Media coverage of the incident was prominent for several days following. Despite the lack of any evidence, the Hamilton Spectator made the story front page news for four straight days and headlined two stories. “Anti-abortion link eyed in MD” s shooting” and “Cross-Canada alert goes out in wake of doctor’s shooting.”
The Canadian Abortion Rights Action League predictable concluded that the shooting of Short was the work of an anti-abortionist.
“Why would he be shot at, if not to scare him and send a message to other abortion providers that they too can be subject to potential violence?” said CARAL president Amanda LeRougetel.
But Eileen Fallon, president of Hamilton Right to Life, expressed sympathy from Short and wished him a speedy recovery. “Our leadership and our organization as a whole denounce any act of violence. We believe in the sanctity of life…We are pro-life, for life. Should someone be (convicted) of this shooting, we feel they should be punished to the full extend of the law.”
And Dr. Carm Scime, head of the Hamilton chapter of Physicians for Life, called the shooting incident “horrible and downplayed the possibility that a pro-life person was responsible.
We are defenders and protectors of life from the moment of conception to natural death,” stressed Dr. Scime, who leads a weekly pro-life picket outside Henderson Hospital. “This has nothing to do with pro-life and pro-family.”
