RICHMOND, Va., March 3 (UPI) -- Police arrested 31 people at the Virginia Capitol in Richmond where hundreds of protesters rallied Saturday against a bill they say restricts abortion rights.
Delegate Delores McQuinn, D-Richmond, called the deployment of state police troopers in riot gear "just the latest example of government overreach," the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.
"The men and women who marched on Capitol Square have a right to peacefully protest without the threat that they will be arrested for exercising that right," McQuinn said in a release. "At several recent women's rights events, there has been an overabundance of police presence."
Seventeen women and 14 men were taken into custody after refusing to leave the south steps of the Capitol, the newspaper said. Capt. Raymond Goodloe of the Capitol Police said the charges were likely either trespassing or unlawful assembly.
The demonstrators, many wearing red arm bands and some carrying signs such as "Gov. [Bob] McDonnell Get Out of My Vagina" and Mind Your Own Private Parts," oppose legislation passed by the General Assembly requiring women to have an ultrasound before getting an abortion and other proposed legislation they view as infringing on their reproductive rights.
