ARTICLES

Womancare South Abortuary Shut Down

SECOND COUNTY CLINIC TO CLOSE IN 18 MONTHS

It started on May 8 when a woman approached a sidewalk counselor saying that one of the Womancare South workers wanted to get another job, "Please pray for her; I'm taking her to my church on Sunday." On May 15 a staffer and her boyfriend carried about ten bizarre paintings of vaginas from the Palm Avenue clinic down the back stairway and into a pickup truck. Pro-lifers joked that the paintings frightened potential clients and that Womancare was going to use them for pro-abortion picketing at August's GOP convention.

On Tuesday, May 22, two yellow sheets taped to the door said: "The clinic is now closed." A caller that day to the Womancare clinic in Hillcrest was told the South San Diego clinic was closed "por falta de dinero [for lack of money]."

This is the second abortion clinic in San Diego County to close within 18 months. El Norte clinic in San Ysidro shut down in December 1994 after the abortionist killed both mother and baby girl, who was 28 weeks gestational age. Signs in Spanish on the El Norte window urged women to come to Womancare South across from the Palm Avenue trolley station.

On Wednesdays since El Norte closed, pro-life sidewalk counselors prayed and spoke to women coming to Womancare South for abortions. Some women, warned that the abortionist, Phillip Rand, "had damaged more women than any other abortionist in the county," changed their minds. Passersby in the low-income area were generally sympathetic to the sidewalk counselors.