Friends,
I was there and remember the march from Jonah House to the church. I
would disagree with one comment you made, that the poverty and desolation along
that march was about the same today. I think the poverty, wealth
inequality and desolation is much worse today than when Phil died. When I
lived on Mount Street a few blocks from Viva House, it was considered "the
ghetto". Let me just say, looking back, it was paradise 50 years
ago, compared to conditions today. Shocking that neighborhoods are left
to rot.
--- Lynn
Robinson
I gave one of the eulogies at Phil’s funeral mass. Amy Goodman recorded
it in its entirety the next day. She was with us when Phil died and she
and Gwen DuBois recited the Hebrew Kaddish prayer that night. Extremely
inspiring!
A copy of my eulogy is in our book, The Long Loneliness in Baltimore. If
you want to include it with your other articles, please feel free to use
it. Thanks, Brendan Walsh, Viva House Catholic Worker
I am working on getting
Brendan’s eulogy, and hope to send it out.
I am continuing
my remembrances of the life of Phil Berrigan. While I was in the Peace
Corps in Botswana reading the International Herald Tribune, I came across a
story on the Plowshares Eight being arrested at a General Electric plant in
King of Prussia, Pennsylvania on September 9, 1980. And this group
protesting nuclear weapons included Dan and Phil Berrigan. I was
impressed that these Catholic radicals were not tamed by the US Empire.
What I did
not know was that I would get a job with Nuclear Free America in Baltimore in
1983. And in 1984, my first political arrest was planned in Baltimore’s
Jonah House, and those of us risking arrest at the White House included Phil
and Dan’s brother Jim. That arrest is a story for another day.
But I would be
with Phil in all of his other Plowshares disarmament actions. And on
December 19, 1999, Phil’s wife Elizabeth McAlister and I transported the four
members of the Plowshares vs. Depleted Uranium to the scene of the crime.
This would be Phil’s last Plowshares. Rev. Steve Kelly, a co-conspirator in
this action, remains underground as I write this message. He also participated
in a disarmament action as part of the Kings Bay Plowshares in Georgia in
2018. While he has completed his jail sentence, there is the matter of supervised release that he must adhere to in Georgia.
Steve is the ultimate resister, and decided not to cooperate with the
authorities in Georgia.
What I
probably remember the most of the trial which took place in Towson, Maryland
was the cross examination of the mechanic who took care of the Warthog aircraft
which was disarmed that chilly night in December 1999. He was quite angry
on the witness stand as these intruders damaged a plane which he treated like
his mother. Judge Jim Smith, not unlike other judges, would not allow the
jury to hear why the group selected this plane. The group admitted they
were there, and that they did symbolic disarmament. But what was their
motive? The jurors were not allowed to hear a basic element of most
trials. Maybe if that mechanic found out that depleted uranium was used
illegally by the US military against noncombatants and caused long-lasting
damage, he might have had a different opinion of his mother.
Kagiso, Max
- Catholic Pacifists disarmed depleted-uranium-firing A-10
"Warthog" in Maryland.
By
Patrick O'Neill
On
March 23, Baltimore County Judge James T. Smith, Jr. sentenced four Catholic
pacifists for damaging two A-10 anti-tank warplanes last December to protest
the United States' use of depleted uranium in recent wars against Iraq and
Yugoslavia.
The
severity of the sentences - far in excess to those recommended by prosecutor
Mickey Norman - shocked the more than 100 supporters who attended the trial,
which began four days earlier. Elizabeth Walz, 33 (whose guidelines were 0 to 1
month) was given 18 months in prison; Susan Crane, 56, and Fr. Stephen Kelly
S.J., 50 (whose guidelines were 2 to 9 months) were each sentenced to 27
months; and Philip Berrigan (whose guidelines were 6 to 12 months) received a
30 month sentence. The judge also ordered the defendants to share in paying
$88,622.11 in restitution for the damage. The large damage total justified
stiff sentences, Smith said. The judge imposed a cash bail of $90,000 each,
"to be paid by the defendants only" in the event the four seek appeals.
"He
went very, very far outside the guidelines in a very, very vindictive
fashion," Elizabeth McAlister, Berrigan's wife, told a reporter from The
Baltimore Sun. Jonah House community member, Sister Carol Gilbert, O.P., also
interviewed by The Sun, said, "I think the judge's prejudices are coming
through. These people were not allowed a defense."
Calling
themselves "Plowshares vs. Depleted Uranium," the four peace
activists disarmed the "Warthog" aircraft at the Warfield Air
National Guard Base in Middle River, Maryland last December 19. Following
Isaiah's injunction to beat swords into plowshares, the resisters hammered and
poured blood on the A-10s' Gatling guns, used to fire armor-piercing depleted
uranium against Iraq and Yugoslavia.
During
his opening statement, prosecutor Norman said the four had taken hammers to
property that didn't belong to them, something you couldn't do "unless of
course there is a legally justifiable reason. The defendants might believe
there is a moral justification, but this is a court of law. There wasn't a
legal justification ... " And so it went - moral justification overruled
by laws that protect weapons of mass destruction.
Throughout
the trial the four defendants, and their attorneys, Jonathan Katz, former U.S
Attorney General Ramsey Clark and Anabel Dwyer, attempted to tell the jury
about the illegality of the United States' use of depleted uranium on civilian
populations. They attempted to show that their actions were justified under
international law and necessity, but Judge Smith refused to allow the
defendants to put on any meaningful defense of their actions. He had granted
Norman's pretrial motion in limine, which prohibited "the defense from
introducing evidence and/or propounding argument concerning depleted uranium."
When
Crane, the only defendant to testify, took the witness stand, she was
constantly interrupted by the prosecutor's objections. Crane was eventually
brought to tears by the severity of the court's restriction of her testimony.
The
prosecutor also objected to testimony by Doug Rokke, an expert in the use and
harmful effects of depleted uranium weapons. Rokke, a professor at Jacksonville
State University, Major in the U.S. Army Reserve, and himself a victim of
exposure to depleted uranium, was only allowed to give his name and academic
credentials. All questions related to depleted uranium and the A-10 Warthogs
were disallowed.
In
response to the gag order, the defendants brought their resistance to Judge
Smith's oppressive courtroom, prompting an incredible moment of solidarity
between the accused and their supporters. The show of defiance may have also
sealed the fates of the four.
Immediately
following Rokke's limited testimony, the four stood at the defense table and
turned their backs on Judge Smith as Crane read a statement decrying the
injustice of the trial.
"We
cannot put on a defense about the dangers of depleted uranium and our rights
and duties under international law," Crane said. The judge ordered her to
be silent, but Crane persisted.
"We
have been denied our right to testify about these topics. We have been denied
our expert witnesses. Therefore, we can't go forward. We will not participate
in what amounts to a legal gag order."
Earlier
in the day Crane had refused to answer the prosecutor's question about who
drove the van that left the four activists off outside the base gates in the
predawn hours of December 19. As the four defendants now stood with their backs
to the bench, a woman in the gallery stood and yelled to the judge, "I
drove the van." Seconds later, others joined in shouting, "I drove
the van." Soon, more than 100 spectators were openly proclaiming
conspiratorial ties to the four as a red-faced Smith screamed for order. When
Crane was finished, Fr. Kelly began reading aloud the day's scripture passage
from Jeremiah.
Smith,
a jurist who was once honored by his peers as Catholic lawyer of the year,
ordered bailiffs to clear the courtroom of everyone except reporters. After a
recess, only Berrigan returned to the courtroom to tell the judge that the four
intended no disrespect for Smith or prosecutor Norman, but they would no longer
participate in an unjust trial.
"The
courts of this country are identified with the Pentagon and the
Government," Berrigan said outside the presence of the jury, "and
there's no way that nonviolent resistance can get a serious hearing in this
country." After Berrigan's comments, the judge recessed proceedings for
the day. He refused to allow the three lawyers to be released from the case,
but he said the defendants had a Constitutional right to boycott the remainder
of the trial.
On the
final day of the trial none of the defendants were in the courtroom when Norman
made his closing arguments. The jury deliberated more than four hours before
reaching guilty verdicts on the charges of malicious destruction of property
and conspiracy. Crane had also been charged with assault because a guard said
he felt threatened by her hammer, but the jury could not reach a verdict on the
charge and it was dropped. (Charges of sabotage and conspiracy to commit sabotage
had been dismissed a week before trial on a defense motion.) The guilty
verdicts could also result in federal probation violations being lodged against
Berrigan, Crane, and Kelly from previous Plowshare actions.
In a
statement released after the trial, Rokke said: "Everyone should consider
if they want thousands and thousands of radioactive heavy metal poison bullets
in their own backyard. If not, then it should not be left anywhere in the world
where children may be exposed! The response to this crime against God and
humanity is simple: 1. All individuals who may have inhaled, ingested, or had
wound contamination must receive medical care. 2. All depleted uranium
penetrator fragments, contaminated equipment, and oxide contamination must be
removed and disposed of properly. 3. The use of depleted uranium munitions must
be banned."
Walz,
a Catholic Worker from Philadelphia, asked the judge that she be permitted to
serve her sentence in the Baltimore County Detention Center, where she awaited
trial and "where I may be of most service to the women around me."
Smith granted her request. Berrigan, Crane and Kelly were quickly moved into
the state prison system.
Donations can be sent
to Max Obuszewski, Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 431 Notre Dame Lane, Apt. 206,
Baltimore, MD 21212. Ph: 410-323-1607; Email: mobuszewski2001 [at]
comcast.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/
"The master class
has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.
The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject
class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their
lives." Eugene Victor Debs
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