‘People’ Bombs May Be New Tactic by Abortion Foes

A violent campaign that has included 43 arson and bombing attacks on abortion-related facilities in recent years has apparently been resumed and intensified with the mailing of four anti-personnel parcel bombs to abortion agencies in the Portland, Ore., area.

One bomb was delivered Monday, to the Portland Feminist Women’s Health Center. The other three were then intercepted by postal inspectors at mail facilities. None exploded, but abortion supporters immediately called the mail bombs a serious escalation of the anti-abortion campaign, in which--for the first time--people and not buildings are the targets.

Postal investigators Wednesday posted a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction. They said they had no suspects.

Nanette Falkenberg, executive director of the National Abortion Rights League, charged that the anti-abortion movement had to bear responsibility for the bombs. “The right-to-life response to (criticism of) clinic bombings has always been, ‘It’s just bricks and mortar, we’re not trying to kill people,’ ” she said in a telephone interview Wednesday. “This is the first time it’s clear they’re trying to kill people.”

Warnings were quickly spread by abortion groups out of fear that a seasonal round of attacks may have begun, similar to the spate of clinic bombings across the country at the end of last year.

“We see this as a serious escalation of anti-abortion tactics,” said Geri Craig, executive director of the Portland women’s health center, where the first bomb was detected by a clinic worker trained in identifying suspicious packages. “It’s the first (bombing) attempt through the post office and the first attempt to kill or maim someone.”

Clients in Building

The bomb, about the size of two shoe boxes, bearing an illegible return address and mailed in Portland on Nov. 30, was received Monday morning while center clients and a physician were in the two-story building housing the center in southeast Portland.

Police described the bomb as capable of killing or maiming and of setting a building on fire. Several nearby businesses were evacuated while the Portland police department bomb squad deactivated the device.

Postal authorities then found three other mail bombs, which were also safely deactivated, addressed to what postal investigators described as “well-known abortion services and referral” agencies:

--Planned Parenthood in Beaverton, Ore., which does not perform abortions but does refer pregnant women to adoption agencies, abortion services and prenatal care agencies. It was the first anti-abortion action against the year-old clinic, “a very sudden and obviously violent beginning,” according to Katie Howe, clinic supervisor.

--Dr. Peter Bours, a Forest Grove, Ore., physician, who for more than two years has been the target of pickets. He was the subject of a profile in the Aug. 11 issue of the New York Times Magazine, which identified him as a doctor performing abortions under siege by anti-abortion groups.

--The Lovejoy Surgicenter in downtown Portland, which performs about 40% of Oregon’s abortions and has been the site of repeated harassment, vandalism, threats and three previous bombing-arson attempts.

Sophisticated Tactic

Although authorities refused to comment, Craig of the Feminist Women’s Health Center said that police “believe some person or some persons opposed to abortion and reproductive rights are responsible.”

“It’s far more sophisticated than we’ve been willing to acknowledge,” said Allene Klass, administrator of the Lovejoy facility, which performs non-abortion day surgery also. Klass said that the package intended for her--she opens the mail--bore 20 22-cent stamps, was heavily taped and was addressed incorrectly to the Lovejoy “Health Clinic.”

Since 1982, there have been at least 43 abortion clinic arsons, bombings and attempted arsons and bombings, according to information kept by the National Abortion Federation. In addition, increasingly hostile street encounters have occurred between clinic workers and patients and abortion protesters.