Pastor Pleads Not Guilty After Arrest Outside Chinese Embassy; Prosecutors Move Forward
WASHINGTON — The Rev. Patrick Mahoney, leader of the Christian Defense Coalition, was arraigned on Wednesday in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia on a misdemeanor "unlawful entry" charge, pleading not guilty by phone from Idaho, the Christian Post reported on October 23.
The judge issued a stay-away order barring Mahoney from the public sidewalk outside the Chinese Embassy until the case is decided. Prosecutors moved forward with the criminal charge, and the next
court date was set for November 20. The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) is representing Mahoney, with attorney Jordan Sekulow vowing to fight the charge in court.
The case stems from September 28, when Mahoney was arrested for protesting on the public sidewalk outside the Chinese Embassy in Washington, D.C., and held in a holding cell for five hours. During the protest, he laid a "red fabric" on the sidewalk bearing the names of people persecuted by the Chinese government, including imprisoned media mogul Jimmy Lai, Hong Kong residents, Falun Gong practitioners and Uyghurs.
Mahoney claimed, in his own account, that Chinese diplomats came out of the embassy "visibly angry" and asked the Secret Service to remove him, and that agents relayed that "the Chinese government has said this sidewalk belongs to China." He also said it was his 113th arrest in decades of advocacy — though his first outside the embassy.
(GSM, based on the Christian Post)
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 中国驻美国大使馆（华盛顿）（资料图）。照片：美国之音，公有领域，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / The Embassy of China in Washington, D.C. (file photo). Photo: Voice of America, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
