Anti-Abortion Group Criticizes UC Nominee : Education: Richard Atkinson is called an ‘unsuitable role model’ because of his former lover’s allegations in a now-settled suit that he forced her to end a pregnancy.

As the University of California Board of Regents prepared to choose the next UC president, an anti-abortion group denounced the nominee Thursday, calling him “an unsuitable role model for students and faculty.”

The California chapter of American Victims of Abortion faxed 20 of the 26 regents Thursday to say it was not confident that the nominee, UC San Diego Chancellor Richard C. Atkinson, has the “scruples and sensitivity” necessary for the job.

The board is scheduled to meet today in San Francisco to consider Atkinson’s nomination to run the nine-campus, 162,000-student system. The nomination, the result of a seven-month confidential search process, became public only Monday.

The president of the anti-abortion group, Michaelene Jenkins, cited Atkinson’s 1986 decision to pay up to $275,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by Lee Perry, a former Harvard University professor. Perry had accused him of impregnating her in 1977 and tricking her into having an abortion by promising to father another child at a later date.

Atkinson has always disputed Perry’s allegations but said he settled the lawsuit to put the matter behind him. On Thursday, Perry, a practicing psychologist now working in Northern California, issued a statement defending her lawsuit and the issues raised in it, but made no comment on Atkinson’s nomination.

“I brought suit because Atkinson intentionally lied to me and deceived me into having an abortion. . . . Newspapers have treated this incident primarily as an embarrassing moment for Atkinson, but its significance goes beyond our past relationship,” she said. Among other things, she stated, the lawsuit raised important civil rights and ethical issues about a woman’s sole right to continue or terminate a pregnancy.

Jenkins, who is also the executive director of the San Diego chapter of the California Pro-life Council, the state affiliate of the national Right to Life organization, said “Atkinson’s past indiscretions . . . leave him unsuitable for such a prestigious and high-profile position.”

If Perry’s allegations against Atkinson were true, Jenkins continued, “their aborted child might well have been a UC applicant this year.”

Through a spokesman, Atkinson declined to comment Thursday. Sources said earlier this week that the regents’ presidential search committee considered the impact of the litigation but ultimately decided it was far enough in the past that it could be discounted. Gov. Pete Wilson is also a longtime Atkinson booster and supports the choice.

But Regent Glenn Campbell said Thursday that he was so concerned by what he called Atkinson’s “peccadilloes” that he would not support his candidacy.

Campbell said he considered Atkinson’s behavior in this matter worse than that of Oregon Sen. Bob Packwood, who is accused of harassing several women. The lawsuit reflects poorly on Atkinson’s character, said Campbell, adding that he agrees with the anti-abortion group that the 66-year-old chancellor would be a poor role model for students.

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“My conscience keeps me from doing anything but abstaining or voting no, because I think we’re just seeing the beginning of this criticism,” Campbell said. “If the criticism keeps up, I don’t want people saying, ‘Campbell, why didn’t you do something about it?’ ”

But Regent Ward Connerly disagreed. One of many regents who expect Atkinson to be approved today, Connerly acknowledged that the UC San Diego chancellor’s past might provoke some “negative outfall” but said the regents should not let that influence their decision.

“None of us is perfect, and people should not be judged in the public domain by things that allegedly occur in their private lives. I just don’t think that should be a factor,” he said. “If we vote no because there might be adverse publicity, then we can always be frightened off of any tough issue.”

If approved, Atkinson, an experimental psychologist and former director of the National Science Foundation, will become UC’s 17th president. Current President Jack W. Peltason is stepping down Oct. 1.

Sources have told The Times that Atkinson, who was a finalist for the UC presidency in 1992, did not get the job then in large part because of the earlier lawsuit, which was filed in 1981 and settled in 1986, three days after the trial began.

Legal papers filed in San Diego Superior Court show that Atkinson, who was separated from his wife at the time, acknowledged having a sexual relationship with Perry, but denied that he had persuaded her to have an abortion.

“I was not the person responsible for Dr. Perry’s pregnancy,” he wrote in a 1982 statement included in court records. “Furthermore, at no time did I try to persuade her to have an abortion.”

One exhibit Perry offered in her lawsuit against Atkinson was a list of people, in Atkinson’s handwriting, that Perry said was a tally he kept of dozens of extramarital affairs.

In court papers, Perry alleged that Atkinson had told her about the list and that she had taken it from him after their relationship soured. In a pretrial deposition, Atkinson acknowledged writing the list but denied that the names on it were women with whom he had had affairs.

“These are a list of people that I’ve met at various times,” Atkinson said in his deposition. “These are not a list of people that I’ve had affairs with. These are a list of people I’ve known over time.”

The two-page document, which is in the court files and was reviewed by The Times, is a list of people, some named, others only generally described. None of the people on the list appear to be male. Some are full names of women, followed by places and dates that range from 1961 to 1977. In some cases, there are references to conferences or professional meetings.

Some of the women are listed by first name only or in other shorthand, such as “Girl in Sweden,” “Girl in Paris,” “Stanford student from Hawaii” and the “2nd wife” of a man he identifies.

In the margin alongside some of the names are numbers that Perry alleged “seemed to be totals” relating to those particular women. Atkinson’s attorney objected to that line of questioning, so Atkinson never got a chance to respond.

His lawyers objected to the handwritten list, which also included Perry’s name and the approximate date that she had met Atkinson, as an “invasion of privacy.”

Also at today’s meeting, Lt. Gov. Gray Davis, who is a member of the board, is expected to call for reforms in the regents’ process for selecting the university president.

The nomination of Atkinson by the regents’ committee came after its top choice--Ohio State University President E. Gordon Gee--withdrew in June.