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Pushing the boundaries at Ft. Benning
Federal, City and State authorities were busy in Columbus, Ga., on the weekend prior to Thanksgiving. Arrests of people from 17 to 90 years old included stilt walkers and puppetistas, four credentialed press, local barber Curtis Thornton, a dozen participants in a planned road blockade, priests, veterans and students, along with many others attempting simply to make it back to their cars outside the "permitted protest area" following the 2010 vigil at the gates of Fort Benning, Ga.
At least five undercover police infiltrated the action.
Franciscan Friar Louis Vitale, 78, and Catholic Worker David Omandi, 24, spent the Thanksgiving holiday in Georgia's Muskogee County jail. They face six months imprisonment after sentencing by U.S. magistrate judge Stephen Hyles. Both pleaded "nolo contendre"-- a plea that accepts charges without admission of guilt--on the Federal charge of trespass onto Fort Benning. This is the fourth conviction for Fr. Louis, a human rights activist who has already served prison time for acts of conscience at Fort Benning.
Omandi scaled the first of three barbed-wire topped fences at the Fort Benning gate on Sunday. Vitale walked on to the post at the I-85 entrance on Saturday accompanied by Nancy Smith from New York who pleaded "not guilty" and will return for trial on January 5, 2011. Christopher Spicer, 28, of Seattle who also scaled the barbed-wire topped fence on Sunday and pleaded "not guilty" is also scheduled for a January 5 trial.