Mark Houck felt the 'hand of God' upon him while facing federal prosecution: 'Suffering for Jesus'

By Samantha Kamman, Christian Post Reporter Saturday, February 25, 2023

CP: Walk us through the day when the FBI came and arrested you at your house. What was going through your mind? Were you thinking, "Oh, this must have something to do with what happened at the clinic that day?"

Houck: Yes. I'll never forget the day. We homeschool our seven children. On Friday morning, our homeschool that day was participating in our weekly co-op. So I was up early, a little earlier than usual, I was up at about 6 in the morning. 

At around 6:45 in the morning, I hear a very heavy banging at my door. And the doorbell was rung repeatedly, so much so that it alarmed the whole house. And I was alarmed myself because I have seven children sleeping, and my wife was still sleeping at that point.  

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So I knew that noise was going to wake them up. And obviously, I was concerned for them. But when I went to the door, I wasn't thinking anything about FBI or anything related to what had happened previously. 

You have to know that I was served a target letter on April 27th. Five days after the dismissal of a local incident at a Planned Parenthood at the local level, I was sent a target letter by the Department of Justice, and a former federal prosecutor representing me contacted the Department of Justice to say, "Hey, no need to bring a federal agent out to his home. He's a peaceful man."

"If you want to indict my client — again, this is back on April 27th — and if you want to indict my client, by the way, you have no case, there's case law against it in your district." 

"But, however, if you want to indict him, he's a peaceful man. We'll bring him to you. Plus, he's on the corner of 12th and Locust in Philadelphia every Wednesday. So you know where he is." 

So when they arrived at my door, I was not expecting the raid at all. First, I went to the door, and I said, "Well, who is it?" because they didn't declare who they were. When they were banging, they just said, "Open up."

That's not normal protocol for an FBI agent. You usually say, "Open up, it's the FBI," or "Open up, it's the police." 

But they didn't say that. So I went to the door, and I asked who it was, and they said it was the FBI. And they banged heavily on the door again. So I said, "OK, stay calm. I'm going to open up the door. I have seven babies in here." 

And so, I didn't know why they were there. I opened the door, and I couldn't believe what I saw. I saw a circus-like event of at least 10 to 15 cars, marked and unmarked units, on my property; I'm about 100 yards from the road. 

My driveway was lined up with police cars, and they were surrounding the side of my house and on my grass with their cars. They were surrounding me. And suddenly, as I opened the door, I saw about five or six agents on the porch with long guns pointed at me. I later learned they were M-16s pointed at me.  

I had [Pennsylvania] state troopers behind their doors in their cars with guns pointed at me. So I'm going to say, 20 at minimum, 20 agents and Pa. state troopers pointing guns at me.

As I opened the door, my hands were up. I said, "What are you doing here? Because I didn't know why they were there. I had to take pause because, again, I didn't hear anything from the DOJ. Actually, my attorney called me in August, and he said, "Have you heard from the assistant U.S. Attorney?" 

And I said, "No. Have you?" And he said, "No, she won't return my phone calls." Remember, we already said we were coming peacefully, so we weren't thinking anything. I wasn't indicted at this point. 

So in my mind, I started putting it all together, and I said, "You're here because I rescue babies." And I looked at all of them, and they didn't really respond to that. Well, about a few seconds later, my wife emerges, and she comes down, and she says, "Do you have a warrant for his arrest?"

And the lead police agent there said, "We're taking him with or without a warrant." And my wife said, "Well, you can't do that." 

I was resigned at this point to just comply for the safety of my children. I mean, I have guns pointed at me, and at this point, they're now pointing it at my wife, and they're pointing it at my children because they're standing in the threshold of my home, and my children are all in the stairwell down range from these weapons. 

So at this point, I'm thinking more protective instincts, like, let me just diffuse this, do whatever they want to spare my children. They're screaming; they're alarmed. They're terrified. My wife is terrified.

And I asked, "Can I at least get some clothes on?" I'm wearing shorts and a t-shirt and flip-flops. It's cold outside. 

 I said, "Can I get a pair of pants on?" 

"No." 

"Can I put some socks on?" 

"No." 

"Can I put some shoes on?" 

"No." 

Eventually, they told my wife to go get me a sweatshirt and a pair of pants while they put me in custody and cuffed me in front of my children and put me in the black Suburban to go down to the federal building. 

At one point, the agent says to my wife, "Let me get you the warrant." So he hands her the cover of the arrest warrant, and I'm out of there within five, 10 minutes of their arrival. I couldn't say goodbye to my children; I didn't have a chance to hug them or even communicate anything to them. 

I don't know when I'm returning; they didn't communicate that to me. We were just quickly taken off the property, and we headed down to the federal building.