Date: Fri, 19 Feb 1999 13:30:27 -0800
From: Chuck0 <chuck-AT-tao.ca>
Subject: Nuclear Weapons Protesters Sentenced To Prison


I believe that at least one of these persons is an anarchist, if not both
of them. The folks with the New York chapter of the Atlantic Anarchist
Circle are more familiar with this.

-Chuck0

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Nuclear Weapons Protesters Sentenced To Prison

February 18

DENVER (Reuters) - Two anti-nuclear weapons protesters were
sentenced Thursday to between 30 and 41 months in prison for
sabotaging an underground silo containing a Minuteman missile
equipped with a nuclear warhead.

U.S. District Judge Walker Miller reluctantly sentenced
Daniel Sicken of Brattleboro, Vt. to 41 months in jail and
Sachio Coe of Ridgewood, N.J. to 30 months.

"I have to follow the law," the judge told them. "I know
that I don't like doing this now."

The defendants had been convicted of using a sledgehammer
and chisel to damage doors, conduits, concrete and rails in a
Colorado missile silo last Aug. 6, the 53rd anniversary of the
atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan by the United States.

The damage left the intercontinental ballistic missile site
inoperative for several weeks, the prosecutor, Assistant U.S.
Attorney Bernard Hobson, said.

Sicken, 57, and Coe, 26, said they acted symbolically
because they opposed the existence of nuclear weapons.

Their sentencing proceeding was reminiscent of the 1960s era
anti-Vietnam war protests with almost 100 peace activists
filling the courtroom. They applauded the defendants as they
were taken away by marshals.

The judge said that in determining the length of the
sentences he took into account that Sicken and Coe were not
acting against national security at a time of war. Miller said
he could have sentenced Sicken to 71 months and Coe to 57 months
if he had not taken that into account.

The prosecutor had opposed the lesser sentence. "Their
deeds, not their slogans, are what matter," Hobson said.

"These weapons are illegal," Sicken told the judge. "I'm
here to say they're immoral."

Coe said his "primary motive was from a sense of what we
call non-violence."