At the least, they are exploiting the situation:
Tuesday, October 16, 2001 Go to: S M T W T F S
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Clinics fear hate mail was tainted
No anthrax so far, but tests go on. Area Planned Parenthood sites are among the targets.
Wearing protective suits and oxygen tanks, members of TEEMEnvironmental Services remove items from a Planned Parenthood office in Stroudsburg. (AP)
By Barbara Boyer, Stacey Burling and Alicia A. Caldwell
INQUIRER STAFF WRITERS
In an apparent widespread intimidation campaign, dozens of Planned Parenthood clinics and offices across the country, including at least nine in the Philadelphia area, have received threatening letters - some of which contained a powder that recipients feared could be anthrax.
At least three of the letters recovered locally contained the powdery substance, officials said.
So far, none of the envelopes - at least one of which was signed "Army of God" - has been found to contain anthrax, but not all test results are in.
Nationally, Planned Parenthood Federation of America said that 90 of its clinics and offices in at least 13 states had received envelopes containing threatening letters and an unidentified powdery substance.
In a statement, the group said that there had been no reported injuries and that law-enforcement officials were conducting tests on the substance to determine whether it was anthrax bacterium spores.
The letters to Planned Parenthood come at a time when the country is awash with anxiety due to the Sept. 11 attacks and the discovery of anthrax in letters sent to news organizations and the U.S. Senate.
"We have been dealing with these kinds of issues for a long time," said Heather Herndon, spokeswoman for the regional Planned Parenthood office in Philadelphia. "But using this national crisis to advance their extremist views is un-American. It's extremely disappointing to have this happen as we're trying to heal as a nation."
Herndon said a clinic employee in Pottstown opened an envelope that contained a powdery substance and a letter signed "Army of God" that warned: "We will kill you all."
According to the national Planned Parenthood, some of the letters sent to other clinics and offices around the nation also contained messages signed "Army of God."
Army of God is the name of an antiabortion group in this country that has been connected with the murders of doctors who perform abortions. It is unclear whether the letters came from that group or originated elsewhere.
The Philadelphia FBI office is investigating the threats and trying to determine specifically who sent them, said FBI spokeswoman Linda Vizi. The FBI would not give details on what the letters said.
Carol Tracy, director of the Women's Law Project, which represents Planned Parenthood, said the letters received locally had a postmark from Ohio and a return address from Georgia.
Other Planned Parenthood offices around the country reported getting suspicious letters from Atlanta; Columbus, Ohio; and Knoxville, Tenn., the national Planned Parenthood office said.
In Philadelphia, all three Planned Parenthood clinics received letters, said Lt. Susan Slawson, a Police Department spokeswoman.
The city's Rapid Assessment Team responded to the clinic in the Northeast, where a letter was opened by a clinic employee. Authorities determined the powder was not anthrax, Slawson said. The two letters sent to Center City clinics had not been opened by employees.
Four of Bucks County's five Planned Parenthood clinics - in Doylestown, Bristol, Bensalem and Warminster - received letters containing the powdery substance yesterday, officials said.
Carol Petraitis, head of the reproductive-rights section of the state ACLU, said 21 offices and clinics throughout the state had received threatening letters.
Tracy of the Women's Law Project said threats were a continuing concern.
"The clinics have been targets of terrorism for years," she said. "They operate on high alert all the time. And the folks who work at the clinic never know when someone is going to take a potshot at them."
As Planned Parenthood officials talked about the new round of threatening letters, Mayor Street sought to reduce residents' fears at an afternoon news conference.
"You really do have to relax," Street said. "In spite of all of the potential problems, we are probably pretty safe in this community."
Police Commissioner John F. Timoney, who spoke at the news conference with Street, Fire Commissioner Harold Hairston, and Dr. Caroline Johnson, medical specialist with the city Health Department's Division of Disease Control, said FBI officials had told him there was "nothing on their radar screen with regards to Philadelphia as a target."
Johnson said anthrax is an extremely rare disease that is difficult to transmit. Even if there is exposure to the germ, there is plenty of time for preventive treatment because the incubation period averages five days.
"Stay calm," she advised. "This is not a bomb sitting on your desk."
Fire Battalion Chief Bill Schweizer urged people to look at any odd powders in context. If it's a sugarlike substance, is it near the office coffee bar? If it looks like ashes, is there a spilled ashtray nearby?
"If it wasn't suspicious last week," Hairston said, "it probably shouldn't be suspicious now."
So far, no substances in Philadelphia have tested positive for anthrax. While some tests have not yet been completed, city officials said they had seen nothing they thought was likely to test positive for the bacterial disease.
Street said he was convinced Philadelphia was prepared to handle terrorism. "I want to assure people in the city and in our region that we are doing everything we can and we are prepared as best as anybody can be prepared," he said.
People in the city and country will have to accept a "new normalcy," he said. Street thought his 14-year-old son's reaction to the terrorist attacks was one of the best he had heard.
"Dad," the mayor said his son told him soon after the Sept. 11 attack, "I figure I probably shouldn't be worried about all this stuff I can't do anything about."
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Barbara Boyer's e-mail address is bboyer@phillynews.com.
Inquirer staff writer Frederick Cusick contributed to this article, which contains information from Reuters
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