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Quakers environmentalists slapped with "guilty" verdict in civil disobedience case
Two senior citizens who protested mountaintop-removal coal mining at PNC Bank were found guilty of defiant trespassing and conspiracy to commit trespass.
Quakers environmentalists slapped with "guilty" verdict in civil disobedience case
It was a bold argument: that Gail Newbold, 62, and Vint Deming, 78, two members of Earth Quaker Action Team (EQAT), had "justification" for bringing things to a halt at PNC Bank in Center City while they built two 9-foot-tall windmills. The two seniors were among five people arrested for protesting the bank, which is the second-largest funder of environmentally disastrous mountaintop-removal coal mining.
EQAT campaign director Zachary Hershman explains the defense's strategy, "They were trying to defend a harm that greatly exceeds the harm they caused, if you compare one hour in the bank to the number of people estimated to die per hour from the effects of mountaintop removal coal mining. That's about one per hour."
The group was expecting a not-guilty verdict; at a similar case in Washington, D.C., two years ago, four demonstrators were acquitted. Though the judge was apologetic and fined each defendant only $72 plus court costs, Hershman says they're now considering an appeal: "As Quakers they have a religious commitment to stewardship and integrity and so when somebody in their community is not acting in a way that's consistent with that, they have to bear witness and call them back to their values. This was an opportunity to enter PNC's human rights violations into the public record, and as community members to call the bank back to its values."
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