report from Art Laffin, Dorothy Day Catholic Worker, Washington, D.C.
Focusing on the theme: LET ALL THE WORLD’S CHILDREN LIVE–REMEMBER THE MASSACRED CHILDREN AND CREATE THE BELOVED COMMUNITY IN A DISARMED WORLD, over 60 people from the Atlantic and Southern Life Communities, and the New Jerusalem Community in Philadelphia, gathered in Washington, D.C. from December 27-30 for the annual Holy Innocents Faith and Resistance retreat. The retreat included a moving ritual on the theme of the retreat, several compelling panels with parents and children reflecting on their experience living in Catholic Worker and resistance communities, prayerful reflection and liturgy, three nonviolent actions, and a spirited talent show.
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As they participated in a walking meditation in the Entergy Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant driveway to mourn cancer deaths caused by radioactive emissions, fourteen women of the Shut It Down Affinity Group were arrested Wednesday, January 18 by Vernon police and Vermont state police when they refused to move.
All were transported to and booked at the Vernon police station where Chief Mary-Beth Hebert coordinated collection of data for later charges. At the power plant, Chief Hebert told the women they would be charged with unlawful trespass, but no citations were issued during the bookings and no arraignment dates were provided.
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photo by Leonard Eiger
On January 14, 2012, activists from a local peace group blocked entry to the main gate at the Navy’s West coast Trident nuclear submarine base for nearly a half hour in an act of civil resistance to nuclear weapons.
Ground Zero Center for Nonviolent Action held a peaceful vigil and nonviolent direct action at the main gate to Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor in Silverdale, Washington. The group protested the U.S. government’s continued deployment of the Trident nuclear weapons system. Its continued reliance on nuclear weapons as an instrument of foreign policy is in contravention of both U.S. and international laws.
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MESSAGE TO OBAMA: NO GUANTANAMO, NO BAGRAM, NO NDAA!!
Thirty-seven members of Witness Against Torture were arrested in front of the White House on Thursday, January 12 around 3 p.m. Dressed in the iconic Guantanamo orange jumpsuits and black hoods, and accompanied by a cage representing indefinite detention, the activists were warned to clear the sidewalk by National Park Police or risk arrest. After occupying the sidewalk for more than three hours, they were arrested one by one.
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Fr. William “Bix” Bichsel, SJ began a 3 month prison sentence at the SeaTac Federal Prison on November 10. The sentence resulted from an action at the Y-12 nuclear weapons complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee on July 5, 2010.
On January 10, Bix left SeaTac, and headed to a federal transition house in Tacoma, Washington for the last month of his sentence.
That evening, friends who are Buddhist monks with the Nipponzan Myohoji Order on Bainbridge Island, were part of a group who were walking and drumming on their way to attend a Martin Luther King, Jr. Day vigil and action at the Trident nuclear sub base in Bangor. Senji Kanaeda and Gilberto Perez decided to make a small detour to drum and pray in front of the house where Bix was now residing.
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from SOA Watch
SOA Watch activist Theresa Cusimano was sentenced on January 13, 2012 to the maximum prison term of six month for a trespass charge, and immediately taken into custody. She had crossed onto the Fort Benning military base in Georgia in November 2011 to protest the continued operation of the notorious School of the Americas / Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.
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From Ralph Hutchison, OREPA Thursday, January 6, 2012 marks the end of eight long months of imprisonment for Steve Baggarly, Mike Walli and Bonnie Urfer who are scheduled to be released today from prisons in Lisbon, Ohio; Morgantown, West Virginia; and Lexington, Kentucky. We celebrate their faithful witness against the destructive power of thermonuclear weapons, expressed so courageously at the Y12 Nuclear Weapons Complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee in the July 5, 2010 resistance action. For each of them, the Y12 action was one of many compelling actions in which these resisters have stood to speak truth to power. Their odyssey through the legal system took them to jails and prisons in Knoxville, TN; Maryville, TN; Ocilla, GA; and Oklahoma City, OK in addition to the facilities from which they are released today.
Iraqi-American physician and humanitarian Dr. Rafil Dhafir, jailed nearly nine years on charges involving his charity to the people of his native country during the years of economic sanctions between the 1991 and 2003 U.S.-led attacks, has been moved from the notorious Communications Management Unit into general population at the U.S. prison at Terre Haute, [...]
photo from CBSnews.com
This post is updated with links to each day’s report of the Article 32 hearings, through Day 6, December 21
Day 1 – Getting into the Courtroom » Read more…
7:35 AM
Manning’s pretrial hearing (called the Article 32) began on December 16, 2011 at Fort Meade in Maryland. The weather was chilly and grey, but lightened as the day progressed. Members of the public and media who wished to attend the trial were processed through the main visitors entrance. Fort Meade prepared for an enormous turnout — designating a soccer-field sized parking lot for trial attendees and setting up an overflow spectator theater with video feed from the trial that could hold 100 people.
Mic check reading of citizens' arrest warrant inside Entergy's office, from left, Frances Crowe, Susan B. Lantz, and Paki Wieland of Northampton, MA; Hattie Nestel of Athol, MA; Nina Swaim of Sharon, VT. Photo courtesy Marcia Gagliardi.
Eleven women of the Shut It Down Affinity Group occupied the offices of Entergy Corporation on Old Ferry Road, Brattleboro, Vermont, on Monday morning, December 12, and attempted to make a citizens’ arrest of the board and officers of Entergy, operator of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon.
All the women were arrested for unlawful trespass and directed to appear for arraignment on various January dates in Brattleboro Superior Court, Criminal Division.
Shut-It-Downers cited Entergy for “heedless disregard of public health, public safety, and the right of the citizenry to hear the truth.”
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