ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, March 26, 1996 TAG: 9603260058
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-5 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: NEWPORT NEWS
SOURCE: Associated Press
AN ANTI-ABORTION GROUP contends the Justice Department is trying to intimidate them into being quiet.
An abortion opponent who spent nearly a month in jail for refusing to answer a federal grand jury's questions was freed Monday after a second appearance before the panel.
Rae Powell said she told the grand jury investigating abortion clinic violence what they wanted to know about how she obtained a copy of the Army of God manual, an underground booklet that describes how to blow up abortion clinics.
According to Powell, she got the manual from a former local activist, Jennifer Sperle, and returned it to her after making copies. ``I thought other people would want to see it,'' she said.
Sperle, who moved last year from Norfolk to Wichita, Kan., has said she knows she's a target of the Justice Department's investigation, which has focused on a pair of small fires at clinics in Norfolk and Newport News.
A small group of abortion opponents regularly conducts protests at local clinics. They contend the grand jury probe is an effort to intimidate them into silence.
``I think they're going to hang somebody,'' Powell said of the investigation. ``I don't think they care who.''
Powell, who was taken into custody Feb. 28 after refusing to testify, said she had a private conference with U.S. District Judge Robert Doumar just before returning to the grand jury room Monday.
She said Doumar warned her that she could face criminal contempt charges and a long prison stay if she continued to refuse to answer questions.
Because investigators already knew the answers to what they were asking her, she said, she decided to go ahead and testify.
``I don't know that it was worth it, but I thought it was at the time,'' she said of her stay at the Western Tidewater Regional Jail in Suffolk.
She spent about 20 minutes before the grand jury, whose proceedings are secret. In addition to being asked about the manual, she said she was asked about the clinic fires, but she didn't know anything about them.
Earlier Monday, Patricia Martin, the wife of a man who was arrested in a 1994 protest at a Newport News clinic, spent about 30 minutes before the grand jury.
Neither she nor her husband, Clark Ryan Martin, would comment afterward. They sat in a courthouse hallway, holding hands and praying, before Patricia Martin testified. She is another target of the probe.
``Neither one of the Martins knows anything about any violent activities or any underground conspiracy,'' said David Daulton, the couple's attorney. ``These are just peaceful protesters who happen to believe that abortion is wrong.''
At least two other abortion opponents have testified in the investigation, which is believed to have stemmed from a 16-month national probe that ended in January without indictments.
Carol McAdoo, who was taken into custody at the same time as Powell for refusing to testify, was released March 6 at the end of an hour-long closed hearing before Doumar.
The judge has barred McAdoo from making any public statements, said Robert V. Semon, her attorney.
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