{"id":857165,"date":"2021-10-07T16:29:21","date_gmt":"2021-10-07T20:29:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=857165"},"modified":"2021-10-07T16:29:24","modified_gmt":"2021-10-07T20:29:24","slug":"kentucky-cop-punished-for-praying-in-front-of-abortion-clinic-sues-city","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/kentucky-cop-punished-for-praying-in-front-of-abortion-clinic-sues-city\/","title":{"rendered":"Kentucky Cop Punished For Praying In Front Of Abortion Clinic Sues City"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">24<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fkentucky-cop-punished-for-praying-in-front-of-abortion-clinic-sues-city%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=857165&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/GettyImages-1232764304.jpg?w=1200&amp;h=800&amp;ixlib=react-9.3.0\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" \/><\/div>\n<p>A Kentucky police officer who was placed on administrative leave for months over a morning he spent praying outside a Louisville abortion clinic while off-duty is suing both the police department and the city.<\/p>\n<p>Officer Matthew Schrenger filed a federal lawsuit on Monday accusing the city of Louisville and the Louisville Metro Police Department of violating his constitutional and civil rights, including his First Amendment rights.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA quiet, off-duty prayer, on a public sidewalk, resulted in Schrenger being immediately suspended for over four months, stripped of his police powers, and placed under investigation,\u201d the <a href=\"https:\/\/thomasmoresociety.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/Complaintfiled-10-4-21-KY-Police-officer.pdf\">complaint<\/a> states.<\/p>\n<p>The suit names Police Chief Erika Shields, the Louisville Metro Police Department, Mayor Greg Fischer, and the City of Louisville, Kentucky as defendants.<\/p>\n<p>In the early hours of Saturday, February 20, Schrenger drove to the EMW Women\u2019s Surgical Center and joined his father in praying the rosary outside the clinic. The clinic was not performing abortions that day, according to the officer\u2019s lawyer.<\/p>\n<p>A picture of Schrenger showing him carrying his firearm near an LMPD cruiser was <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/jecoreyarthur\/status\/1363111370514915330\">posted<\/a>&nbsp;on a Twitter account run by volunteer escorts at the clinic. He was off-duty but wearing his uniform with a coat over it, his attorney said. In March, the abortion clinic&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wdrb.com\/news\/surveillance-video-released-by-louisville-abortion-clinic-shows-lmpd-officer-marching-in-protest\/article_3d8ade82-7e16-11eb-83f8-db0a258683d6.html\">released<\/a> surveillance footage showing Schrenger pulling up in his cruiser just before 6 a.m., getting out and putting on a jacket, and remaining with another person outside the clinic for about 45 minutes, at one point holding a sign reading, \u201cpray to end abortion.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Shortly after he started his regular patrol duty that morning, Schrenger was ordered to return to his division\u2019s office and was placed on administrative leave with pay, meaning he was prohibited from making arrests, working cases, or working overtime hours. He was locked out of his work computers and relieved of his police vehicle. During the months he was on administrative leave, Schrenger, a 13-year Louisville police veteran, lost a substantial amount of pay, which he relies on to support his wife and four young children.<\/p>\n<p>LMPD sent Schrenger notices of potential violations of LMPD\u2019s Standard Operating Procedures, as well as of Kentucky law.<\/p>\n<p>The Thomas More Society, which represents the officer,&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/thomasmoresociety.org\/kentucky-police-officer-returns-to-work-after-being-suspended-for-praying\/\">said<\/a> the law group sent the LMPD a \u201ccomplete legal analysis\u201d of the allegations and requested that the matter be resolved quickly and that Schrenger be allowed to return to work.<\/p>\n<p>Schrenger\u2019s attorneys also said that they discovered through an open-records request to LMPD that the department did not take any disciplinary action against other officers who were on-duty and uniformed when they marched with Black Lives Matter protestors and in LGBT parades. Those officers were even commended within the force, his legal team claimed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt just can\u2019t be allowed that city officials and police chiefs do this sort of thing to really commended, loyal officers,\u201d&nbsp;Matt Heffron, senior counsel at the Thomas More Society, told The Daily Wire.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou certainly don\u2019t treat them so noticeably different than other officers doing the same thing at approximately the same time,\u201d Heffron said. \u201cThat makes pro-life, religious officers as second-class citizens in the police department. That can\u2019t be.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Heffron said the lawsuit will likely be amended to request injunctive relief, which would mean a court ordering the police department \u201cnot to treat officers differently in the future.\u201d If Schrenger wins the case, the city will also have to pay all of his attorney\u2019s fees, Heffron added.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOfficer Matt Schrenger\u2019s real \u2018sin\u2019 in the eyes of certain city hierarchy was that his quiet prayer was for the end of abortion,\u201d Heffron said in a press release. \u201cThey left his career and his livelihood dangling. Now the city government will face the consequences of their actions, which are illegal under the Civil Rights Act and under the Constitution.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>The Daily Wire is one of America\u2019s fastest-growing conservative media companies and counter-cultural outlets for news, opinion, and entertainment. Get inside access to The Daily Wire by becoming a&nbsp;<\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/subscribe\"><em>member<\/em><\/a><em>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Kentucky police officer who was placed on administrative leave for months over a morning he spent praying outside a Louisville abortion clinic while off-duty is suing both the police &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-857165","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857165","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=857165"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857165\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=857165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=857165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=857165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}