Priest Jailed for Abortion Protest Role : Courts: First Catholic cleric arrested in an abortion protest in the county, admitting he violated probation at three further protests, gets 45 days.

A Catholic priest was sentenced to 45 days in San Diego County Jail on Tuesday after admitting he violated probation in connection with an abortion protest by taking part in three other anti-abortion demonstrations this spring and summer.

El Cajon Municipal Judge Larrie R. Brainard imposed the sentence on Father Edward (Bud) Kaicher, director of the San Diego diocese’s youth ministries program and the first Catholic priest to be arrested in San Diego County during an anti-abortion demonstration. Kaicher was jailed immediately.

He was sentenced to jail after admitting to Brainard, as an audience filled with clerics looked on, that he had been at the three demonstrations this spring and summer and would not accept further probation nor pay a fine for the three violations.

On Feb. 1, Brainard had sentenced Kaicher to two years’ probation after the priest pleaded no contest to a charge of criminal trespass in a protest Sept. 30, 1988, at a La Mesa abortion clinic. Kaicher’s arrest at that demonstration marked the first arrest in the county of a Catholic priest at an anti-abortion demonstration.

Among the terms of Kaicher’s probation were that the priest agree not to block any doorway or access to any medical clinic nor direct anyone else to do so, Deputy Dist. Atty. Paul Johnsen said Tuesday.

Kaicher admitted, however, that he violated those terms at protests March 18, June 10 and July 8.

Kaicher had said at the Feb. 1 hearing that, although he would continue to take part in local abortion protests, he would abide by the terms of his probation. But, in a statement he read to the judge Tuesday, he said he “cannot in conscience promise to obey any law or probation” that interferes with his anti-abortion stance.

The priest appeared before Brainard without a lawyer, saying one was not necessary because his case is “rather simple.”

Though Brainard sentenced Kaicher to 45 days in jail, the priest could earn good-time credits and be released in 30 days, Johnsen said.

Bishop Leo T. Maher, the archbishop of the San Diego diocese, said Kaicher’s jailing should shake the “consciences of anyone who is pro-choice in the Catholic church,” because abortion “is such a vital moral issue that they cannot proclaim to be Catholic and pro-choice, be they teachers, politicians or other public figures.”

Those comments appeared to be aimed at Kristine Strachan, the recently appointed dean of the law school at the University of San Diego, a Catholic institution, who has come under fire from area priests for her views on abortion.

Strachan has said she personally opposes abortion but supports a woman’s right to choose for herself.

“People can read into the statement what they choose to,” said Dan Pitre, the diocese’s communications director. “I’m not confirming or denying that’s a shot at Dean Strachan.”

Strachan, reached at her office late Tuesday, declined comment.

Maher said in a statement released Tuesday afternoon that, though he does not “condone breaking the law,” the church supported Kaicher’s “strong view requiring him to follow his conscience and to accept any consequences.”

A secretary at Kaicher’s office, Rachel Lopez, who attended the hearing Tuesday, said she thought the prison sentence was “great. I believe it’s a success. It’s showing people that we have to stand up for what we believe in, and he’s doing exactly that.”

Lopez conceded that the priest admitted breaking the law. But “sometimes you have to break the law to show that what you’re speaking of, you really do believe in it,” she said.

Meanwhile, in San Diego Municipal Court, about 35 anti-abortion demonstrators facing misdemeanor charges stemming from one of the three protests Kaicher admitted he attended, as well as from two other demonstrations this spring, have agreed to plea bargains and will be sentenced to either community service work or probation plus fines, prosecutors said Tuesday.

None of the 35 protesters, however, chose jail as a sentencing option, though a 15-day term was one of the three choices they had, said James M. Bishop, head deputy city attorney.

Of the 35 facing misdemeanor charges who agreed to plead no contest to a charge of disturbing the peace, 19 chose 10 days of community service, such as highway cleanup, Bishop said Tuesday.

Twelve others chose to pay a $220 fine and accept two years’ probation, agreeing to refrain from taking part in similar behavior at abortion protests, Bishop said.

Four activists agreed to the plea bargain but have not yet chosen their sentence, Bishop said.

All are set to be formally sentenced Monday by San Diego Municipal Judge John M. Thompson.