Group claims responsibility for attack on anti-abortion organization in Madison, warns of more violence | Crime

The group’s “first communiqué” was shared anonymously with an investigative reporter for the online Netherlands-based news site Bellingcat, who posted a series of tweets describing it early Tuesday morning.

“This was only a warning,” the statement reads. “We demand the disbanding of all anti-choice establishments, fake clinics and violent anti-choice groups within the next 30 days.”

The Wisconsin State Journal could not independently verify the statement or the existence of an actual group named Jane’s Revenge. The Bellingcat journalist, Robert Evans, tweeted that the source who shared the statement with him “has a reputation for extreme reliability.”

Madison Police spokesperson Stephanie Fryer said in a statement Tuesday that the department “is aware of a group claiming responsibility for the arson at Wisconsin Family Action and are working with our federal partners to determine the veracity of that claim.” The FBI, which is helping to investigate the arson and graffiti at Wisconsin Family Action early Sunday morning, did not respond to a request for comment.

The statement claims to represent multiple groups “in every city” and that the attack on Wisconsin Family Action could be the first of many.

“Next time the infrastructure of the enslavers will not survive,” the statement says. “Medical imperialism will not face a passive enemy. Wisconsin is the first flashpoint, but we are all over the US, and we will issue no further warnings.”

The attack in Madison came after two Catholic churches in Colorado, including one known for its annual anti-abortion display, were vandalized last week. Also, on Sunday night in Oregon, two Molotov cocktails were thrown at an anti-abortion organization after an unsuccessful break-in attempt, the Associated Press reported.

The leak last week of a draft opinion suggesting that the U.S. Supreme Court was on course to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that recognized abortion as a constitutional right sparked protests across the country, including several in Madison.

Madison police said Monday that they had made no arrests in the fire at Wisconsin Family Action. The remnants of two Molotov cocktails were found at the site and the message “If abortions aren’t safe then you aren’t either” was spray-painted on the building’s exterior. Madison Police Chief Shon Barnes has said someone set the fire after a Molotov cocktail thrown into the building failed to ignite. It took the fire department about five minutes to extinguish the fire. There were no injuries.

Also spray-painted on the building’s exterior was graffiti depicting an anarchy symbol and a coded anti-police slogan.

Barnes said at a Monday press conference that he was not aware of any further such threats in the city, while FBI assistant special agent Robert Paine said there are “no further leads of any things that have occurred of this nature in Wisconsin.”

Wisconsin Family Action has been a prominent force in the state for years, advocating for laws to limit access to abortions, fighting to overturn Roe v. Wade and working on numerous other hot-button social issues.

Clinics that perform abortions have sometimes been targeted by vandals, too, including as recently as January when a Planned Parenthood clinic in Tennessee was hit by arson. In 2012, an anti-abortion activist threw a firebomb into Planned Parenthood’s Appleton location. The location closed a few years later after a mass shooting took place at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado.

Wisconsin Family Action project coordinator Diane Westphall said Tuesday morning that there had been about 15 “nasty calls” to the group since the fire, with some callers saying they wished more Molotov cocktails had been used and the group’s building burned down.

Seventeen businesses or organizations in addition to WFA have space in the two-story building at 2801 International Lane on Madison’s North Side, including the Northside Planning Council, an addiction treatment center and financial services providers.

WFA had heard no claim of responsibility before reading about the Jane’s Revenge statement Tuesday.

“We’re getting serious death threats from people,” WFA president Julaine Appling said, that have “escalated today” and include “next time we won’t miss.”

Fryer said Tuesday that police have increased patrols around the organization’s offices, “as well as other similar offices and pro-choice clinics in our community.”

Jane’s Revenge echoes the name of the The Jane Collective, which provided illegal abortions in Chicago in the late 1960s and early 1970s before Roe v. Wade.

Anyone with information about the attack at Wisconsin Family Action can call police at 608-255-2345 or contact Madison Area Crime Stoppers at 608-266-6014 or P3Tips.com. Those providing tips can remain anonymous. Barnes asked specifically for people near the site of the fire to contact police if they have surveillance video cameras that might have collected footage of the attack.