In May 2025, anti-abortion group Live Action released a report targeted to Congress and the executive branch entitled “The Case for Defunding Planned Parenthood,” which outlined common anti-abortion claims of alleged harm committed by Planned Parenthood staff. While the report primarily cited Live Action’s own articles, it also used “findings” from a group called Sherlock Research to shore up arguments of alleged misconduct by Planned Parenthood. But nowhere in the 56-page report does Live Action, which claims “pro-lifers have never advocated for the use of violence,” mention that Sherlock Research’s founder, Kevin Sherlock, is best known as the author of the 1985 “Abortion Busters Manual.” This manual, published alongside anti-abortion extremist group Operation Rescue, encourages readers to aggressively harass abortion providers—even at their own homes.

Operation Rescue members and their associates have long been known for encouraging (and in some cases planning to commit) violence against abortion providers and blockading abortion clinics. In addition to their own Senior Vice President Emeritus, Cheryl Sullenger, who was once imprisoned for a failed plot to bomb an abortion clinic, Operation Rescue has ties to individuals who have assassinated abortion providers, including James Kopp who murdered Dr. Barnett Slepian in 1998 and Scott Roeder who murdered Dr. George Tiller in 2009. Operation Rescue and the “Abortion Busters Manual” were also implicated in the murder of abortion provider David Gunn by his son, David Gunn Jr., during a 1993 House Judiciary Subcommittee hearing, who referred to the manual as “their [Operation Rescue’s] manifesto of terrorist acts” that outlined the tactics used against his father before his assassination. (At this same hearing, Operation Rescue founder Randall Terry stated that Operation Rescue’s goal was to “expose [abortion providers], humiliate them and disgrace them.”)

The “Abortion Busters Manual” is a one-stop shop for violent anti-abortion rhetoric and disturbing tactics, teaching anti-abortion activists a host of ways to harass and intimidate abortion providers. Within the first two pages, Sherlock tells readers that, “We might not be able to cut off the enemy’s head yet, but we can certainly start making him bleed from a number of wounds!” (chap. 1-pg. 2) He uses this violent, tactical language throughout, frequently referring to the “war” he is training readers to wage against abortion providers. He directs his readers to seek information about where abortion providers live, their families, and their past patients so that they can “waste our common enemy—the abortionists.” (9-6) Sherlock seems to acknowledge that the fear abortion providers have when it comes to anti-abortion activists is well-founded:

Later, Sherlock implicates landlords who lease spaces to abortion clinics in his crusade while comparing abortion providers to hitmen:

Remember, the abortion mill corporation has its abortionists doing legally what The Mob has its hit men doing illegally – killing human beings. You owe it to society to bring the full force of the law down on these killers. And as for the property owner(s) – well, anyone who knowingly rents to an abortionist is a Judas who deserves to lose far more than 30 pieces of silver! (7-1)

Despite dedicating this manual to, among others, slavery abolitionist Harriet Tubman, Sherlock joins many of his anti-abortion compatriots in promoting racism in his work: in Chapter 3, Sherlock gives “One word of caution…look the part. Guys, have a woman with you. Whites, don’t go to any inner-city private hospital or a county or state hospital looking well-off or even well-groomed.” (3-7) This is unsurprising given Sherlock’s—and Live Action’s—mutual efforts to paint abortion as a “Black genocide.”

Live Action staff writer Carole Novielli, who seems to be leading Live Action’s efforts to praise the work of Kevin Sherlock, notes Sherlock as an influence on the work of Mark Crutcher, founder of Life Dynamics and close ally of Operation Rescue. Crutcher is also the creator of Maafa 21, a landmark anti-abortion film which argues that abortion constitutes the “genocide” of Black people, and which Novielli worked on as a production assistant. In March 2025, Novielli authored an article for Live Action with a similar thesis to the “The Case for Defunding Planned Parenthood,” citing both “research” conducted by Life Dynamics and alleged findings by Sherlock Research, further demonstrating her, and Live Action’s, continued working relationship with both groups.

While the “Abortion Busters Manual” appears to be Sherlock’s only guide to terrorizing abortion providers, he has published a number of other anti-abortion manuals heralded by anti-abortion leaders and groups for decades, including “Victims of Choice” (1996) and “The Scarlet Survey” (1997). “Victims of Choice” claims to provide proof of “scores of girls and women who have died at the hands of abortion providers.” Of note, Sherlock includes the actual names and “case documentation” of every case he touts as evidence of his assertions. A self-proclaimed expert in “research and investigation” (which he’ll also make you an “expert” on for $39.99), Sherlock claims to have accessed medical journals, health code violation reports, and “photocopies of government documents implying concealment and/or underreporting of abortion deaths are going on within government circles” when writing “Victims of Choice.” In an author’s note, Sherlock writes, “I make no moral judgments on the women and girls who seek abortions […] They are to be pitied, not judged. I don’t have to pass judgment on the abortion providers themselves. The public record proves objectively that many of them are at best substandard doctors, and at worst, the scum of the earth.” Sherlock’s “The Scarlet Survey” is cited nearly 80 times in a deeply disturbing document by Human Life International which lists alleged victims of abortion by full name, age, ethnicity, date and place of death, and the name of the doctor who allegedly provided the abortion care. (Editor’s note: Out of respect to the abortion providers and the families of those named, we have not included the link to this document.)

It’s unsurprising that Live Action has chosen to promote and cite Kevin Sherlock’s work. Live Action has employed at least two “abortion abolitionists” (a self-titled sect of anti-abortion individuals who expressly believe in punishing those who have abortions): AJ Hurley, who has compared abortion to sexual assault, and Samantha DeLoach, who posted on X, “Abortion can’t be banned just by charging the abortionist or the pill manufacturers – it must be illegal for ANYONE, including the mother, to kill the child.” Even Live Action’s founder, Lila Rose, has openly expressed support for the criminalization of people who have abortions. Citing a clinic harassment specialist such as Kevin Sherlock in their latest report—in an attempt to sway Congress to “defund” Planned Parenthood—is just another in a long line of reminders that, despite efforts to align themselves with nonviolence in the past, Live Action continues to support an inherently violent agenda.

Sherlock closes the “Abortion Busters Manual” with two disturbing words: “Happy hunting!” This is what Live Action is uplifting when they uplift Sherlock: a man who encourages readers to see abortion providers as targets to be hunted, threatening their livelihoods and even their lives.