Council with financial challenges spends six-figure sum prosecuting peaceful pro-life prayer

Image credit: Therese Westby via Unsplash / Wesley Tingey via Unsplash

A council in the UK has spent a six-figure sum (approximately £150,000) in an attempt to prosecute two pro-lifers who were silently praying and offering counsel within an exclusion zone, despite experiencing financial challenges that led to the council to consider ways of saving money, including switching of street lights and reducing the live monitoring of CCTV cameras.

In 2022, the Bournemouth, Christchurch & Poole (BCP) introduced Public Spaces Protection Order (PSPO) around Dean Park Clinic located in Bournemouth, which bans peaceful pro-life protest, prayer and counselling within 100 metres of the abortion clinic. Since then, two people, Adam Smith-Connor and Livia Tossici-Bolt, have been arrested and charged by the council for breaching the PSPO.

Mr Smith-Connor, 51, an Afghanistan veteran, was arrested in November 2022 and charged for silently praying for his unborn child whilst standing within the councils’ exclusion zone. Mr Smith-Conor and his then-partner had aborted their unborn child 25 years prior, a decision which he has described as still haunting him.

“It’s unthinkable that I was issued a penalty simply for praying for my son, Jacob, whom I lost to an abortion I paid for. The decision I made all those years ago now grieves me deeply. I was praying also for those contemplating abortion, especially those in vulnerable situations who believe abortion is their “only choice”. It isn’t for the authorities to determine the contents of my thoughts on this matter, on a public street”, he said speaking on the case.

“Nobody should be prosecuted for silent prayer. It is unfathomable that in an apparently free society, I am being criminally charged on the basis of what I expressed silently, in the privacy of my own mind,” he added.  

He was later prosecuted in November 2024 and was ordered to pay £9,000, in what has been described by ADF UK as “the first known conviction of a "thoughtcrime" in modern British history.”

Even more recently, Ms Tossici-Bolt, 64, a retired medical scientist was arrested in March 2023 after holding a sign that said “here to talk, if you want”, whilst standing within a buffer zone in Bournemouth. Police then approached her after one woman complained that she felt harassed by Ms Tossici-Bolt, and asked her to move, to which she refused on the basis that there was no legitimate reason for it. After also refusing to pay a fixed penalty notice issued by the council, she has been charged for breaching the PSPO and is awaiting a verdict that will be given on 4th April.

Ms Tossici-Bolt told the magistrates that she was “just there if people just wanted to come up and talk to me.”

“My signs are solidarity signs. I am just there to offer support. I rejoice when a life is saved. People can say yes or no when they see me,” she said. “There is always an element of subjectivity. How can you know what is going on in someone else's head when you see them in the street? I was not moving to intercept people.”

“I always made sure I did not come across as aggressive. I always try and do it in a loving way. I never tell people to terminate. If they decide to go ahead with the abortion then we can offer support afterwards,” she added.

According to the Daily Mail, the BCP Council spent £93,000 in the case against Mr Smith-Connor, whereas to date they have spent £45,000 on the case against Ms Tossici-Bolt, which accumulates to a six-figure sum of just under £150,000.

However, the Daily Mail also report that the BCP Council have been experiencing financial challenges, to the point they have had to find ways to save money, such as switching off some street lights in Poole, which they had considered back in 2023. Other considerations included, getting rid of lollipop men and women, closing public pools, cutting down on opening times in libraries, and reducing the live monitoring of CCTV cameras.  

Legal counsel of ADF UK, Jeremiah Igunnubole, who represented both Mr Smith-Connor and Ms Tossici-Bolt, as well as Isabel Vaughan-Spruce and Fr Sean Gough in similar cases back in 2023, said that free speech was in a crisis.

“In a free country, citizens shouldn't have to prepare a budget to defend the peaceful exercise of fundamental rights,” he said. “Far from amounting to 'harassment and intimidation', both are peaceful, lawful activities that should be able to take place on any public street in Great Britain.”

“The council's ideological drive is clear, that they would charge the public purse such exorbitant costs to criminalise particular views,” he added.

US Vice President JD Vance also made headlines recently after he slammed Europe’s censorship laws at the Munich Security conference, particularly referring to Mr Smith-Connor’s case to criticise the UK’s buffer zones law, and also expressed his concerns over the suppression of free speech.

“Now, I wish I could say that this [case] was a fluke, a one-off, crazy example of a badly written law being enacted against a single person. But no. This last October, just a few months ago, the Scottish government began distributing letters to citizens whose houses lay within so-called safe access zones, warning them that even private prayer within their own homes may amount to breaking the law. Naturally, the government urged readers to report any fellow citizens suspected guilty of thought crime in Britain and across Europe,” he said.

“Free speech, I fear, is in retreat and in the interests of comedy, my friends, but also in the interest of truth,” he added.

Back in 2024, both Ireland and the UK brought in laws that provided an exclusion zone around abortion clinics and abortion providers around the country.

Sandra Parda of the Life Institute commented, saying: “It is bad enough that people are being arrested in the UK for thought crime, but it’s something else when the council is struggling with funds but instead prioritises prosecuting peaceful silent prayer or pro-life counsel.”

“Neither Mr Smith-Connor nor Ms Bossici-Bolt were of any threat to anyone, and what they did should not be considered a crime under any law. Councils should not be spending thousands prosecuting someone for saying a silent prayer in their head or offering wanted help to pregnant women, when their funds are so low they are struggling to provide for their community,” she continued.

“It is becoming clearer that these unjust exclusion zones laws are not about “protecting” women as they seek an abortion, but about ensuring that one view point that seeks to promote a culture of life is silenced. It’s time for society to wake up and realise the rising threat to one’s right to freedom of speech.”