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Anti-Abortion Activists Protest Arrests At St. Pete Church

Tribune photo by Stephen Thompson

From left, Francisco Gonzales, Joseph Landry, Andrea Terry and Randall Terry gathered outside a Catholic church in St. Petersburg to protest abortion Tuesday. Landry and Andrea Terry were arrested and charged with misdemeanor trespassing.

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By STEPHEN THOMPSON | The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 22, 2008

Updated: 01/22/2008 05:14 pm

ST. PETERSBURG - An anti-abortion activist, his wife, their four little children and two other adults gathered outside the Cathedral of St. Jude the Apostle today to protest the arrest Sunday of two in their group.

Andrea Terry, 32, and Joseph Landry, 26, were charged with misdemeanor trespassing during the 6 p.m. Mass. They are accused of continuing to put anti-abortion fliers on the windshields of parked cars after they were asked to leave the property at 5815 Fifth Ave. N.

Terry is the wife of Randall Terry, who made national news protesting the removal of Terri Schiavo's feeding tube before she died. Tuesday he said his anti-abortion group, the Society for Truth and Justice, had been passing out the fliers at Catholic churches in a half-dozen states, but not until Sunday had any church summoned police.

"We're obeying the Church's teachings and then they arrest our staff for doing what the church teaches," Randall Terry said Tuesday. "It's absurd and it's obscene."

Andrea Terry wants Bishop Robert Lynch to have the charges dropped. She said she is a mother of four children who is "doing everything I can to uphold the church's teachings."

The flier, which Randall Terry said was satirical, features a fictitious candidate named Smith who espouses owning blacks. Halfway through the six-page flier the reader learns that aspect of it is a joke and that its intended claim is that as a Christian can't support a candidate who supports slavery, a Christian can't support anyone who supports abortion.

Terry said his group is against any presidential candidate that is pro-choice, but especially Republican Rudy Giuliani, who is Catholic.

According to a police report, an officer was summoned to the Cathedral of St. Jude the Apostle during the 6 p.m. Mass. People were putting pamphlets on cars, and some refused to leave, the report states. The officer noted that one person in the group was holding a video camera.

Steve Pokorny, a spokesman for the group, said there were five group members at St. Jude and that Terry's wife, Andrea, and Landry continued putting the pamphlets on the cars after being asked to stop.

"They've been told they can never come back to that church," Pokorny said. "That means they can never go to Mass; they can never go to confession. It's ridiculous."

Reporter Stephen Thompson can be reached at (727) 451-2336 or spthompson@tampatrib.com.

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