Citing fear of violence, doctors stop abortions> Four years of picketing to end at Rockport clinic

ROCKPORT — Years of peaceful protests locally and increasing violence nationally have brought an end to abortions at Penobscot Bay Women’s Health Center.

Pro-life picketers have demonstrated at the entrance to the center at least once a week for four years. Although there have never been any complaints of threats by the protesters, the center’s two physicians decided last month to stop performing elective abortions. They were concerned about the shootings and other acts of violence that have occurred elsewhere.

“The physicians began discussing this issue after a doctor was shot in Florida,” Penobscot Bay Medical Center spokesman Russ Donahue said Wednesday. “The picketers here were always peaceful; the concern was that the activity might eventually attract someone prone to violence.”

The women’s health center and the medical center are subsidiaries of the same parent corporation, Northeast Health.

Donahue said the women’s health center “is anything but an abortion clinic. It provides the whole gamut of women’s health services. The number of elective abortions in 1993 was less than five. The physicians came to the conclusion that the risk to themselves, their patients, staff and families was not worth it for such a small group when the procedure is available elsewhere.”

Ed Gerrish of Stockton Springs, one of the original picketers, called the center’s decision “a major victory for pro-life forces, a major victory for non-violent, Christian protest. We were out there every Wednesday for four years, sometimes dozens, sometimes just a few of us, regardless of the weather. We took the abuse, we never reacted with violence. This is proof that it works.”

The center’s reason for stopping abortions, to avoid violence, “is only part of the story,” Gerrish said. “Yes, this issue has attracted crazy people, I understand the center’s concern about violence. We can’t expect them to say our presence changed their minds, to see abortion as wrong, but they never would have made this decision if we hadn’t been there, standing up for what we believe in.”

Gerrish’s group also pickets regularly at clinics in Falmouth and Ellsworth. “We are done in Rockport; we’ll probably move some activity up to Bangor now,” he said. “The small number of abortions done there wasn’t the issue; you go where it’s occurring. Maine leads the nation in the decline in abortion. The more we expose people to what abortion really is, the more they realize they don’t want it. Eventually, this will end.”

According to Rockport police, the pro-life group has a spotless record of non-violence during their four years here.

“We had two fairly minor incidents in which they were the victims, but not one complaint about any threatening behavior on their part,” Police Chief Leforest Doucette said. “We got calls about the pictures on their signs, some people said were objectionable, and a few calls about occasionally blocking the driveway. They were always polite and cooperative.”

A spokesman for the Maine Hospital Association said he was unaware of any other Maine hospitals or physician practices that had stopped doing abortions because of protesters.