Preparation for Court: nonviolence civil resistance

(These resistance actions have three parts: the first being the actual act of civil resistance, the second part happens in the court room, and the third part of the action happens if there is jail or other consequences. In each part we hope to speak truth, we hope to be clear about who we are and what we are doing.)

When I was at the Pentagon on Holy Thursday, I was thinking about depleted uranium. The US has been using DU munitions since the first gulf war, and the consequences of using a heavy metal that is a chemical toxic and radioactive poison have been grievous for our own soldiers and for the people of Iraq .

(cancer, birth defects, terror….poison that keeps on for 4.5 billion years. Over 300 tons of DU left in Iraq after first gulf war)

1. The use of depleted uranium munitions arei against treaties that the US has ratified, (Geneva 12 August 1949 and the Hague convention IV)

2. According to the US constitution, (Article 6, Paragraph 2) which you, judge, are bound to uphold, these treaties become the law of the land to be upheld in every court by every judge.

And then there is the US law, 18 USC 2441, which said that it's a war crime to violate these two particular treaties

And then there another US law, 18 USC 4 that says that if I know a crime, a felony is being committed, I have to tell people, I have to act, or I am guilty of this crime!!!

Crimes are being committed by our government. We are indiscriminately killing civilians. .

My faith tradition teaches that we are to love our enemies….

And on a purely human level, it seems to me that it makes more sense to be kind to people and treat them justly instead of being mean and stealing their resources.,

So, judge, what would you do when your government is committing crimes? If you had been a judge in Hitler's Germany , how do you hope you would have acted?

I hope that you find us not guilty, that you join us in protesting and bringing to light the crimes of our government. . We are not the criminals. The real criminals are out there lying and murdering others, and we ask you to help stop the high crimes in high places.