Suit Claims Clinics Hide Their Bias : Abortion: Planned Parenthood sues four groups it says operate bogus abortion clinics as a ruse to talk women out of terminating their pregnancies.

Planned Parenthood sued four San Diego County counseling centers Monday, alleging that they advertised themselves as medical clinics offering abortion counseling and services when in fact they are operated by anti-abortion groups.

Officials at the four centers declined to comment Monday.

The lawsuit, filed in Superior Court by Planned Parenthood of San Diego and Riverside Counties, and an anonymous woman identified as Jane Roe, accused the centers of enticing pregnant women to facilities not licensed to perform abortions and attempting to intimidate them into carrying fetuses to full term.

Named as defendants in the lawsuit are San Diego Pregnancy Services, Escondido Pregnancy Services, Center for Unplanned Pregnancy and the Poway Pregnancy Counseling Center.

Abby B. Silverman, one of three attorneys representing the plaintiffs, said Jane Roe is a single college student who went to the Center for Unplanned Pregnancy, near San Diego State University, to find out whether she was pregnant. Planned Parenthood officials said the young woman was subjected to “vehement anti-choice propaganda” when center officials confirmed her pregnancy.

Silverman declined to say whether Jane Roe aborted the fetus or carried it to full term.

Silverman and Planned Parenthood officials said the intent of the lawsuit is not to shut down the counseling centers but to make them “be forthright with the public about their true intentions.”

“They serve a purpose to their own constituency,” Silverman said. “But they have to be up-front about their own mission and methods. Their mission is to counsel pregnant women not to have abortions.”

Planned Parenthood provides services that include family planning and abortion referrals.

In addition to unspecified damages for Jane Roe, the lawsuit also asks the court to order the centers’ officials to tell women in advance who they are and what they advocate. According to the lawsuit, women were lured to the centers through deceptive advertising and offers of free pregnancy tests.

“Through false advertising, these centers deceive women at an especially vulnerable time in their lives, promising to offer help, confidentiality and choices,” Planned Parenthood executive director Mark Salo said. “Instead, they violate the trust which is placed in them.”

At least one of the centers, however, advertises itself as a non-medical facility offering pregnancy options.

Silverman said the centers are not affiliated with each other.

Planned Parenthood has received numerous complaints from women about the treatment they received at the centers, she said, adding that Planned Parenthood sent female investigators to the centers on the pretense of needing pregnancy counseling.

The organization estimates that there are as many as 70 “bogus” abortion clinics in California and as many as 2,000 throughout the United States.