Anti-abortion group targets home of clinic worker
Posted: Saturday, April 08, 2006
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) -- An anti-abortion group has a new strategy: It plans to picket the homes of all employees of a Bellevue abortion clinic.
The group Rescue the Heartland recently picketed the home of one, Karen Pender, until she received a protection order against the group's director, Larry Donlan.
The group sent at least two letters to employees of the clinic run by Dr. LeRoy Carhart, giving the employees two weeks to quit or face protests at homes.
When the deadline passed for Pender, the protesters moved into her Bellevue neighborhood with prayer vigils and graphic anti-abortion posters.
Pender obtained a protection order against Donlan after four protests outside her family's home.
Donlan said the new strategy is meant to boost pressure on the clinic.
"You have freely chosen a controversial occupation," the letter said. "Likewise, we are free to hold you accountable by disseminating information about your evil trade."
The group has protested at the homes and businesses of doctors who performed the abortions. They also picketed outside horse shows held at a stable run by Carhart's daughter.
Donlan said he wants to expand the protests to anyone who does business with Carhart's clinic.
"I hope to locate, for example, the company that does their linen, and we'll start picketing them as collaborators," Donlan said.
Pender said she will not quit her work, which she describes as a medical assistant who helps women through a difficult time.
Another clinic employee has received a letter from Donlan's group. The deadline it gave her to quit has passed, but protesters have yet to come into her neighborhood.
Carhart has been at the center of Nebraska legal battles over abortion.
In 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled for him in striking down a Nebraska statute that outlawed a late-term abortion procedure that doctors call "intact dilation and extraction." Opponents call it partial-birth abortion.
He is also among complainants in a challenge to the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act.
The group Rescue the Heartland recently picketed the home of one, Karen Pender, until she received a protection order against the group's director, Larry Donlan.
The group sent at least two letters to employees of the clinic run by Dr. LeRoy Carhart, giving the employees two weeks to quit or face protests at homes.
When the deadline passed for Pender, the protesters moved into her Bellevue neighborhood with prayer vigils and graphic anti-abortion posters.
Pender obtained a protection order against Donlan after four protests outside her family's home.
Donlan said the new strategy is meant to boost pressure on the clinic.
"You have freely chosen a controversial occupation," the letter said. "Likewise, we are free to hold you accountable by disseminating information about your evil trade."
The group has protested at the homes and businesses of doctors who performed the abortions. They also picketed outside horse shows held at a stable run by Carhart's daughter.
Donlan said he wants to expand the protests to anyone who does business with Carhart's clinic.
"I hope to locate, for example, the company that does their linen, and we'll start picketing them as collaborators," Donlan said.
Pender said she will not quit her work, which she describes as a medical assistant who helps women through a difficult time.
Another clinic employee has received a letter from Donlan's group. The deadline it gave her to quit has passed, but protesters have yet to come into her neighborhood.
Carhart has been at the center of Nebraska legal battles over abortion.
In 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled for him in striking down a Nebraska statute that outlawed a late-term abortion procedure that doctors call "intact dilation and extraction." Opponents call it partial-birth abortion.
He is also among complainants in a challenge to the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act.
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