibly the longest-ever sentence for a civil rights activist. She told The Epoch Times that she expects to die in prison and that it hurts her to miss time with her grandchildren.

Prison Experience

According to the DOJ sentencing recommendation written by Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general for civil rights, Ms. Idoni is an “active anti-abortion extremist, with a history of participating in reproductive health clinic invasions around the country to prevent patients from obtaining, and providers from providing, pregnancy termination services.”

As Ms. Idoni, 59, was considered a violent offender by the court, she was not allowed to wait at home until sentencing. She was whisked out of the courtroom at the end of her trial in August 2023 and has been held in prison since, awaiting this first sentence.

Her health has deteriorated since she was imprisoned. After recently experiencing cardiac symptoms while in Northern Neck Regional Jail in Warsaw, Virginia, she was taken to the hospital and three stents were put in her heart.

She said that is what triggered a mini-stroke that put her back in the hospital in recent weeks and left her with a dark spot on the edge of her vision.

The judge said she was unaware of Ms. Idoni’s health issues until May 20. Her attorney asked for Ms. Idoni to be put on house arrest so she can be treated by a cardiologist at home. The judge said that the request requires a separate filing.

Ms. Idoni told The Epoch Times that it can be difficult to control her diabetes in prison because of the limited food choices and sedentary lifestyle.

She was taken to the hospital by ambulance wearing ankle shackles. When she arrived, she was put in a wheelchair and her shackles were covered with a lap blanket. The only time the shackles were removed was when she had an MRI. U.S. Marshalls kept a watchful eye on her.

She has been moved nine times and lived in seven prisons; she returned to two.

“Every time, you start from scratch. You can’t take one stitch with you. Not a phone number. Not a pencil. Nothing but the clothes on your back,” Ms. Idoni said.

“If you’re already somebody who’s mentally unstable, or you don’t have a strong relationship with the Lord … it can actually cause mental illness if your needs are not being met. … You hear people crying, and screaming, ‘Let me out of here’. … There’s a high level of hopelessness here, and it’s very hard.”

Some guards have been kind, and others not, Ms. Idoni said. She recalls a day when her blood sugar spiked to above 300, which made her feel unsteady.

“I was sick and I just needed to lean on the wall,” Ms. Idoni said, noting that the guard was in a hurry to get back from escorting her and didn’t want her to use the walls to steady herself.

“She said, ‘If you don’t get in the middle of this hall and walk, you will be falling down.’ We were alone. It was just myself and this guard, and you do feel helpless.”

She says her medicine has not been complete at times, and she has been denied access to the Bible, which is the foundation of her life.

She is touched by the letters she has received, and while she cannot access a Bible right now, she was happy to find an inspirational book by Corrie ten Boom, whose family sheltered and saved 800 Jews during the Holocaust.

In her presentencing memorandum, Ms. Idoni requested that the judge consider a sentence of time served. In the memorandum, she shares some of her life story.

She had a difficult childhood with a mentally ill mother. At age 13, she and her siblings were removed from their home. Ms. Idoni was placed in an orphanage at age 14. Her family background was Jewish, but at 18, she became involved with Campus Crusade for Christ and became a Christian. She spent much of her life raising children.

In addition to her biological children, she and her husband adopted 10 children from Ukraine. At 39, she acquired a bookstore in Fenton, Michigan, which she operated until shortly before the FACE trial.

She transferred ownership to a young woman, requiring no compensation, to give that woman the hope that she would be able to run the business and make it profitable, according to court papers. She did that believing she would be convicted in this case.

10 Charged With FACE Violations

Ms. Idoni is one of 10 defendants found guilty of participating in the Oct. 22, 2020, “block and lock” at the Washington Surgi-Clinic, which performs abortions up to 27 weeks, or six months.

The pro-life group arrived just as the business opened. Some blocked the patient entrance by moving chairs in front of the main door. Then, using bike locks and rope to tie themselves together, they sat on the chairs and prevented women from having abortions for a few hours.

Ms. Idoni, who traveled from Michigan to participate, blocked the staff entrance, according to DOJ documents.

One woman who went to get an abortion that morning was in labor, according to court documents, and had to lie down on the hallway floor in pain because the group would not let her in to end her pregnancy. Ultimately, abortion workers were able to open the employee entrance door and get the woman inside. Another woman who wanted an abortion climbed through a window to get inside.

The blockade was over in a few hours after police cut the bicycle locks and removed the activists.

Box of Babies

Those who participated in the Oct. 2020 incident were charged 17 months later, in March 2022, with conspiracy, which has a maximum of 10 years in prison, for livestreaming on social media. They were also charged with violating the FACE Act, which carries a sentence of up to one year in prison.

In a legally unrelated matter, Lauren Handy, director of activism for Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU), who led the Oct. 2020 “block and lock,” was walking to the Washington Surgi-Clinic in March 2022 with PAAU founder Terrisa Bukovinac when they saw a medical waste truck collecting boxes from the business.

They told a worker that there were aborted babies in the boxes and asked if they could have a box to give the babies a proper burial, according to PAAU.

Inside, they found the remains of 110 first-trimester babies and five later-term babies that appeared to have been in the second and third trimesters. They named each one, held a funeral mass with a Catholic priest, and buried the remains in a cemetery.

The women contacted the police through an attorney because the older five babies appeared to have been born alive or to have been subjected to partial-birth abortions. They asked police to take the babies, have an autopsy performed, and learn if they were legally or illegally aborted, according to PAAU. No autopsy has yet been performed.

The same day that the police picked up the remains of the five babies in March 2022, the FBI arrested Ms. Handy and charged her with a violation of the FACE Act for an October 2020 incident at the same abortion business. They soon charged the other nine defendants.

Concern for Health

In a May 16 joint letter from the U.S. House Pro-Life Caucus to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, the caucus expressed concern about reports suggesting the U.S. Marshal Service did not provide medically necessary health care to two prisoners: Ms. Idoni and Ms. Jean Marshall, 74, another FACE Act prisoner.

Ms. Marshall was scheduled for hip surgery in October 2023 but was not allowed to keep her surgery date.

“My right knee is stiff, preventing me from bending it, and so I just drag my right leg as I walk,” she said.

She wrote to lawmakers, adding that her right leg was growing numb. Ms. Idoni was denied medicine that was prescribed after her stents were put in, the letter reads.

The letter asked for a conversation with the Bureau of Prisons. It was signed by Reps. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), Andy Harris (R-Md.); Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.); Chip Roy (R-Texas); Harriet Hageman (R-Wyo.); Claudia Tenney (R-N.Y.), and Debbie Lesko (R-Ariz.).

Some of these representatives have brought forward legislation to end the FACE Act, but there have not been enough votes to get it through Congress.