San Francisco Takes Anti-Abortion Activist Back to Court After Meme Mistrial

Rogers’ criminal proceedings ended in a mistrial last week, after a jury failed to come to a unanimous decision. According to Rogers’ counsel, Michael Millen, the majority of jurors found her not guilty on both counts, citing a lack of evidence that her intention was to intimidate the volunteer.

He filed a motion asking the judge to dismiss the case on Monday. A pre-trial conference to discuss that motion is set for June 29, ahead of a new trial slated to begin June 30.

Millen said he believes under normal circumstances, the DA’s office would drop a case with such a seemingly low chance of success based on the initial jury’s leanings, but that this particular instance hasn’t been because of “political overtones.”

“If this was a robbery case, a carjacking case, and nine or 10 jurors said ‘not guilty,’ I assure you they would never retry the case,” he said.

The case centers around a 14-second video Rogers posted on Instagram in August, mimicking an internet trend set to a Pinkpantheress song, that juxtaposed clinic volunteers and pro-life protesters’ methods of “help[ing] women entering Planned Parenthood.” The video features a clip of Rogers with the text “Unalive them with kindness,” followed by a clip of a volunteer in a ‘clinic escort’ vest with the text “Unalive them.”

“Unalive” is internet slang often used instead of “kill” to skirt some social media apps’ content guidelines.

The suit alleges that the post threatened the life of the escort pictured, but Millen said Rogers was referring to what happens to fetuses during an abortion.

“ What she was trying to communicate was what the escorts do is ‘unalive’ their children, and given complications that can result from abortions gone wrong, actually injure or sometimes even kill the women who are going in,” he told KQED.

The video has garnered nearly 400,000 views.

Rogers was arrested outside of the same clinic in December on a warrant tied to the video. She said at the time that she was arrested for “sidewalk counseling,” or handing out pregnancy resource pamphlets.

The district attorney’s office did not respond to a request for comment on the charges.

KQED’s Desmond Meagley contributed to this report.