Arson Is Suspected in Fire at Family Planning Clinic : Blaze: A flammable liquid is found at the front door of the Newport Beach facility.

NEWPORT BEACH — Police and fire officials suspect arson in a fire in the lobby area of a family planning clinic in Newport Beach early Wednesday.

A flammable liquid was found at the front door of Family Planning Associates, 4501 Birch St., where a fire alarm sounded at 1:35 a.m., Fire Capt. Ray Pendleton said. Damage, estimated to be $9,000, was confined to the lobby area. The clinic was closed at that hour and there were no injuries.

Police are seeking suspects and a motive in the case, Sgt. Andy Gonis said. Investigators found other evidence, which he declined to discuss.

The clinic was able to open as usual at 8 a.m., said Dr. Edward C. Allred, the medical director.

Allred speculated that anti-abortion activists might have started the fire to protest the Supreme Court decision earlier this week, which upheld a woman’s right to have an abortion. He added that Operation Rescue activists held a candlelight vigil at his Long Beach home Monday.

“I have no way of knowing for sure who did this, but you can’t get (anti-abortion protesters) whetted up like that and not have some take it to extremes,” Allred said.

Sue Finn, an Operation Rescue spokeswoman, said the arsonist could have been anybody and gave a list of types of people convicted in the past of damaging abortion centers: clinic owners looking for insurance reimbursement, women who had abortions only to regret it later, angry husbands or boyfriends, anti-abortion activists as well as abortion rights advocates who want to give a bad name to abortion foes.

“Basically there has been abortion mills bombed or burned up for the last 20 years throughout the country. We hear about it every three months or so,” Finn said. “But Operation Rescue does not advocate burning down abortion clinics.”

About 75 people participated in the vigil outside Allred’s home from 8 to 10 p.m. Monday, she said.

“We wanted to expose Dr. Allred for killing babies, to let his neighbors know that he’s an abortionist,” Finn said. Operation Rescue’s state headquarters is in Anaheim.

Jackie Stuart, an administrative coordinator with the Right to Life League Education Center in Santa Ana, said she did not think anti-abortion demonstrators were responsible for the blaze.

She added that her agency had a bomb threat Tuesday but fortunately there was no bomb.

“Both sides have crazy people,” Stuart said.

Allred said security forces for the nine family planning clinics in the county have been doubled and scheduled for all hours.

“We’d really like to catch someone doing this,” Allred said. “What’s scary is that sometimes there are people working really late at the clinics and they could have been hurt.”

Vandalism at family planning centers is “a constant concern,” he said, but most of the time “we assume people are reasonably sane.”

Workers at the clinics are used to anti-abortion demonstrations in front of their buildings, Allred said. “Most are not violent people, they’re a pretty good people. This obviously was a misguided person,” he said.

The Newport Beach clinic, which was located down the street for 15 years, just moved into the new office a couple of months ago. Clients are being directed to use the back waiting area until the front lobby can be renovated.