ARTICLES
April 2006 ARTICLES
Contents © 2006
by Jim Holman.
All rights reserved.
Closed for Good
Health Department Shuts Down West Covina Abortion Clinic
BY MARIA ELENA KENNEDY
Late last year, San Gabriel Valley sidewalk counselors heard the good news that authorities had shut down longtime abortion clinic operator, Eva Winchell. A November 7, 2005 letter from the Los Angeles County department of health services said Winchell was operating Family Planning Medical clinic, an illegal clinic in buildings on Merced Avenue in West Covina. "You have been found in violation of Health and Safety Code ... in that you are unlawfully operating a clinic," said the letter. The fact that Winchell was operating an illegal clinic was not a surprise to sidewalk counselors, who have faithfully followed Winchell for years, praying at various clinics Winchell has operated in the East San Gabriel Valley.
In August 1998, this reporter went to Winchell's clinic in El Monte and interviewed Charles Castle of the ACLU inside the clinic. Castle said the clinic was besieged by sidewalk counselors. The picketing "does interfere with business," he said. "There is a marked difference in the number of people who make appointments and show up." At the time, according to the El Monte police department, the ACLU and Winchell wanted the police department to serve as their private security company. "The clinic wants the police to post a guard during business hours," said Lieutenant John Burkhart.
Although the ACLU threatened to sue the El Monte police department for its alleged failure to enforce the FACE (Federal Access to Clinic Entrances) law, no one was charged with a FACE violation. FACE prohibits the physical obstruction of an abortion clinic.
Ted Wiggins, a long time pro-life activist who prayed at Winchell's clinic in El Monte, said that approximately three years ago, Winchell decided to move her operation. "We're not sure why she moved," Wiggins said in an interview. "She probably wanted to get away from protests. When she had a chance to move on to more private property, she did it." Some press accounts note that the property owner of the medical building where Winchell relocated her clinic reported to the health department that she was running an illegal operation. "I talked to the building manager, who said the building had a new owner, and he was pro-life," said Wiggins. According to the state health department, Winchell's Win Management, which owned the clinic, received the cease and desist order. According to the order, the building, located among other medical buildings on Merced Avenue in West Covina, is owned by Irvine-based Clear Creek Holding. I was unable to reach Clear Creek Holding to comment on this story.
A story in the December 2, 2005 San Gabriel Valley Tribune quotes Winchell as saying the state was wrong to shut down her clinic. "It's an administrative problem," she said. "I was shocked when they came with a cease-and-desist order. They hadn't completed the investigation when they just shut the doctor's office down."
The sidewalk counselors who have picketed Winchell's clinic, of course, welcomed its closing. When I asked John Hanranhan, who picketed Winchell's clinic for over twenty years, whether he was surprised that Winchell's clinic had been closed, he replied, "well no ... we have thought for years that she was losing business. We figured Planned Parenthood was subsidizing her. She had so little business, we figured she had to get help. Compared to the FPA [Family Planning Associates] in Rosemead, she had very little business. At one point we surmised that perhaps she would be doing the abortions herself."
Hanrahan told me how the escorts at Winchell's clinic would harass them while the pro-lifers prayed outside the clinic. "At the clinic in El Monte," he said, "the escorts would roll oranges while we prayed the Hail Mary, saying, 'this is the fruit of her womb.'" Hanrahan said that at one point he and his group picketed Winchell's Claremont home. "We picketed her twice. We let her neighbors know what she did for a living. We had signs saying, 'Eva makes her living aborting babies.'"
Hanrahan said he was "delighted" with the clinic's closure. "It's been more than twenty years. I personally went to church and prayed the Te Deum when I heard the good news," he said.
After Winchell's clinic was shut down, Bob Ferguson, a veteran pro-life activist, spoke to Winchell, who said that Mohammed Bararsani was the abortionist who worked at the clinic. "On Dec 14th, 2005 Eva Winchell told me that Mohammad Bararsani is the abortionist on record at her (physician owned) West Covina clinic that was and remains closed down," said Ferguson. Dr. Bararsani was employed by Edgar Adolfo Ruiz, who performed abortions and other medical procedures at Centro Medico Para La Mujer in central Los Angeles. Los Angeles county authorities closed down Ruiz's clinic in 2002. Dr. Bararsani has never been disciplined by the Medical Board of California for aiding and abetting Ruiz in his illegal practice of medicine, according to spokeswoman Debbie Nelson.
When asked for final thoughts about the shutting down of Winchell's clinic, Wiggins said simply, "it's not everyday that you shut down an abortion clinic." Efforts to locate Winchell for comment for this story were unsuccessful.