Page 66 - Encyclopedia Of Terrorism

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Antiabortion Movement———39

and harass abortion providers, who had been pinpointed employee, shot and killed Dr. David Gunn as he entered
as the weak link in the abortion “industry.” Activists the Pensacola Women’s Medical Services clinic
were encouraged to search all public records for any in Florida, while members of the antiabortion group
evidence of malpractice, criminal history, or abortion- Rescue America protested outside. Griffin’s actions
related deaths, which, if found, would be used as quickly transformed the movement. Five months later,
propaganda. Scheidler’s volume discussed a number Rachelle “Shelley” Shannon, a prolific antiabortion
of actions that could create a maximum level of dis- activist from Oregon who was linked to arson attacks in
ruption at clinics, including aggressive sidewalk Eugene and Portland as well as butyric acid attacks in
counseling techniques and full-scale clinic blockades. Reno, Nevada, and Chico, California, shot Dr. George
Scheidler included instructions for using license Tiller in both arms as he left his Wichita, Kansas, clinic.
plates to identify individuals, both patients and staff, (On August 21, 1993, Dr. George Wayne Patterson,
and obtaining personal contact information. Activists owner of Pensacola Women’s Medical Services, was
would later confront the individuals, “outing” doctors shot to death in Mobile, Alabama. Although authorities
in public places or calling women at their homes. attribute the murder to a botched robbery, many pro-
One of Scheidler’s protégés, Randall Terry, a for- choice activists believe this was another antiabortion
mer used-car salesman, began Operation Rescue, murder.) In February 1994, the FBI announced that it
an antiabortion group that was, for a time, the most would begin investigating death threats received by
active and successful in the movement. Founded in abortion providers and clinic staff in several states,
Binghamton, New York, in 1986, Operation Rescue including Florida.
focused its efforts on “rescues”—large-scale sit-ins Antiabortion groups now grappled with the
and blockades in which hundreds of activists faced choice of murder as an antiabortion tactic and what
arrest. In 1987, the group engaged in its first major that meant for their movement. In April 1994, more
blockade at a clinic in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. The than 80 antiabortion leaders met in Chicago specifi-
New Jersey “rescue” was followed by protests nearly cally to discuss the new level of violence. Among
every weekend thereafter through 1990, when Terry the attendees was former Presbyterian minister Paul
closed the Binghamton office and passed leadership Hill, an extremely vocal proponent of antiabortion
of Operation Rescue to Rev. Keith Tucci. Under violence who, in July 1993, had drafted the
Tucci, in 1991, Operation Rescue conducted a seven- “Defensive Action Statement” that called Griffin’s
week occupation of three clinics in Wichita, Kansas, actions “justifiable homicide.” Hill and those who
in which 1,734 people were arrested. Since 1988, supported his views split from the majority of
Operation Rescue California, headed by Jeff White, antiabortion leaders to form the American Coalition
has been waging some of the most aggressive rescue for Life Activists.
campaigns in the country, dubbed “No Place to Hide,” The following six months were among the most
in which doctors, nurses, and clinic staff are besieged violent in the history of the antiabortion move-
with harassment. ment. On the morning of July 29, 1994, Hill shot Dr.
The Army of God Manual advocated an array of John Bayard Britton and his bodyguard to death
tactics, from gluing locks and using foul-smelling outside the Ladies Center in Pensacola, Florida.
butyric acid, sometimes referred to as “liquid rescue,” That September, Michael Bray, a convicted clinic
to shut down clinics, to arson and bomb threats. The bomber, published A Time to Kill, in which he
antiabortion movement had previously used many of gave theological rationale for “justifiable homicide”
the tactics; however, the manual also contained step- in the antiabortion battle. Three months later, on
by-step instructions for making plastic bombs, and, in December 30, 1994, John Salvi III, a hairdresser,
a November 1992 epilogue, advocated the murder of murdered two clinic receptionists outside a clinic in
abortion providers. (The Army of God Manual has Brookline, Massachusetts. During this same period,
undergone at least three clandestine reprintings.) antiabortion forces had engaged in significant vio-
lence, including bombings and arson, against 52
percent of all clinics in the United States. (Similar
MOVING ON TO MURDER
violence was perpetrated concurrently in Canada,
The manual proved to be prophetic. On March 10, with several abortion doctors shot in their homes by
1993, Michael Griffin, a 31-year-old chemical plant snipers.)