Monthly Archive for April, 2019

Magistrate recommends Kings Bay Plowshares Religious Freedom Motion be denied

Posted on April 28, 2019

Four of the seven Kings Bay Plowshares activists with some of their attorneys

from the Kings Bay Plowshares

The Kings Bay Plowshares 7 activists received word on Friday evening, April 26 that Magistrate Cheesbro of the Southern District Court of Georgia recommended that their motions to dismiss the charges, including the Religious Freedom Restoration Act argument, be denied. The seven defendants, all Catholics, had testified with expert witnesses during their November 2018 evidentiary hearings and waited fourteen weeks for the final decision. There is still no trial date set. 
Their statement follows:
On April 4, 2018, we went onto the Kings Bay naval base, the largest nuclear submarine base in the world, to make real the prophet Isaiah’s command to beat swords into plowshares. We were charged with three felonies and a misdemeanor which carry a maximum penalty of over 20 years in prison.

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Twenty-five protesters arrested for blocking roads outside ship christening in Bath, Maine

Posted on April 27, 2019

Photo by Regis Tremblay

from The Times Record

April 27, 2019

BATH — Bath police arrested 25 protesters who they say were blocking roadways outside Bath Iron Works Saturday morning during the christening ceremony for the USS Lyndon B. Johnson.

The protesters were arrested around 9 a.m. They face charges of obstructing a public way, a Class E crime punishable by up to six months incarceration and a $1,000 fine. The protesters were primarily members of Maine Veterans for Peace, Code Pink and the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, according to police.

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Police arrest protester at Lockheed Martin in Palo Alto, California

Posted on April 27, 2019

Photo courtesy of Bruce Druzin

from Palo Alto Online

Man spray paints sign, contacts media, waits for police

by Linda Taaffe / Palo Alto Weekly

April 27, 2019

Palo Alto police arrested a 34-year-old man after he notified local media that he had just spray painted the word “Yemen” in bright red letters across the sign at Lockheed Martin’s Palo Alto headquarters on Saturday afternoon in protest of the aerospace company’s sale of weapons to Saudi Arabia.

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Six nuclear disarmament activists arrested on Good Friday at Lockheed Martin in Pennsylvania

Posted on April 27, 2019

Photo by Paul Sheldon

from the Brandywine Peace Community

LET US SEE WHAT LOVE CAN DO (William Penn, Quaker founder of Pennsylvania, October 18, 1681, A Letter to the Lenape Indian Nation)
It was noon on Good Friday 2019, in this Season of Passover at the Brandywine Peace Community sponsored observance, a Prayer for the Love of Humanity at Lockheed Martin in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. All participants adhere to our nonviolence discipline: observing the spirit and discipline of nonviolence “refraining (in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.), from the violence of fist, tongue, and heart”.

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Good Friday line-crossing at Nevada nuclear test site results in 33 arrests, 8 taken to jail

Posted on April 21, 2019

by Jason Nellis

from Nevada Desert Experience

Mercury, Nevada – On Friday, April 19, more than two dozen people were arrested during a peaceful, nonviolent demonstration for nuclear abolition and indigenous rights (to end the occupation of the Western Shoshone Nation’s homeland) in the roadway leading to the Nevada National Security Site (N.N.S.S., formerly known as the Nevada nuclear Test Site).

Thirty-three people were detained on N.N.S.S. land until the remaining crowd left the roadway, uphill towards the historic Peace Camp. Twenty-five of those arrested were issued written warnings by Nye County, with the threat that if they return for such ritual, supervised line-crossing events the warning will turn into an actual citation with attached court dates. But eight men and women – the “Good Friday 8” – were taken to the Pahrump Jail (1520 E. Basin Ave., Pahrump, Nevada). 

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Six arrested at Good Friday witness at Pentagon

Posted on April 20, 2019
[Good Friday actions at the Nevada Test Site, Livermore Labs and Lockheed Martin in Pennsylvania will be added to the Nuclear Resister website soon.]
by Art Laffin
From Holy Thursday afternoon to Good Friday afternoon, about 20 people gathered in Washington, D.C. for a Faith and Resistance retreat and public witness that was organized by the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker and held at St. Stephen and the Incarnation Church. Those who participated in the retreat/witness were members of Dorothy Day Catholic Worker, Jonah House, the Atlantic Life Community and students from Loras College from Iowa. 
Holy Thursday was a day of bible reflection, action planning and Liturgy. Good Friday was a time of public witness and heartfelt community sharing about how to conduct and communicate the intent of our nonviolent resistance actions.

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Nuclear weapons ruined my life, and I wouldn’t have it any other way – by Frida Berrigan

Posted on April 10, 2019

Liz McAlister and Phil Berrigan with baby Frida

From Waging Nonviolence 

Nuclear weapons ruined my life, and I wouldn’t have it any other way

As someone deeply embedded in a life of anti-nuclear resistance, I know the only way to get rid of these weapons is to never stop thinking about them.
by Frida Berrigan
April 4, 2019

I want to offer you something different than the barrage of facts and figures around nuclear weapons. But let’s establish the basics. There are nine countries that possess them: France, China, the United Kingdom, India, Pakistan, Israel, North Korea and — of course — Russia and the United States. Together these nine countries possess a total of 14,575 nuclear weapons, with the United States and Russia accounting for 92 percent of them.

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Message from the Kings Bay Plowshares on the one year anniversary of their nuclear disarmament action

Posted on April 4, 2019
MESSAGE FROM THE KINGS BAY PLOWSHARES
ON THE ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF THEIR ACTION

Like most of you who have been supporting and praying for The Kings Bay Plowshares, the seven of us are very surprised that a year has passed since our April 4, 2018 faith witness at (Trident) Naval Station Kings Bay in St. Mary, Georgia.

It appears our decision to apply the Religious Freedom Restoration Act to our defense has slowed down the works. We were last in court November 19, and we are still awaiting the government’s response to several of our motions. 

On the bright side, our lawyers think the delay is a good sign that we have stumped the system by making it work hard to deny us our rights.

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Six peace activists arrested blocking Creech drone base’s front gate 

Posted on April 3, 2019

Photo by John Amidon

from Shut Down Creech

Week-long Actions Protest Killing of Civilians in Expanding U.S. Killer Drone Program
  
CREECH Air Force Base, Nevada – Six people – holding up bloody hands to illustrate everyone’s complicity in war crimes – were arrested at Creech drone base about 7:50 a.m. on Wednesday, April 3 as they stood at the entrance to Creech Air Force Base drone center in an attempt to stop the killing of civilians in the ever-expanding, worldwide U.S. killer drone program.

Two women and four men – two of whom are military veterans – were arrested and taken to the Clark County Jail on misdemeanor counts. When arrested they were holding a banner reading:  “Drones = Blood on our Hands.” The theme of the protest was “No more blood on our hands. Stop the terror. Stop the drone wars.”

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