The plight of the critically ill baby Charlie Gard has been taken up by a pro-life US pastor with a history of publicity stunts, leading to fears he is trying to exploit the case for political purposes.

Rev Patrick Mahoney has flown in to London from Washington to act as self-appointed spokesman for Charlie’s parents, Connie Yates and Chris Gard, as they fight a court battle to allow him to be taken abroad for experimental treatment.

Doctors at Great Ormond Street hospital have argued that the therapy available to Charlie in the US is unlikely to have a beneficial outcome.



Mahoney was initially barred from praying at Charlie’s bedside, in a decision he said was an “outrage” and an example of the hospital’s disregard for the wishes of Charlie’s parents. When hospital officials did allow him inside, Mahoney was quick to treat this as a “victory”, posting a picture of himself by Charlie’s bed next to his parents.



Quick Guide Charlie Gard and mitochondrial disease Show What is wrong with Charlie Gard? Charlie has a very rare mitochondrial disease caused by a genetic defect inherited from his parents. The official diagnosis is infantile onset encephalomyopathic mitochondrial DNA depletion syndrome, referred to generally as “MDDS”. What is mitochondrial disease? Mitochondria supply energy to the cells in the human body. Mitochondrial failure leads to cellular injury and cell death. When multiple cells fail, the body’s organs are damaged and shut down. These diseases are usually fatal and kill children, although sometimes they don’t show up until adulthood. Where they don’t kill, they cause serious permanent brain damage. What is the damage to Charlie? Charlie is in intensive care at Great Ormond Street hospital in London, the leading children’s hospital in the UK. Life support machines are keeping him alive. The hospital says that he has severe brain damage, cannot move or breathe by himself, is deaf and has epilepsy. It says his heart, liver and kidneys are also affected. His eyelids cannot stay open and because of the weakness of the muscles, his eyes point in different directions and the damage to the brain will not allow his sight to develop.

The pastor said the hospital could yet relent on the issue of allowing Charlie to travel. Writing on Facebook, he said: “A wonderful update and victory. The hospital did allow me to go pray with Charlie. Here I am with his parents, Chris and Connie. Let’s believe for a miracle and that Great Ormond Street hospital [Gosh] would continue do the right thing.”

He even suggested his prayers were answered when the hospital announced another court hearing about Charlie’s treatment. Earlier in the week Mahoney briefed White House officials about Charlie’s plight, after Donald Trump offered to help his parents.

Mahoney’s self-publicising intervention follows a familiar pattern in the causes he has adopted. The 63-year-old father of three describes himself as an “outspoken advocate for the struggling and oppressed”. He says he has “worked extensively on ... pressing issues of social justice from a Christ-centre biblical perspective.”

He is best known in the US as fervent pro-life campaigner and former national spokesman for Operation Rescue, an anti-abortion group with links to violence at clinics and against abortion providers. In 1992 he was sentenced to six months in jail with three others for breaching a restraining order prohibiting them from demonstrating in front of abortion clinics in Texas.

He is also a founding board member of the US anti-abortion healthcare provider Stanton Healthcare, which helps women with “challenging pregnancies”, including encouraging rape victims to give birth.

In his Facebook profile Mahoney suggests he had a central role in several major recent events. He says he was the first American to walk the Dublin-to-Belfast road for peace, without giving further details. He also says has been “very active in Christian/Islamic dialogues”.

The pastor also says he was have been a “champion for protecting religious freedom around the world”. He was arrested twice in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square during the Beijing Olympics after marching with banners declaring “Jesus Christ is King”.

Mahoney said he had prayed in the high court where the latest hearing in the protracted legal fight was to be heard on Monday.

Alison Smith-Squire from Feature World was acting as the spokeswoman for Charlie’s parents until she was usurped by Mahoney last week. She is now concerned that Mahoney is using Charlie’s plight as a political and religious crusade.

She said: “Connie and Chris have been the sweetest and most genuine people I’ve worked with. I feel they are in a very vulnerable situation and having got all this publicity, Mahoney appears to be seizing on their case to make the most of it.”

She added: “I helped to raise the profile of their case in a very sensitive way and never asked for any money from them. Initially I advised Connie and Chris not to approach the media but to try to resolve the case behind closed doors. I wanted Gosh and the family to mediate and come to some arrangement.

“Only when it came to court did we cautiously approach the media. The story then became so big that it reached the attention of the pope and Donald Trump. After Trump tweeted things started to change. I was no longer in regular contact with Connie.

“From the day Trump tweeted he [Mahoney] had been there, wheeling his way in with his supporters. I tried to tell Connie that this could be negative for her, but she didn’t come back. And they seemed to be being told to take a much more confrontational approach with Gosh. It was wrong to march to the hospital. All the doctors there have got a very difficult job, and I felt it would be disruptive.

“I was looking after them in an ethical way and I was keen to pursue a non-confrontational approach with Gosh in the interests of everybody involved.”