The irony is deep enough to drown in: anti-abortion protesters want to shut down the clinic because of the threatening/dangerous behavior of ... anti-abortion protesters ~ ~ Sooz

Kansas clinic under fire from anti-abortion activists
Irin Carmon
3:38 PM on 08/13/2013

Tuesday morning, abortion opponents went before the Wichita City Council seeking to shut down the South Wind Women’s Center, a clinic that provides abortions. Among their complaints: The clinic draws gun violence.

This struck some, including the clinic’s director, Julie Burkhart, as ironic. After all, South Wind opened in April in the same building that housed George Tiller’s clinic. Before Tiller was murdered in church by an anti-abortion extremist in 2009, there was indeed documented gun violence in front of the clinic—by Shelley Shannon, an abortion opponent who shot Tiller.

“That’s the only gun violence that I’m aware of,” Burkhart, who has been fielding attempts to shut down the clinic since before it even opened, told MSNBC. “We talk to law enforcement regularly and I’ve never had any complaints of gun violence.”

Reached by phone, Mark S. Gietzen, chairman of the Kansas Coalition for Life and one of the petitioners, had a rather different account. He said he and his fellow volunteers had counted 18 incidents involving guns — none actually discharged — between 2004 and 2009, two of which were security staff employed by the clinic pulling guns out of a holster, Gietzen said.

He also counts as “gun incidents” the guns toted by male associates angry at women in their lives getting abortions, including, he said, a “high-powered rifle” pulled on Gietzen himself by a man angry at his anti-abortion protesting.

“I talked him out of killing me,” Gietzen told MSNBC. “That’s why I’m still here.”

But if much of that alleged violence was directly related to the presence of the protesters, wouldn’t it make more sense to restrict their very own protests rather than shut down the clinic? Gietzen was unmoved.

“The fact is that this is typical about what happens at the abortion clinic,” he said. “Abortion clinics are going to bring that sort of clientele. You’re not going to have a mad husband or a Shelley Shannon showing up at a dental office.”

Gietzen insisted with some vehemence that Shannon and Scott Roeder, the man who ultimately killed Tiller, shouldn’t be linked to his own anti-abortion activities. “We comply with the law,” he said. Shannon and Roeder, he said, “are law-breaking people.” You could say they’re on the pro-choice side: If we choose to kill it’s our choice to do whatever we want.”

Gietzen also blamed the clinic’s own staff, saying that the security guards had refused to cooperate with the protesters as Tiller’s had, tipping each other off about major gatherings. And Gietzen charged that an escort—tasked with protecting women en route to the clinic—had been “harassing” the protesters, including “making babies cry” and knocking down signs.

And then he issued what sounded a lot like a threat. “Even a well-meaning dog will bite at some point in time if you keep antagonizing it,” Gietzen said.

Asked what he meant by that, Gietzen said, ”We have this concealed carry thing where half the people in Kansas are walking around with firearms.”

“The way this guy acts, I’m afraid that someone’s going to shoot him,” Gietzen continued, referring to the escort. “He’s asking for it. I don’t want for that to happen…It’s not good for the cause.”

Gietzen refused to say whether he or his fellow protesters are armed. “That’s not a polite question to ask an individual,” Gietzen said. “That’s why it’s concealed.”

While no date is set for a response to the petition to rezone the clinic, Burkhart said she thought it was unlikely to prevail. And if it did, she added, “We will sue the city and we will win.”

http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/08/13/kansas-clinic-under-fire-from-anti-abortion-protesters/

“The fact is that this is typical about what happens at the abortion clinic,” he said. “Abortion clinics are going to bring that sort of clientele. You’re not going to have a mad husband or a Shelley Shannon showing up at a dental office.”

Oh really? No one ever goes to a place of business and guns down others


Some fatal shootings at U.S. workplaces:

_ Aug. 3, 2010: Warehouse driver Omar Thornton shot and killed eight people before apparently committing suicide at a Manchester, Conn., beer distributorship.

Feb. 12, 2010: Three biology professors were shot and killed and three other employees injured at the University of Alabama's Huntsville campus. Amy Bishop, a 42-year-old instructor and researcher at the school, is charged with murder.

_ Nov. 5, 2009: At Fort Hood, Texas, 13 people were fatally shot and 32 were injured. Army psychiatrist Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, 39, is charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder.

_ June 25, 2008: Wesley N. Higdon, 25, killed five workers, then himself, at Atlantis Plastics in Henderson, Ky. A sixth shooting victim survived.

_ March 18, 2008: Lee Isaac Bedwell Leeds, 31, shot and killed four men at a junk yard in Santa Maria, Calif.

_ March 12, 2008: Robert Lanham killed two people in the Regions Bank of McComb, Miss., where his ex-wife worked, then forced the woman to flee with him before killing her and committing suicide.

_ Jan. 30, 2006: Former postal worker Jennifer San Marco, 44, shot and killed six postal employees, then himself, in Goleta, Calif.

_ July 2, 2004: Elijah Brown, 21, killed four co-workers and wounded three others at ConAgra Foods meatpacking plant in Kansas City, Kan., before committing suicide.




_ August 27, 2003: Recently fired Salvador Tapia, 36, killed six former co-workers at an auto parts warehouse in Chicago, then was shot dead by police.

_ July 8, 2003: Doug Williams, 48, shot and killed six workers and wounded eight others before killing himself at a Lockheed Martin aircraft parts plant in Meridian, Miss.

_Feb. 25, 2003: Emanuel Burl Patterson, 23, shot and killed four fellow jobseekers and wounded a fifth at a temporary employment service in Huntsville, Ala.

_ Feb. 5, 2001: Factory worker William D. Baker, 66, killed four co-workers, then himself, at the Navistar International factory in a Chicago suburb.

_ Dec. 26, 2000: Software tester Michael McDermott, 43, shot and killed seven people at a Wakefield, Mass., Internet consulting company, Edgewater Technology Inc. He was convicted, sentenced to life without parole.

_ March 20, 2000: Fired employee Robert Harris, 28, fatally shot five people and wounded another at a Dallas-area car wash. He was convicted, sentenced to death.

_ Dec. 30, 1999: Housekeeper Silvio Izquierdo-Leyva, 36, fatally shot five co-workers at Tampa, Fla.'s Radisson Bay Harbor hotel. He pleaded guilty, was sentenced to life in prison.

_ Nov. 2, 1999: Copier repairman Byran Uyesugi, 40, fatally shot seven people at Xerox Corp. in Honolulu. He was convicted, sentenced to life in prison.

_ Aug. 5, 1999: Truck driver Alan E. Miller, 35, fatally shot two co-workers at Pelham, Ala., office, then killed a former co-worker. He was convicted, sentenced to death.

_ July 29, 1999: Former day trader Mark Barton, 44, killed nine people at two Atlanta brokerage offices before he committed suicide.

_ March 6, 1998: Former Connecticut Lottery Corp. accountant Matthew Beck, 35, fatally shot four lottery executives, then himself, in Newington.

_ Dec. 18, 1997: Fired employee Arturo R. Torres, 43, killed four former co-workers at maintenance yard in Orange, Calif., and was shot to death by police.

_ Sept. 15, 1997: Fired assembly line worker Arthur H. Wise, 43, shot and killed four at Aiken, S.C., parts plant. He was convicted, sentenced to death.

_ April 24, 1996: Firefighter Kenneth Tornes killed four superiors at Jackson, Miss., firehouse. He died on death row.

_ April 3, 1995: Former employee James Simpson, 28, shot and killed five people at refinery inspection station in Corpus Christi, Texas, then killed himself.

_ July 19, 1995: City electrician Willie Woods shot and killed four supervisors at C. Erwin Piper Technical Center in Los Angeles. He was sentenced to life in prison.

_ July 1, 1993: Gian Luigi Ferri, 55, a mentally disturbed man with a grudge against lawyers, killed eight people and himself in a San Francisco law office.

_ June 18, 1990: James E. Pough, 42, killed 10 people and wounded four others before killing himself at a General Motors Acceptance Corp. office in Jacksonville, Fla.

_ Sept. 14, 1989: Joseph T. Wesbecker, 47, on disability for mental illness, killed eight people and wounded 12 others at a printing plant in Louisville, Ky., before killing himself.

_ Feb. 16, 1988: Richard W. Farley, 40, killed seven people with a shotgun at ESL Corp. in Sunnyvale, Calif., before surrendering. He was sentenced to death.

_ Aug. 20, 1986: Pat Sherrill, 44, a postal worker who authorities say was about to be fired, killed 14 people at a post office in Edmond, Okla., then fatally wounded himself.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/0 ... 70128.html

IMO, Mr. Gietzen should be prevented from owning/using/possessing any firearms. He's far too unstable.
He shouldn't be allowed near rolling pins, baseball bats or feather dusters, either.