A Baltimore jury convicted 28-year-old Patrick Brice on two counts of second-degree assault and reckless endangerment for savagely attacking pro-lifers Mark Crosby, 73, and Dick Schaefer, 80, outside of a Planned Parenthood abortion center in 2023.
BALTIMORE (LifeSiteNews) -- A 28-year old man was found guilty of savagely beating two elderly pro-life men, Mark Crosby and Dick Schaefer, outside Planned Parenthood in Baltimore in May 2023.
"The jury deliberated for about two hours and convicted Patrick Brice in Baltimore Circuit Court of two counts of second-degree assault and reckless endangerment for attacking Schaefer and Crosby,” according to a report by The Baltimore Banner’s Dylan Segelbaum.
Crosby and Schaefer were ages 73 and 80 at the time.
LifeSiteNews previously reported that the pro-life advocates were brutally attacked while engaging in their sidewalk ministry outside the Planned Parenthood abortion facility on North Howard Street in Baltimore.
Schaefer reportedly recovered at home, but Crosby went to the University of Maryland’s shock trauma facility to receive treatment for serious injuries to his skull and eye socket as well as his knees and fingers.
Crosby’s right eye was blinded and he suffered a concussion.
LifeSiteNews conducted a video interview with Crosby and Schaefer outside Baltimore’s Planned Parenthood facility a few days after the unprovoked attack.
Crosby told LifeSiteNews at the time that he and Schaefer were engaged in their pro-life ministry when an unknown man approached, told Crosby to stay in the street, handed his drink to an abortion “escort,” and then charged into Schaefer who had his back to him, causing the pro-life advocate to fall against a planter and hit the ground.
A witness said that the then-as-yet-unidentified suspect previously engaged in a “visibly aggressive conversation” with Schaefer before knocking him to the ground.
Schaefer said that he had been speaking with someone just before he was attacked, but couldn’t be sure of who assaulted him because he had his back turned at the time.
“When I got hit, I didn’t see anybody,” he said.
“He speared the one gentleman over that flowerpot into the window and knocked him out. He was out cold for several minutes,” one witness said, according to WBAL. The outlet noted that “[i]t’s believed the assailant didn’t like Schaefer’s anti-abortion message.”
“I was worried he was going to be thrown up into the plate-glass window, but he went through the planter,” Crosby told Hale. “Dick hit the ground. He kicks Dick, I come over to help. He grabs my medals and yanks them off. He didn’t get to my rosary.”
After rushing over to help Schaefer, Crosby was “punched, knocked down, and kicked in the head.”
“I went in there and he was on a gurney. His face was all swollen and bloody, blood all over his clothes,” Schaefer said regarding Crosby, according to WBAL.
Brice will be sentenced on March 20.
