Occupation Project Action

Jury acquits six in protest -- Maine

Jeff Leys — Thu, 01 May 2008 15:08:13 -0500

Short Information Teaser

6 acquitted after trial for occupation of Senator Collins office in Maine

Excerpt

May 1, 2008

Acquittal in Maine: Standing in front of the Penobscot County Courthouse while the jury deliberated their fate are, from left to right: Doug Rawlings, Henry Braun, Jimmy Freeman, Dud Hendrick, Rob Shetterly and Jonathan Kreps. (Photo: Kelly Bellis)> “I think that the public in Maine is so disgusted with the war in Iraq that they demonstrated their disgust with this verdict,” said (District Attorney R. Christopher) Almy, a Democrat. “And, that they are upset with [Sen. Olympia] Snowe and Collins for getting us involved in this debacle.”

“At this point,” Almy said, “we’re going to have to consider the precedent that this verdict sets and we may very well have to consider giving these cases to the U.S. attorney to prosecute because this state court case may preclude successful future prosecutions.

“Also, I would like to say that Snowe and Collins got us involved in this mismanaged war and it may be up to them to persuade the U.S. attorney to take on these cases,” he concluded.

Body

Thursday, May 01, 2008

Pax Christi Maine has additional photos and information.

The following article is from the Bangor Daily News. The photo is by Kelly Bellis, present in support of those on trial that day.

Judy Harrison
Bangor Daily News

BANGOR, Maine - Six longtime anti-war activists arrested last year for refusing to leave the Federal Building when it closed for the day were found not guilty Wednesday of criminal trespass.Acquittal in Maine: Standing in front of the Penobscot County Courthouse while the jury deliberated their fate are, from left to right: Doug Rawlings, Henry Braun, Jimmy Freeman, Dud Hendrick, Rob Shetterly and Jonathan Kreps. (Photo: Kelly Bellis)

A Penobscot County Superior Court jury deliberated for 2½ hours after a two-day trial.

The defendants, who live in communities from Wells to Bangor, were arrested along with six others on March 8, 2007, at a protest at U.S. Sen. Susan Collins’ office in the Harlow Street building.

They said they were protesting President Bush’s proposal to increase the number of U.S. combat troops in Iraq to support a military strategy known as the surge. Members of the group also were urging Collins to vote against continued funding for the war.

After the verdict was announced about 1:45 p.m., the defendants, their attorneys and their supporters celebrated on the steps of the courthouse in between interviews with reporters.

Jonathan Kreps, 57, of Appleton, Henry Braun, 77, of Wells, James Freeman, 59, of Verona, Dudley F. Hendrick, 66, of Deer Isle, Douglas Rawlings, 61, of Chesterville, and Robert Shetterly, 61, of Brooksville, chose to go to trial. The other six pleaded guilty and paid fines.

“To be honest, I’m a little incredulous,” Freeman said after the verdict. “I thought there was a remote chance that we’d have a hung jury, but I didn’t expect this. The fact that this was a not-guilty verdict says something about the way the wind is blowing in this state.

“People have had enough of this war, enough of corruption and enough of high oil prices,” he said. “We can’t continue to spend $12 billion a month on the war and not be affected at home.”

Freeman, Hendrick and Shetterly represented themselves.

Attorney Philip Worden of Northeast Harbor represented Rawlings.

“The key to the verdict was the great defendants,” said attorney Lynne Williams of Bar Harbor, who represented Kreps and Braun. “They were sincere, believable and honest. That, along with very careful jury selection, is why we have this verdict.”

Williams said that Superior Court Justice William R. Anderson, who presided over the jury selection process but not the trial, allowed a defense-proposed question about potential jurors’ attitudes toward civil disobedience. Justice Michaela Murphy presided over the trial.

Brendan Trainer, assistant district attorney for Penobscot County, prosecuted the case. He referred questions to District Attorney R. Christopher Almy.

“I think that the public in Maine is so disgusted with the war in Iraq that they demonstrated their disgust with this verdict,” said Almy, a Democrat. “And, that they are upset with [Sen. Olympia] Snowe and Collins for getting us involved in this debacle.”

State law, he said, does not allow the prosecution to appeal a not guilty verdict.

Almy, who praised Trainer’s presentation of the case, said the verdict most likely would affect whether his office prosecutes protesters arrested in the Federal Building in the future.

“At this point,” Almy said, “we’re going to have to consider the precedent that this verdict sets and we may very well have to consider giving these cases to the U.S. attorney to prosecute because this state court case may preclude successful future prosecutions.

“Also, I would like to say that Snowe and Collins got us involved in this mismanaged war and it may be up to them to persuade the U.S. attorney to take on these cases,” he concluded.

When informed of the verdict, Jen Burita, a spokeswoman for Collins, said Wednesday, “We are pleased that the matter has been resolved.”

U.S. Attorney Paula Silsby, who is based in Portland, said she would have to research whether her office had jurisdiction to prosecute people arrested in the federal building in Bangor. Many years ago, she said, protesters arrested at the Federal Building in Portland were prosecuted in federal court.

A woman juror who refused to be identified talked to the defendants on the courthouse steps after the verdict. She said that the war really did not factor into the verdict.

The juror said that the state did not meet its burden of proof on the first element needed to prove them guilty of criminal trespass — whether the protesters were in the Federal Building knowing they were not licensed or privileged to be there.

“I testified that I felt we had an obligation to be there,” Freeman said, when asked if he felt he had a right to be in the Federal Building after he had been told to leave.

He speculated that his acquittal and that of his co-defendants would increase the number of protests against the war.

The six others arrested during the protest pleaded guilty to criminal trespass between May 2007 and January 2008 and paid the following fines:

Patricia L. Wheeler, 62, Deer Isle, $200.

Nancy W. Hill, 54, Stonington, $400.

Judith Robbins, 59, Sedgwick, $400.

Peter Robbins, 59, Sedgwick, $200.

Diane Fitzgerald, 66, Blue Hill, $200.

Maureen R. Block, 53, Swanville, $200.

The fine for a first conviction is $200, the fine for a second is $400.

Project

The Occupation Project

Seven Memphians Arrested in Senator Corker's Offices

Dan Pearson — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 14:11:05 -0500

Short Information Teaser

Video, press release, Statement of Purpose

Excerpt

March 21, 2008

March 19, 2008

MEMPHIS—On Wednesday March 19, 2008 seven members of the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center were arrested in the Memphis offices of Senator Bob Corker. Protestors had come to the office for a scheduled meeting in order to present Corker’s staff with 1,000 petition signatures and to ask that the Sentor hold a town hall meeting in Memphis on the Iraq war, which the Senator has not done since taking office. Protestors vowed not to leave the office until a signed letter from the Senator committing to a town hall meeting was recieved.

Body

March 21, 2008

At approximately 6:00pm Jacob Flowers, Dr. Peter Gathje, George Grider Jr., Ceylon Mooney, Jessica Buttermore, Kathleen Kruczek, and Denis Paden were taken into custody and charged with criminal trespassing in their own Senator’s offices. The arrestees issued the following statement (personal statements of purpose follow):

“Senator Corker has refused our requests. We are disappointed he would not agree to our demand, a town hall meeting. Corker continues to refuse to meet with those he purports to represent.

We still believe that we live in a democracy and that those who are elected by the people should listen to the people. After five years of war with no end in sight the Senator needs to learn to recognize that the people reject this war and reject the massive causalities of the war, over 600,00 Iraqi civilians and 4,990 soldiers not counting the wounded and the squandering of resources namely $3.1 trillion.

We will stay here until Senator Corker meets our reasonable demand to have a public forum to hear from Memphians our thoughts on the war.”

Statements of Purpose:

Jacob Flowers, Executive Director, Mid-South Peace and Justice Center

Homeowner and lifelong Memphian

“I am participating in today’s action because the past five years of occupation in Iraq have decimated the communities in that country and in our own. As each bomb explodes in Baghdad we hear it reverberate in Binghampton. As the children suffer in Fallujah we hear their cries in Frayser. We have spent over a half a trillion dollars on this illegal and immoral war, that is over $720 million dollars a day.”

Dr. Peter Gathje, Associate Professor of Christian Ethics, Memphis Theological Seminary

Homeowner and Memphian

“I am here today to say to say no to the war in Iraq, which is criminal and immoral. After years of death, lies, and an obscene amount of money apent, it is past time to say this war must end. Our cities and rural areas are devastated and need the monies wasted on this war.”

George Grider Jr., Chair, Mid-South Peace and Justice Center- Veterans for Peace

Homeowner and Memphian

“I am here today protesting the war in Iraq. The war was sold to us based on lies. Four thousand U.S. soldiers have died based on these lies. How many veterans have been mamed- physically and mentally. A half million innocent Iraqis are dead.

I swore an Oath of Allegiance as a naval officer to uphold the constitution. In this small way I feel that is what I am doing.”

Ceylon Mooney, Homeowner and Memphian

“Standing up against war and terror sometimes means laying down in the street. If the normal order of things is mass killing, then may our actions be abnormal.”

Dennis Paden, Veterans for Peace, Concerned Memphian

“The war in Iraq is a violation of common-sense, a violation of human decency, and a violation of any reasonable sense of common-law. The war in Iraq threatens the safety of the world community, the United States, and my family. It is murder.”

Jessica Buttermore, Concerned Memphian

“Direct action against war, the money spent on this war, the lives lost and resulting poor conditions here at home are the reasons I am here.”

March 20th Penny Poll action at Federal Bldg

Dan Pearson — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 17:35:27 -0500

Short Information Teaser

Photos: March 20th Penny Poll action at Federal Bldg

Excerpt

Chicago - March 20, 2008

Body

March 20, 2008

2. Don’t Buy Me War

3. The Penny Poll

4. In the federal bldg. lobby

6. blocking the door

March 20th AM lockdown at Rahm Emanuel's office

Dan Pearson — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 11:06:39 -0500

Short Information Teaser

March 20th 4 arrested after chaining themselves to the entrance of U.S. Congressman's office

Excerpt

March 20, 2008

Chicago - at 8:30am members of Christian Peacemaker Teams and Wellington Avenue UCC Gerald Paoli, John Volkening, Rev. Dan Dale and Sarah Shirk chained themselves to the entrance of U.S. Congressman Rahm Emanuel’s office at 3742 W. Irving Park Road in Chicago demanding that he “unchain us from this unjust and immoral war.” CPD arrived shortly after with no less than 10 squad cars and a wagon obstructing the busy street traffic for more than a half hour until a bolt cutter could be delivered to remove the 4 demonstrators.

Body

March 20, 2008

1. Early AM lockdown

2. Gerald, John, Dan, Sarah and Kathy

3. CPD abstructing traffic

4: Gerald Paoli, John Volkening, Rev. Dan Dale, Sarah Shirk, Kathy Kelly and Dan Corcoran

5. bolt cutter

6. cutting chain

7. detained

Commemorating the White Rose: Resisting the Iraq War

Jeff Leys — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 17:51:49 -0600

Short Information Teaser

Discussion of the White Rose and an action at Rahm Emanuel's Office

Excerpt

February 24, 2008

We Will Not Be Silent (photo: Suzanne Sheridan): Chris Spicer, a Jesuit, and Abby Strozinski, student at Loyola University Chicago, in Representative Emanuel’s office.65 years ago, on February 22, 1943, the Nazi regime executed three German students because of their active resistance to the regime’s murderous global and domestic agenda. Known as the White Rose, nearly all participants were students. 29 members were indicted for promoting opposition to the holocaust and to World War II.

Here in Chicago, several dozen people gathered in early February to watch “Sophie Scholl: The Final Days,” a film about the White Rose movement which focuses upon the experience of Sophie, and to think about our responsibilities, today, to confront Congressional Representatives and Senators in the U.S. who fund and prolong the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Seventeen people agreed to commemorate the 29 indicted White Rose activists by delivering white roses to people working in Representative Rahm Emanuel’s office. Rahm Emanuel is Chair of the House Democratic Caucus and consistently votes to fund the war in Iraq. We hoped that staffers would receive the roses and also engage with us in a conversation about Representative Emanuel’s position regarding the war in Iraq.Commemorating the White Rose (photo: Laurie Hasbrook): We remember the 29 individuals indicted by the German government for participation in the White Rose resistance effort during World War II. Five were executed and most of the rest sentenced to lengthen prison terms.

Body

February 24, 2008

Moments after we entered Emanuel’s office, a storefront on Chicago’s north side, a polite receptionist stepped out of the staffers’ workspace and greeted us while we crowded into the small reception area. Jacob Olzen, a Loyola University graduate student, explained our purpose and handed her a letter to deliver to Representative Emanuel. She received the letter, but assured us that we wouldn’t be able to give our roses to her colleagues working in cubicles nearby. A thin four foot door separates the reception area from the staffers’ workspace.

The Chief of Staff joined the receptionist for a few minutes, shortly after we arrived. She assured us that Emanuel braves criticism from other Congressional Representatives, in Washington D.C., for having mounted pictures in his office of all the people who’ve died in Iraq, all the photos being of U.S. soldiers. We held up pictures of Iraqis and reminded her that Iraqis also suffer and die. Then she told us she couldn’t talk to us, nor could any of her staff.

The receptionist said that all of the staff were busy, and that they must make themselves available to people who come into the office from “off the street.”

We pointed out that we’d just come in from “off the street.”

The staffers and their supervisors respected our right to be there. They shunned us, but didn’t arrest us.

Anyone working behind the partition might easily have seen or heard us, and I’m guessing that when we left, about two hours later, the workers were curious about the group of people who spoke earnestly about the connection they felt with the White Rose. We left behind dozens of white roses, laid upon enlarged photo portraits of ordinary Iraqis, and also forming a bouquet over a poster bearing the names of 142 military service members from Illinois killed in Iraq. Another poster bore the names of the White Rose members indicted for their active resistance to war and the holocaust.

Did Emanuel’s staff sweep up the roses, pictures and lists, without another word, and dispense of them in a waste basket? I don’t know, but I don’t think memories are dispensed with so easily.

What might anyone listening have heard, last Friday morning, in Rep. Emanuel’s office?

Chris Spicer, a Jesuit studying at Loyola University, read a prayer which he had carefully written, in Arabic. Abby Strozinksi, also a Loyola student, held aloft a poster she’d made the previous night. On it she’d drawn a long-stemmed rose and written words from the fourth White Rose leaflet: “We will not be silent. We are your bad conscience. The White Rose will not leave you in peace.” Justin McMahon, who, like Abby, majors in peace and justice studies, noted that the White Rose members risked their lives to end the war. “Shouldn’t we take risks, now?” asked Justin. “Sophie Scholl’s voice is echoed through our voice; it’s a message that’s not welcomed, not a priority for many people. But we have a connection to people who’ve died.”

Erin Cox read aloud our letter to Rahm Emanuel. We asked him to vote against any additional funding for the war in and occupation of Iraq, to oppose any further military action against Iraq, and to support complete withdrawal of all U.S. military forces from Iraq.

Several people spoke about the “burden of knowing,” –after studying the consequences of the war, listening to eyewitness testimony, researching the bloated military budget, and learning more about people who bear the consequences, how could we remain silent?

Before leaving, we agreed to briefly state our names and say something about what groups we represented. We came from Voices; from colleges; from the Catholic Worker movement; from labor unions; from faith based communities; from the neighborhood and elsewhere. Spontaneously, the youngest members of our group identified themselves as citizens of the world, a part of humanity, members of the global neighborhood and at one with global brotherhood and sisterhood.

Then we read this quote from the White Rose’s first leaflet:

“Nothing is so unworthy of a civilized nation as allowing itself to be governed without opposition by an irresponsible clique that has yielded to base instinct. It is certain that today every honest German is ashamed of his government. Who among us has any conception of the dimensions of shame that will befall us and our children when one day the veil has fallen from our eyes and the most horrible of crimes – crimes that infinitely outdistance every human measure – reach the light of day?

If the German people are already so corrupted and spiritually crushed that they do not raise a hand, frivolously trusting in a questionable faith in lawful order of history; if they surrender man’s highest principle, that which raises him above all other god’s creatures, his free will; if they abandon the will to take decisive action and turn the wheel of history and thus subject it to their own rational decision; if they are so devoid of all individuality, have already gone so far along the road downward turning into a spiritless and cowardly mass – then, yes, they deserve their downfall.”

PHOTOS OF WHITE ROSE ACTION

White Rose Action Leaflet (photo: Laurie Hasbrook)

Conversing with Emanuel’s Staff (photo: S. Sheridan)

Remembering Iraqi Citizens (photo: S. Sheridan): We ask: “Does Representative Emanuel have photos of Iraqis harmed by the war lining the hall outside his office?”

Le Anne Clausen (photo: Laurie Hasbrook): Le Anne Clausen, seminarian at Chicago Theological Seminary, joins us in remembering the White Rose. Le Anne lived in Iraq with Christian Peacemaker Teams. She will soon begin a jail sentence for nonviolent resistance at the School of the Americas.

Remember the Dead (photo: S. Sheridan): We recall those whose lives have been lost and disrupted: Iraqi citizens, U.S. soldiers, members of the White Rose resistance movement.

Remembrance: Dan Gerber of Christian Peacemaker Teams. Let the challenge of the White Rose move us to resistance to the Iraq war.

Justin McMahon Reading White Rose Leaflet

Remembrance and Action (photo: S. Sheridan): Chris Spicer, Abby Strozinksy, Tyler Chen and David Hovde (Tyler and David are members of Reba Community in Evanston, IL).

Concluding Gathering (photo: S. Sheridan)

Recommitting to Resistance: We Will Not Be Silent (photo: S. Sheridan)

From the Outside Looking In: Resisting War - Remembering Iraq (photo: Laurie Hasbrook)

VCNV Author

Kathy Kelly

Protesters guilty only of acting on their beliefs

voices — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 17:56:42 -0600

Project

The Occupation Project

Short Information Teaser

Two days of trial for 3 of the Salazar Seven ends with suspension of $50 fines and court costs

Excerpt

By Bill Johnson
Rocky Mountain News
December 7, 2007

They had, in the end, absolutely no chance for acquittal. You don’t need a fancy law degree hanging on the wall to see that.

Indeed, a Denver County Court jury of four women and two men on Thursday convicted all three after less than an hour of deliberation on charges of trespassing. They were quite obviously guilty.

What was even easier to figure after two days of trial was that trespassing, alone, was never once the sole point for Rafael Eggers, Sue Gomez or Merrill Carter.

Their trial before Judge Claudia J. Jordan, besides being great theater, was a sometimes-riveting lesson in the responsibility of the governed to hold accountable those elected to govern, and on the price that is paid when the effort falls on deaf ears.

Body

By Bill Johnson
Rocky Mountain News
December 7, 2007

They had, in the end, absolutely no chance for acquittal. You don’t need a fancy law degree hanging on the wall to see that.

Indeed, a Denver County Court jury of four women and two men on Thursday convicted all three after less than an hour of deliberation on charges of trespassing. They were quite obviously guilty.

What was even easier to figure after two days of trial was that trespassing, alone, was never once the sole point for Rafael Eggers, Sue Gomez or Merrill Carter.

A little background: All they wanted was a brief chat with U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar. Eggers, Gomez and Carter were among a group of people who had been after him for months to vote against continued funding of the Iraq War.

They had called him, e-mailed him and snail-mailed him, finally arranging a Feb. 1 meeting with Matt Cheroutes, then an aide to the senator.

The meeting, the calls and the mail, they would later contend, were met with yeah-yeah-we-get-it responses.

Another funding request from the Defense Department was approaching. Congress was in recess. They would press their case with the senator on Feb. 21. In his office.

They arrived, about a dozen of them, shortly after 1:30 p.m. The senator that day was touring the federal prison in Florence with then-U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. They would not leave, the group told his staff, until they met with him personally or at least spoke with him on the telephone.

So they sat on the floor and began reading the names of the Colorado military dead and the Iraqi dead, ringing a bell after each name.

At 5 p.m., the office’s closing time, seven were left. They were asked to leave. They refused. Police arrived at about 5:30 with handcuffs and leg shackles. Four would plead no contest or guilty.

Assistant City Attorney Robert F. Reynolds barely broke a sweat proving his case against the remaining three, each acknowledging on the stand that they had remained in the senator’s office past closing time.

Yet their intent, contended their lawyer, Walter Gerash, was not to trespass, “but to save lives.”

“These three stood for life over death, for communication over worrying about when a door is closed,” he told the jury.

“It is our duty, not just our right, to stop atrocities when we see them, and atrocities are occurring in Iraq,” testified a defiant Merrill Carter, 50.

As a young man, he testified, he had become fascinated by the Nuremberg trials that followed World War II, how many German citizens were convicted of war crimes for standing silent in the face of Nazi atrocities they witnessed. It informed who he is today, he said.

Sue Gomez is 61, soft-spoken, a former nurse who for 13 years worked as a church secretary and spent several years as a missionary to the poor in Mexico. She now works at the Catholic Worker homeless shelter in Denver.

She never blinked on the stand while explaining why 5 p.m. meant little to her.

“Violence does not stop violence,” she said. “Anything done to bring light to the immorality of this war was worth the risk of my being inconvenienced.”

Some people see things more clearly and a lot faster than most of us. The Salazar Seven, as they dubbed themselves - the seven who went to jail for actions on a day when Ken Salazar refused to even put in a call to his own office - are among them.

And it was almost surreal to hear them testify of peace and of attempting to save soldiers’ lives.

I realized that I have witnessed this war from both sides of it, on the roads, streets and hellholes of Iraq with soldiers, and in a courtroom with those fully convinced none of them should have ever stepped foot there.

Having witnessed the sacrifice made on both sides, all I honestly see is patriotism - the real kind in which men and women of courage risk everything they are in the name of a country they love.

Sue Gomez, Rafael Eggers and Merrill Carter, I have come to see, are just as heroic as Sgt. 1st Class Justin Vasquez, Lt. Mike Smith, Lt. Col. Ross Brown and Specialist Scott Ulbrich, men and women who put everything on the line in service to our freedoms.

In the end, perhaps even Judge Jordan saw this. She fined each of the three $50, immediately suspending all of it. She suspended court costs payments, too.

The true irony of Thursday’s trial?

Ken Salazar, right or wrong, is now a leading opponent of the Defense Department’s request for additional funding for the war in Iraq, believing there is no solution to an adventure that has cost nearly 4,000 American lives and untold thousands of Iraqi lives.

“For us, it is a victory of sorts,” Merrill Carter said after the trial. “I still wish he would take a stronger stance. People are still dying. But he is coming around.

“Maybe it proves democracy works, that it doesn’t just happen in a voting booth. You have to work at it. You have to be vigilant.”

Occupation Project Continues: Chicago Action

Dan Pearson — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 12:32:56 -0500

Short Information Teaser

15 Arrested at Durbin's Chicago Office

Excerpt

October 16th, 2007

Also, listen to Free Speech Radio News segment Occupation Project Targets Senator Durbin’s Office. Johnny Hap reports from WZRD in Chicago.

Continue reading and see photos from the action:

Body

October 16th, 2007

CHIGAGO - In a combined action by members of 8th Day Center for Justice, Voices for Creative Nonviolence, and St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Worker, 15 people were arrested while protesting Senator Richard Durbin’s continued support for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Following a weekly vigil held outside the federal building in downtown Chicago, 10 people entered the building at 9am and proceeded to the office of Senator Durbin where they pledged to stay until Senator Durbin pledged to vote against any future spending for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as refusing any military action against Iran. They stayed for one and a half hours until they were arrested by agents of Immigration Customs and Enforcement(ICE).

Shortly after the first group entered the building a second group of 5 people entered the building’s lobby revealing shirts that came together with the message, “SENATOR DURBIN, STOP FUNDING WAR”. They remained in the lobby waiting to meet with a member of Durbin’s staff until they were arrested four hours later.

Listen to Free Speech Radio News segment Occupation Project Targets Senator Durbin’s Office. Johnny Hap reports from WZRD in Chicago.

From left to right: -DON’T ATTACK IRAN
-WHAT ABOUT REPARATIONS FOR IRAQIS?
-HEY MAJORITY WHIP, HOW ‘BOUT WHIPPING UP SOME PEACE?
-HEALTH CARE NOT WARFARE
-WHY ARE SYRIA AND JORDAN DEALING WITH OUR IRAQI REFUGEE CRISIS?

4. leave now

5. the cuffing begins

6. hold still

7. one by one

8. lucky

9. floor sweep

10. to the elevators

11. Three agents, one protester

Project

The Occupation Project

Occupation Project Video: Young people against the war

voices — Sat, 13 Oct 2007 14:07:16 -0500

Project

The Occupation Project

Short Information Teaser

Video: Twelve courageous Iowa young people occupied the office of Senator Charles Grassley

Excerpt

October 13, 2007

On September 21st twelve courageous Iowa young people occupied the office of Senator Charles Grassley demanding that he take a strong stand to end the U.S. war in Iraq and to bring the troops home as soon as possible. To stop funding this illegal and immoral war being wages in our name. They called for all young people to stand for Peace!

More videos by soundslikesouth1

Body

October 13, 2007

More videos by soundslikesouth1

Des Moines Jury Finds Protesters Not Guilty

Dan Pearson — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 10:04:21 -0500

Short Information Teaser

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, September/October 2007

Excerpt

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, September/October 2007, pages 49-50

By Michael Gillespie

IN A DRAMATIC ending to a three-day trial, a jury unanimously found five Iowa peace activists “not guilty” of charges of trespassing at the Des Moines office of Iowa Republican Sen. Charles Grassley in February. Acquitted in the July 11 verdict were Des Moines peace activist Elton Davis, Iowa Methodist Federation for Social Action member Chester Guinn, American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) Iowa Program Coordinator Kathleen McQuillen, Catholic Peace Ministry executive director Brian Terrell, and Catholic Just Faith member Dixie Webb.

Body

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, September/October 2007, pages 49-50

By Michael Gillespie

Even before the verdict was returned the case had attracted national attention, in part because the five defendants admitted that they had, in fact, refused an order by a U.S. Department of Homeland Security inspector to leave Grassley’s office. The anti-war protesters argued that they had a First Amendment right to have their grievance heard by their senator—a right denied them by Senator Grassley and his staff.

The protest (see December 2006 Washington Report, pp. 62-63) was carried out in conjunction with The Occupation Project, a sustained campaign of nonviolent civil disobedience planned to focus attention on widespread public sentiment against the Iraq war. Among those testifying for the defense was Jeff Leys, co-director of Voices for Creative Non-Violence and Occupation Project organizer.

After members of Senator Grassley’s office staff refused to make eye contact with the activists and ignored their presence in the office, the Iowa activists reverently read aloud from lists of names of American servicemen and servicewomen and of Iraqis killed in the war.

“We brought a grievance,” said Terrell. “We brought a list of names. Each name is a grievance.”

A Grassley staffer proceeded to call a Homeland Security officer to the senator’s office, and the officer interrupted the reading of the names of the dead. Des Moines Police Department officers were summoned to arrest the activists.

District Court Judge Odell McGee allowed Terrell to read the Amendment aloud to the court for the purpose of “judicial notice.”

Terrell read: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”

The jury’s not guilty verdict on grounds of constitutional justification strongly suggests that the jurors agreed that the protesters’ right to freedom of speech, to peaceably assemble, and to have their grievances heard by their elected representative had been abridged by their arrest.

Terrell and Davis represented themselves, while Guinn, McQuillen and Webb were represented by noted Des Moines civil and human rights attorney and National Lawyers Guild member Sally Frank, who teaches law at Drake Law School in Des Moines.

On the July 5 edition of National Public Radio’s “The Diane Rehm Show,” a scholar from the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute singled out Iowa as “a state that has perhaps the strongest anti-war movement in the country.”

Project

The Occupation Project

Protesters grow frustrated as war wears on

Dan Pearson — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 12:29:58 -0500

Short Information Teaser

Some activists use civil disobedience to force change

Excerpt

Monday, October 08, 2007

By Robert Stern / Times of Trenton

TRENTON, NJ — Mary Ellen Marino has had enough of the Iraq war.

She is fed up that too many lawmakers from both political parties are acting too slowly or not at all in heeding the message from anti-war activists like herself that it’s past time that U.S. troops leave Iraq.

It’s a message that Marino, a peace activist from Princeton Borough, and other demonstrators are trying to deliver not just through anti-war marches but also by directly pressuring individual members of Congress through smaller-scale rallies, sit-ins and lobbying of their offices.

Even civil disobedience — generally in the form of purposely occupying a legislator’s office even beyond business hours — has become a tactic meant to draw attention and provoke change.

Body

Monday, October 08, 2007

By Robert Stern / Times of Trenton

TRENTON, NJ — Mary Ellen Marino has had enough of the Iraq war.

Even civil disobedience — generally in the form of purposely occupying a legislator’s office even beyond business hours — has become a tactic meant to draw attention and provoke change.

“My concern is that we’ve done all the things that people can do but the Congress itself is not using the techniques that are available to them” to end the war and even to initiate impeachment of President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, said Marino.

Ed Dunphy, an anti-war activist from Washington Township who is a member of the Princeton Borough-based Coalition for Peace Action, expressed similar frustration.

“No one is holding this president or this administration accountable for what I consider to be lies and deceptions that led us into this invasion and occupation of Iraq,” Dunphy said.

Dunphy and Marino were among some 30 people who tried to draw more attention to the anti-war cause when they staged a protest inside and outside Republican U.S. Rep. Chris Smith’s Hamilton office on Aug. 29, although the congressman wasn’t there himself.

Hamilton police said Friday they are still investigating who is responsible for vandalism that was discovered — cords linking computers were ripped from a central hub, causing a system crash — in Smith’s office 30 minutes after the protest.

Several of the protesters present that day have said in press interviews that causing damage to the office wasn’t part of the demonstration plan and expressed doubt that any of their fellow demonstrators are to blame.

And protesters throughout the country, from Dunphy and Marino in Mercer County to Jeff Leys in Illinois, emphasize they are fed up with both Republicans and Democrats over the Iraq war.

“My frustrations are as much with the Democrats as with the Republicans because the Democrats seem to only want to re-elect themselves and the Republicans seem to want to maintain the power,” Marino said, alleging that “the Democratic leaders are afraid of the propaganda machine of the Republicans.”

Leys, one of the organizers of the nationwide Occupation Project — “a campaign of sustained nonviolent civil disobedience aimed at ending funding for the U.S. war in and occupation of Iraq” — said he doesn’t look at the protest strategy as a Democrat or Republican matter, but rather as one addressed to both parties.

Increasingly, anti-war activists have made use of civil disobedience — risking fines and jail time — to put pressure on individual members of Congress so the troops will come home.

“What we’ve seen, especially over the last year, I think, is nonviolent civil resistance, nonviolent civil disobedience … to try to much more effectively target senators and representatives,” Leys said.

Leys said he himself was arrested three times during demonstrations this spring.

One was at the Illinois office of Senate Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin, D-Ill.; another was at the Washington, D.C., office of Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.; and a third was at the Wisconsin office of U.S. Rep. Dave Obey, D-Wis., who is chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.

In the McCain case, Leys said he was found guilty of disorderly conduct and had to pay a $50 fine, while the case in the Durbin demonstration was dismissed and the Obey one has yet to be settled in court.

Since Feb. 5, when the Occupation Project kicked off, Leys said there have been about 400 arrests of demonstrators who held protests inside the offices of 42 representatives and senators all over the U.S.

The idea isn’t to get arrested — it’s to send a message and change lawmakers’ minds on providing funding for keeping U.S. forces in Iraq, he said.

“Fifteen (of the 42) ended up voting against the final version of the supplemental Iraq spending bill,” earlier this year, Leys said. Of those 15, 14 had voted for the funding last year.

However, every one of those 15 lawmakers was a Democrat, even though the Occupation Project targeted Republican members of Congress as well, he said.

Dunphy and others who are involved in the anti-war movement — both now and during the Vietnam War — including Princeton Borough-based attorney R. William Potter, said it’s unfortunate that popular sentiment against the Iraq war hasn’t triggered a larger, more sustained groundswell of mass demonstrations and student activism.

The anti-war strategies during the Vietnam War “had a great deal more energy behind them because of the draft,” Potter said. Even so, he said, “it still took a long time to end that disastrous war.”

Now the outcry hasn’t been as energetic because the galvanizing element of a draft isn’t present as it was during Vietnam, Potter said.

“On the other hand, we have a great deal of support for ending the war simply because Bush and his stay-the-course strategy has lost all credibility with the majority of the voting public,” Potter contends.

“There is broad public disgust with President Bush and his utter lack of credibility on the origins of the war and the need to continue it,” he said. “I think it balances out the relative lack of energy to oppose the war.”

Another notable difference between the anti-war movement now and the backlash against the Vietnam War is that the current movement got going in earnest in the months leading up to the war, said the Rev. Bob Moore, executive director of the Princeton Coalition for Peace Action.

“In Vietnam, of course, before a significant peace movement emerged, we had already been there for five or six years, whereas this time we had mobilized a huge outcry and protest before the war even broke out,” Moore said.

He said leaders and participants in the anti-war campaign have to evaluate and adjust their strategy to bring about change in U.S. policy on military involvement in Iraq.

“The question of effectiveness is a very important question for leaders of peacemaking,” Moore said.

Part of that question deals with who should be the focus of demonstrations.

“As the public opinion corner began to be turned (against keeping large numbers of U.S. troops in Iraq), we have focused more and more on the Congress,” Moore said.

That’s because Congress has the Constitutional power to control the purse strings that determine spending for the Iraq war.

“The Congress was literally who stopped the Vietnam War, and we want them to stop this war,” Moore said.

Contact Robert Stern at or (609) 989-5731.

Project

The Occupation Project