(From VandenbergWitness.org)
Photo courtesy vandenbergwitness.org
Thirteen people from the Pacific Life Community were arrested on Monday, March 12, as they blocked the roadway to the main gate at Vandenberg Air Force Base on the California coast.The nonviolent direct action was the culmination of a three day retreat in Santa Barbara, California, where over 50 people from various faith-based groups on the West Coast gathered to pray, study, and reflect upon the consequences of U.S. imperial policy carried out from Vandenberg AFB. Suffering those consequences are the people of the Marshall Islands, target of recent and ongoing ICBM tests from Vandenberg that have contaminated the water and land of the Kwajalein Atoll with nuclear radiation and displaced the native population of the islands so that it could be used for nuclear target practice; and Jeju Island off the coast of South Korea, where the U.S. is behind South Korea’s construction of a naval base as a forward base for future actions against China.
Those arrested included members of the Los Angeles Catholic Worker, Guadalupe Catholic Worker, Ground Zero Center for Nonviolent Action, Tacoma Catholic Worker, Nevada Desert Experience, Las Vegas Catholic Worker, among others. They are Dennis Apel, Rebecca Casas, Dennis DuVall, Ed Ehmke, Jim Haber, Theo Kayser, Betsy Lamb, David Omondi, Mary Jane Parrine, Juliette Twomey-Spohn, Fr. Louis Vitale, Mike Wisniewski, and John Yevtich.
All were cited for trespass and released a short time later at Ryon Park in Lompoc. A court date is forthcoming.