While most of us will be enjoying summer, Linda Gibbons will still be in prison in Milton. She will be there at least until August 10, 2010, when she is due to appear at the College Park Courts on Yonge and College Streets, Toronto. Her crime is to have attempted to counsel women and to have demonstrated peacefully against abortion outside the “Scott Clinic” abortion facility in Toronto. For that she has been incarcerated since January 2009.

Pro-lifers are encouraged to go to the court on that day to show support for Linda.

What prison life is like

Linda will have been in prison continuously for more than 19 months by the time she stands before a judge. Here is a glimpse of what prison is like for Linda, as related to Tony Gosgnach of Lifesitenews.com by Gordon Truscott, who has written a book about her:

“I visited (Linda) on Tuesday, May 25th and Linda has aged. Prison life is hard. Often, Linda has been denied her mail. For three months, Linda suffered with a bad cold … Linda has suffered more than seven years in prisons for her peaceful pro-life witness. Although Linda is non-violent and harmless, she has served more time in jail than men who have used a gun to hold up a variety store.”

Linda welcomes letters

Being denied mail must be one of the cruellest aspects of what Linda has had to endure. She welcomes letters from pro-life supporters. She replies, and anyone who has received her letters knows of her dedication to the children in the womb and their mothers, and has experienced the eloquence with which she expresses it. She writes in pencil; pens are forbidden since they can be used as weapons.

A display at the recent Alliance For Life Ontario provincial conference featured information about Linda with appeals for people to write and to visit. Anyone who wishes to write to her can do so at: The Vanier Centre for Women, 655 Martin Street, P.O. Box 1040, Milton, ON L9T 5E6. John Bulsza, one of Linda’s supporters behind the display at the AFLO conference, has this advice to people wishing to write:

• Limit letters to six pages each.
• Enclose a copy of
• Don’t enclose any plastic cards, medals, stamps, stickers or anything similar, and don’t put stickers on the enveloper.
• Add your name and address to the letter as well as to the envelope; the envelope will be opened and discarded by prison staff, so if you don’t add your name and address to the letter, Linda won’t be able to reply.
• Prison staff will read the letter before it reaches Linda, so don’t mention prison conditions or internal workings and don’t write anything personal you want only Linda to read.

John Bulsza is also asking people to write to their MPPs and to:

• Hon Christopher Bentley, Ministry of the Attorney General, 11^th Floor, 720 Bay Street, Toronto, Ontario M5G 2K1. email cbentley.mpp@liberal.ola.org
• Hon Deborah Matthews, Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care, 10^th Floor, Hepburn Block, 80 Grosvenor Street, Toronto, Ontario M7A 2C4; email dmatthews.mpp.co@liberal

 Bubble zone injunction

Linda was arrested in October 2008 on a charge of disobeying a court order not to carry out pro-life activities in a “bubble zone” around the abortion facility. That charge was dismissed but later reinstated by the Ontario Court of Appeal.

“No date has yet been set for that trial, as the Crown has for over a year been stonewalling defence requests for key documents related to the case,” Tony Gosgnach wrote on Lifesitenews.

On January 2009, she was arrested again, initially on charges of obstructing a peace officer and mischief to property (she dumped some headless models of preborn children on the steps of the facility). Those charges were dropped and she was eventually charged with disobeying the court order.

Linda remains in prison and has been denied bail because she will not sign a document promising not to violate the bubble zone. She has been arrested 10 times since the injunction was granted in 1994.

 For the Executive Director’s opinion of this, please go to his blog. 

(Pictures above of Linda being arrested in 2009 and a group of her supporters outside the courthouse for a June 2, 2010, hearing courtesy of lifesitenews.com and Canadian Register)