A 22-year-old woman has been arrested for allegedly setting fire to a building that was slated to house an abortion clinic in Casper, Wyoming, causing devastating damage that prevented the facility from opening.
Lorna Roxanne Green was arrested in Casper on Wednesday by the local police and agents from the FBI and ATF, and charged with arson. The arrest came after an anonymous donor offered a $10,000 reward for information about the unsolved crime. Four tipsters from the local community named Green as the arsonist, according to documents filed in federal court.
The attack on the Wellspring Health Access clinic took place in the early hours of May 25, 2022, just weeks before the abortion services provider planned to open its doors to patients. The clinic’s security cameras caught a person breaking windows, entering the building, pouring gasoline on the floor and setting fire to the building, according to court filings. The inside of the clinic was gutted, and the attack caused around $250,000 worth of damage, the clinic’s president, Julie Burkhart, told The Daily Beast last year.
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The clinic had been the subject of protests in the weeks leading up to the arson attack, Burkhart said.
After receiving several tips naming Green as the suspect, investigators questioned her about the crime, according to court filings. She told them she was the person in the security footage, prosecutors say. Green told investigators she had read news reports about the clinic’s opening.
“Green stated she did not like abortion and was having nightmares which she attributed to anxiety about the abortion clinic” investigators wrote, “so she decided to burn the building.”
Green now faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
“Over the last 10 months, our team has worked tirelessly to renovate the facility after the arson attack, all while the perpetrator remained at large,” Burkhart said in a statement about the arrest, “We can finally open our doors to the patients who need us.”
A new, highly restrictive abortion bill came into effect in Wyoming last Sunday. The Repulbican-sponsored bill bans the procedure entirely except in cases of rape and incest, or if the mother’s life is in danger. Yesterday, however, Teton County District Court Judge Melissa Owens temporarily blocked the bill, meaning abortion remains legal in Wyoming—for now.
Wellspring Health Access is one of the groups pushing against the ban, and is currently suing Republican Governor Mark Gordon, challenging another law that would make Wyoming the first state to outlaw abortion pills entirely.
Attacks on abortion clinics have been on the rise, according to data collected by the National Abortion Federation. In June 2022, they found that violence and threats were up compared to the previous year. Incidents of arson, vandalism, blockades, bomb threats, and death threats had doubled compared to May through August 2021, NAF’s data shows. Clinic invasions and hate mail also increased.
In one such incident, in January 2023, an Illinois man was charged with malicious use of fire after prosecutors said he set fire to a Planned Parenthood. Security footage showed a man lighting a rag at one end of a bottle on fire, smashing a window, and placing the device inside the clinic in Peoria, according to prosecutors. Tyler W. Massengill, 32, was arrested and charged. He allegedly admitted to police that a former girlfriend had an abortion three years ago, and that if his actions caused “a little delay” in the clinic’s ability to operate and serve patients, then it would have been “all worth it.”
