By Rita McInerney

Two people arrested last summer during Operation Rescue were jailed Tuesday, Jan. 31, after a trial before a woman judge in Fulton County State Court. Theirs were the first jail sentences imposed on Operation Rescue defendants.

The two, Mrs. Brenda Roberts, 42, a homemaker from Warner Robins, Ga., and Rev. Fred Kerr, 51, a Baptist minister from West Columbia, S.C., refused to plead no contest and acted as their own lawyers at the one-day trial presided over by Judge Rank M. Hull.

She sentenced Mrs. Roberts to three years in jail and a $1,320 fine on charges of trespassing and unlawful assembly. Rev. Kerr received four years in jail and a $1,760 fine. They were arrested Aug. 3 during an Operation Rescue demonstration at the Feminist Women’s Health Center, 580 14^th St. in Atlanta.

Judge Hull suspended all but 60 days in each case and told the defendants they would have to serve the jail sentences if they do not pay the fines, or if they go within 100 yards of any of seven metro Atlanta clinics where abortions are performed.

“I fear God more than anything that can happen in that courtroom,” Mrs. Roberts said before sentencing. She said she does not intend to pay the fine, according to Jane Shepard at Operation Rescue in Atlanta.

It was the first arrest for Mrs. Roberts, a grandmother who has been counseling women suffering from post-abortion syndrome in the Macon and Warner Robins areas.

Eleven other protesters arrested the same day pleaded no contest and received $500 fines and 12 months probation.

On Jan. 27, nine other Operation Rescue protesters pleaded no contest in a trial before a six-person jury which took 20 minutes to find them guilty of criminal trespassing and unlawful assembly. They were arrested Aug. 10 at the Feminist Women’s Health Center.

Fulton County State Court Judge Albert Thompson imposed fines of $250 and six months probation.

About 145 Operation Rescue defendants are scheduled to stand trial Feb. 15 before Fulton County State Court Judge Nick Lambros. One hundred and 34 defendants were arrested July 19 in the first Operation Rescue at SugiCenter, 1133 Spring St., in midtown Atlanta, during the Democratic National Convention.

On Jan. 25, 39 anti-abortion protesters received a speedy trial in Chamblee Municipal Court, DeKalb County. The protesters left the court as they had entered, without giving their own names and using Baby Jane or Baby John Doe. They were arrested Dec. 16, 1988 while demonstrating at Northside Women’s Clinic on Chamblee-Dunwoody Road.

As the court convened, Chamblee Police Chief Reed Miller asked Municipal Court Judge John Blandford to “dead docket” the cases. The judge agreed and the five-minute trial was over. Contacted Feb. 2, Chief Miller explained “dead docket” to mean that the cases could still be re-opened but that it would be up to the judge to do so.

Father Michael Woods, pastor of St. John the Evangelist Church in Hapeville, one of the 39, said he was “thrilled” with the outcome. “It indicated that the people in Chamblee understood that the protesters had legitimate concern.”

Awaiting trial are protesters, including four priests of the archdiocese, arrested Oct. 4 at Atlanta abortion clinics.