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| Crime Scene at Y12 bomb plant. photo by John Kernodle |
Dateline: Oak Ridge, Tenn. April 6, 2013
by Clare Hanrahan
Police
Chief James T. Akagi of Oak Ridge, Tennesssee made it clear: his officers
would show “zero tolerance" for anything
considered an infraction.
And he meant it. Answering the call for an “April
Action Against the UPF!” about 75 people traveled from North Carolina, Georgia,
Michigan, Minnesota, Washington, D.C., nearby Knoxville and other parts of
Tennessee to take a stand on April 6 against the proposed multi-billion dollar
expansion of the Uranium Processing Facility at the Y12 National Security
Complex, a nuclear bomb plant.
“The hostility is a
mystery to us,” Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance longtime coordinator
Ralph Hutchinson told activists gathered in Alvin T. Bissell park. Officers had
just issued a parking citation to one of the out of state demonstrators parked
in a lot adjacent to the park, and warned others who were helping unload props
for the Catalystica
Players, a
family energized theater,
puppetry
and clowning collaborative setting up for a show on a park lawn.
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| Hanrahan observing on the way to Y-12. Photo: Jim Brown |
I was one of three
legal observers on duty for the day, wearing the bright green hats provided by
the National Lawyers Guild. My first encounters with Oak Ridge police were at
the park as I moved closer to observe and to verify the name of the officer
issuing the parking citation. Chief
Akagi approached and warned me not to
interfere with officers. Deputy Chief Massengel
inquired, “Is this a new tactic ya’ll have?” I assured him that as Legal Observers, our
role was simply to observe and record interactions, not to interfere with
police.
Despite the unusually
unfriendly police presence, the ephemeral beauty of early Spring graced us as
we greeted one another at the International Friendship Bell. The solid bronze
bell, crafted in Japan, was a gesture of friendship between Japan and Oak Ridge
on the 50th anniversary of
the “Secret City.” Uranium enriched in Oak Ridge as part of the
Manhattan Project was used in the A-bomb that devastated Hiroshima, Japan, in
1945.
With cherry trees
blooming,
golden daffodils clustered
along the roadsides,
graceful
willow-green branches waving,
and tiny
blossomed bluets brightening the grass, OREPA organizers briefed peace walkers
about some changes in this year's gathering.
A barrier, installed just days before the planned rally, had effectively
cut off an area used for twenty-five years as a traditional forum for free
speech. The $95k fence, consisting of waist high modular aluminum units, was
erected on State right of way along Scarboro Road just outside the Bear Creek
entrance to the Y12 bomb plant.
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| "Don't Fence Me In" Photo: J.Kernodle |
District
Judge Curtis L. Collier in Knoxville questioned the jurisdiction of his court
to address a complaint filed by the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance, its
board members, and others that the fence constituted an infringement on First
Amendment Rights. The Group was given two weeks to make a case for
jurisdiction.
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| Enriched Uranium storehouse at 12. The heart of the nuclear beast |
The barrier is part of
new security measures enacted after an embarrassing failure of plant security
in July, 2012, when three unarmed elders in the Plowshares anti-nuclear
movement cut through four security fences making their way on foot, undetected
and undeterred, to the building storing the U.S. stockpile of highly enriched,
weapons grade uranium. These elders had clearly demonstrated the inherent
insecurity of the nuclear weapons complex.
Later investigations
revealed that dozens of pieces of security hardware — motion
detectors, surveillance cameras, etc. — were inoperable at the time. Subcontractors
pointed fingers at one another, and both Babcock & Wilcox of B&W Y-12,
the managing contractor, and WSI-Oak Ridge, Y-12’s protective force contractor,
lost lucrative contracts.
Since 1988, Oak Ridge
Environmental Peace Alliance has organized non-violent direct action protests
at the Y-12 Complex in an effort to close down the weapons plant, and has
maintained thirteen years of
uninterrupted Sunday vigils on a grassy field outside the gate. There have been
over 200 arrests over the years, and many have served prison and jail time as a
result of peaceful protest when activists either crossed over the boundary
fence or blocked the entrance road to the bomb plant.
In July, 2010, Fourteen
protesters crossed a barbed-wire fence onto Y-12 property, a federal charge;
while another 23 received state charges for blocking a roadway into the plant.
In July, 2012, the Transform Now Plowshares, including Viet Nam combat veteran
Michael Walli, 64, who served 8 months for his 2010 arrest at Y12, Greg
Obed-Bjorte, 57, and Catholic nun, Sr. Megan Rice, 83, turned the security
culture of Y-12 and Oak Ridge on its head with their nonviolent walk onto the Y-12 bomb plant, which caused a suspension of all weapons production at the bomb plant for more
than two weeks.
The National Nuclear
Security Administration has proposed an oversized, “capacity-based” Uranium
Processing Facility (UPF) in Oak Ridge to
manufacture thermonuclear secondaries for 80 nuclear warheads a year.
The new production facility at Y-12 is estimated to cost somewhere in the range
of $4.2 billion to $6.5 billion, or more. The recently released 2014 DOE Budget, as reported on Frank Munger's Atomic City Underground blog,
proposes $7.87 billion for weapons activities, an increase of $654 million, or
nine percent above the 2012 enacted level, “to maintain a safe, secure, and
effective nuclear deterrent.” An expanded Uranium Processing Facility would
enable the production of new design nuclear weapons into the indefinite future,
according to the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance.
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| The Catalystic Players dramatize the problem of nuclear proliferation. Photo: Jim Brown |
Sr. Mary Dennis Lentsch, who has seven convictions at Y12 and served time
prison and jail for acts of conscience against nuclear weapons says it well:
“Continuing nuclear weapons
production at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, is in
direct violation of the treaty obligations of the United States (The Nuclear
Nonproliferation Treaty, Article VI), and therefore is a violation of Article 6
of the Constitution of the United States of America and fails to conform to our
obligations under international law according to the ruling of the
International Court of Justice, July 8, 1996.”
The rally in Bissell Park was energized with music by the Knoxville
band, Emancipators, and a creative puppet show dramatizing the human costs of
nuclear weapons spending. The three Transform Now! Plowshares activists, in
town for a court hearing prior to their May 7 trial, addressed the crowd. Then we set off along the sidewalk for the
two mile walk to the bomb plant.
“What we hope to do is
tie peace cranes on the fence, then move
to the other side of the road,” Hutchinson told the gathering. “If you want to cross the fence, expect
considerable time in a federal prison.”
The Transform Now Activists are facing up to 35 years imprisonment for
their nonviolent breach of plant security.
Police patrol cars
cruised up and down the route to the bomb plant with some pacing the walkers by
driving alongside. One young peace
walker recorded the vehicle numbers of nine separate Oak Ridge police cars. We were under close scrutiny.
As the walk began one
legal observer, standing on a grassy median to observe, was warned by police to get back to the
sidewalk. He complied. A few blocks
later, on Tulane near Illinois, Legal Observer Bill Ramsey stepped off the curb
to follow alongside the walkers. A squad
car pulled up, and two officers jumped out.
Ramsey, of Asheville,
NC, was whisked off into police custody. As a Southeast
organizer with the American Friends Service Committee thirty-four years earlier, Ramsey had worked with local organizers to bring about expert
testimony in public hearings about the environmental and economic impacts and health &
worker safety of the bomb plant. Ramsey said he was concerned with the
restrictive climate for First Amendment Rights in Oak Ridge, but felt joy at that so many were organizing to bring about a transformation from our reliance on nuclear weapons.
As the walk proceeded,
turning onto Illinois Avenue, passersby
in cars and trucks yelled “Go home!” and “Remember Pearl Harbor.” No one
responded to the taunts.
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| Arresting the Peace Walking Monk. Photo: Ralph Hutchinson |
Japanese Buddhist Monk,
Gyoshu Utsumi and Sister Denise Laffin, of the Nipponzan Myohoji order, led the walk, chanting and drumming their
traditional prayer for peace, as they have done for decades, walking to weapons
plants, mountain top removal coal mining sites, military installations, and commemorations
of civil rights struggles in the south. As the walkers stopped at a crosswalk
at Tulsa Ave., awaiting the change of light, Bro. Utsumi and Knoxville resident
Larry Coleman, stepped off the curb in anticipation of the changing light. Five police rushed to arrest, and the
Buddhist monk and the anti- nuclear activist were taken away.
One of the
participants, Asheville Veterans for Peace member Jim Brown, noticed soon after
that his van, and other vehicles belonging to demonstrators, were not where
they had parked them. After several
queries of police officers riding alongside the walkers, he discovered they had
been towed. The fee for retrieval was $160 per vehicle. Maryville resident and
OREPA organizer Rev. Erik Johnson's van was not only towed, but the bomb squad
had been called in because of the small gas container in the van used to bring
fuel for the generator for the rally musicians.
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| Occupying the Road to the Nuclear Nightmare. Photo: J. Kernodle |
As we proceeded to the
gate, somewhat bewildered at the hostile and aggressive police actions, it
became clear that we would be prevented from approaching the fence with our
origami peace cranes. Dozens of Oak Ridge Police were visible, standing at the
Bear Creek Road entrance to the bomb plant. They directed walkers to a roadside
grassy area across the rail tracks, to a space barely large enough for the
walkers to stand, with water filled depressions and sloping ground. Each walker
was filmed close up with a police camera and warned to stay five feet from the
white line on the edge of the highway. In the distance, other
security vehicles and personnel were visible at the guardhouse entrance further
up Bear Creek road.
“There are a lot more
out there than you can see,” OREPA organizer Hutchinson quipped.
After a period of
silence, which lent a serious tone to our presence at the gates, with our First
Amendment rights restricted, we realized that shuttle vehicles had either been
towed or otherwise prevented from entering the area to retrieve walkers, many
who were elders already tired out from the two mile walk.
We headed back to the
park, along the opposite side of the road, past ditches thick with green
algae. We were expecting a water break
at a public parking area in front of Panera Bakery. Even this level of hospitality was thwarted
by police who warned walkers to keep moving and leave the parking lot.
Evidently, as overheard on a police radio by arrested legal observer Bill
Ramsey, police had succeeded in convincing management of the bakery to object
to peace walkers on the lot.
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| FREE! Sr. Megan Rice greets Bill Ramsey & Ralph Hutchinson welcomes Bro. Utsumi |
The three arrestees
were transported from Oak Ridge to the Anderson County jail in Clinton,
Tenn. Jail support outside the county
lock up was strong. Folks shared food, blankets, water and stories. It was not
the first time OREPA had held vigil here.
Bail for Brother Utsumi and Bill Ramsey was set at $200, and Larry
Coleman was freed on $100 bail.
Sister Megan Rice, Greg Obed-Bjorte & Michael Walli have trial in Knoxville on May 7.
