corrente

Even those who have something to lose. Of course Helen Woodson wasn't so old when she started trying to save us from ourselves:

(via KC Star)

A 61-year-old peace activist was sentenced to 51 months in prison Wednesday for threatening federal officials and pouring red paint and cranberry juice on a federal courthouse security station.

Helen Woodson previously served 20 years in federal prison for a 1984 incident in which she and three others used a jackhammer to chip the concrete cover of a nuclear missile silo near Whiteman Air Force Base near Knob Noster.

Before hearing her new sentence, Woodson told Chief U.S. District Judge Dean Whipple that she would stage another symbolic protest immediately after serving whatever term he imposed.

“What you will be doing today is setting the date for my next action, and I invite you to be there that day,” Woodson said.

Whipple responded by calling her a “freeloader” who had depended on her friends and taxpayers to care for children that she adopted before going to prison after the Whiteman protest.

Woodson was detained by deputy U.S. marshals on March 10 after she threw a mixture of red paint and cranberry juice, which resembled blood, on a security desk and screening device at the U.S. District Courthouse.

The day before, she had mailed threatening letters to judges and the commander at Whiteman. She followed those the next morning with similar letters titled “Second Warning.” And before coming to the courthouse on March 10, she made a threatening phone call to a courthouse employee, saying there was a weapon of mass destruction in the building.

Addressing Whipple before sentencing, Woodson explained her protest in March. She contended that much evil in society — including nuclear weapons, toxic chemicals, abortion and capital punishment — is legal.

“The laws of the United States, upheld by the federal courts, are thus themselves weapons of mass destruction,” Woodson said. “And so my warning was, and is, the truth.”

Four and a quarter years for red paint, cranberry juice, and a warning. Then the charge that wasn't on paper: First Degree Refusal to Knuckle Under, With Recidivism.