Safe, Legal, Inaccessible: Harassment Rachets Up in Allentown

There's a poster in the hallway of the Allentown Women's Center in Allentown, PA, that quotes esteemed Rabbi Moshe Sofer [1762-1839]: "No woman is required to build the world by destroying herself."

That sentiment has goaded AWC staff to provide a wide range of reproductive health services to women of the Lehigh Valley for 31 years; it has also goaded local anti-abortionists who relentlessly picket, taunt, and pray outside the clinic's doors.

Allentown is one of America's hotspots, locales where a confluence of anti-abortion lawmakers, religious groups, and fanatical individuals come together to make the provision or acquisition of reproductive health services as difficult as possible.

The tactics of Allentown's antis have ranged from "sidewalk counseling," to prayer vigils, home pickets, and Internet harassment. On Good Friday, for example, the AWC was subject to "spoofing." In that incident hundreds of clinics across the U.S. received computer-generated phone calls showing the number of the Allentown Women's Center on their caller ID. "The recipients picked up and got 45 seconds of babies crying and a man asking them if they heard the millions of children they were killing," says AWC Executive Director Jen Boulanger.  The AWC subsequently received dozens of calls from irate providers. "When we finally figured out what had happened we got the FBI involved and emailed a warning to clinics affiliated with the National Abortion Federation and the Abortion Care Network," Boulanger says. "The FBI has been great." Nonetheless, a week later the Reproductive Health and Counseling Center in Chester, PA. was similarly "spoofed."

While the spoofing incident was a first, from four to six days a week protesters can be seen and heard at AWC.  They've undoubtedly been encouraged by Pennsylvania's many abortion restrictions:  The state mandates a 24-hour wait between counseling and surgery; there is a parental consent requirement for girls under 18; and Medicaid pays only for the abortions of women who've been raped or victimized by incest. What's more, says Boulanger, "government officials and police officers in Allentown are afraid of lawsuits."

And perhaps they should be. Since 2004, the antis have brought numerous cases against the AWC, the City of Allentown, its police department, and Boulanger herself. One lawsuit was settled in 2007 by Mayor Ed Pawlowski, a Democrat who graduated from Chicago's Moody Bible Institute and whose resume boasts a stint in college ministry.  In that case, Pawlowski paid 13 protesters $10,000 each, essentially caving to allegations that their free speech rights had been impeded. "The Mayor told me that he sees the lawsuits as our fault and thinks we should pay the City $430,000 because that's what the City has spent overall," Boulanger continues "Now, when we ask him for help with the protesters, he says, ‘No. I've already spent $430,000 on you.'"

Even more maddening, she adds, three picketers are presently suing again, once more charging that there is a conspiracy between the clinic, Boulanger, and the City to violate the protester's free speech rights.

A recent Saturday protest gives the lie to these assertions.  On a warm, sunny Saturday in mid-April, more than 70 members of Helpers of God's Precious Infants - men, women and children - spent approximately an hour on the sidewalk facing the clinic. The Helpers, a 20-year-old group founded by Brooklyn, NY's Monsignor Philip Reilly, see women's health centers as "places where Christ is re-crucified." Their mission, according to their website, is to "remain with the children during their hour of death." On this particular day, they were led by Allentown Bishop Edward C. Cullen and sang, chanted, and prayed the rosary.

Closer to the AWC entrance, a tiny but vitriolic group accosted women and their support people as they got close to the building.   The six protesters offered a shrill chorus:

"You won't just kill a baby. You'll die of breast cancer if you have an abortion;

"You're killing all your relationships...They'll all be dead after this;

"Mommy, stop. Mommy, don't kill me;

"Sweetheart, don't you see. People DIE in there;

"Women always regret their abortions. You can change your mind."

"I've tried everything to keep women from killing their babies and am now going with the selfish angle," says protester John Dunkle. "I tell her that a woman who kills a baby is three times more likely to die within a year of the abortion than a woman who carries her child to term.  Why is this? I'm not sure, but it's been proven. Then, 20 years later, she may get breast cancer. I appeal to her feelings about saving herself, letting her know that she is harming herself."

Dunkle is no neophyte to the anti-abortion cause.  The publisher of a website called SKYP, Stop Killing Young People, he champions the use of force to stop abortion and provides a cheering section for such incarcerated felons as Michael Griffin, James Kopp, and Eric Robert Rudolph. What's more, two years ago Dunkle was permanently enjoined by the Department of Justice from publishing the names, addresses, and photos of providers and patients on his website. DOJ found that SKYP violated FACE by explicitly threatening to harm those listed on the page.

"I was imprisoned dozens of times when I was in Operation Rescue," Dunkle reports. "But we failed. We were chicken. As soon as the government levied fines we backed off. A few people kept at it but they're all in jail." He now contents himself by protesting at two clinics, the AWC and a Planned Parenthood in Redding, PA. "I was a coward," he mumbles, turning from me as a patient walks toward the AWC entrance. "Don't kill your baby," he shrieks.

Clinic escorts do their best to shield patients and their support people, literally wrapping them in a 12-foot tarp to form a barrier as they move toward the entry area.

"This is torment," says Howard, who is at the AWC with his friend Tania. "She's been contemplating this for the past few weeks," he begins. "She doesn't need this badgering.

"Being told, ‘please, mommy, stop,' will always be with me," says patient Chelsea K. "These protesters are a burden on a day when my heart is burdened enough. I feel I'm entitled to do what I feel is right for me."

Volunteer clinic escorts and staff agree, and do whatever they can to support the patients. When the protesters are particularly hostile, or when they grab at people, police are called. "They are very responsive and come right away," says clinic director Boulanger. "The problem is enforcement. Since the financial settlement the police have had to bring all complaints to the City Solicitor, a mayoral appointee, and he decides whether to prosecute. Since the settlement in 2007, he has not prosecuted anyone."

The Solicitor did not respond to calls or emails from this reporter.

Meanwhile, Dunkle and veteran protester Gerald McWilliams picket Boulanger's home every third Sunday. A clinic physician is also picketed at home.

While other staff have not been targeted in this way, they are repeatedly rebuked. Administrator Renee DeLorme, for one, says that she was startled when a protester came up to her on the anniversary of her brother's death and said, "Maybe you should think about your brother when you're killing babies in there."  DeLorme is still incredulous. "There was no compassion in her voice. She just dug in. She obviously waited for the anniversary so this was premeditated and it really set me off."

Counselor Katherine Wilgruber came to the AWC as a 19-year-old volunteer. "The first thing I heard was, ‘You're a traitor to your generation." At the time, Wilgruber says that she was totally unaware of anti-abortion tactics. "I was floored that they would reach out and touch patients. Before this, I had no idea people were harassing women. I was horrified."

But like others at the AWC, the presence of the anti-abortionists has cemented Wilgruber's belief in the efficacy of choice and has intensified her commitment to women needing reproductive health care. Boulanger calls it upholding women's human rights.

Heads nod as AWC Assistant Director Sara Faisetty sums what others are feeling. "I have two kids so know that motherhood is the hardest job in the universe. If someone is not ready to be a mother she should have an abortion or put the baby up for adoption. This is not a dental office. The women who come here are dealing with a huge, life altering decision and to be bombarded by people calling them names and misinforming them, fuels my fire. When they scream at me it has the effect of making me more invested in what I do, in choice."

While all concede that time spent dealing with the antis would be better spent caring for patients, to a one they are resolute: Neither John Dunkle nor the Helpers of God's Precious Infants will change their decision to provide reproductive health services to the women who need them.

Patients' and their supporters' names were changed at their request.

THE AWC has had a Pledge a Picketer program. People can contribute by sending checks to 1409 Union Blvd., Allentown, PA 18109.

There is presently legislation pending to make it a criminal offense to insert someone else's phone number into a caller ID. Contact your legislators about the Truth in Caller ID Act of 2009.