-Nevada Test Site  
Two events came together at the Nevada nuclear weapons test site in early August. On Sunday, August 5, a Hiroshima-Nagasaki commemorative service was held at the Mercury gate, as part of the Las Vegas Catholic Worker's 15th anniversary. More than 50 people attended, and 22 who crossed the line were arrested, cited and released at the gate.

The service also initiated a four-day prayer vigil at the gate, sponsored by the Nevada Desert Experience. Over the next four days, Nye County sheriffs made ten more arrests as nuclear abolitionists crossed the test site boundary.

One of the activists arrested on Hiroshima Day, Erik Thompson, refused to cooperate with the routine of being cited and released at the gate. Thompson has been trying for years to have a court revisit the issues that the citizen protesters are trying to raise, i.e., that nuclear weapons are illegal and that the U.S. must comply with international law and end its nuclear weapons development program, of which the test site is a part.

This time, Thompson's persistence resulted in a trip to the jail in Beatty and arraignment later the next day. He pleaded not guilty to trespass, and was released on his own recognizance.

Thompson returned to the Nye County courtroom of Judge Coldin on October 4. While arguing for the legitimacy of his action under principles of international law, Thompson also placed his action in the post-September 11 context, and invited the judge to do so as well.

"This is a time that calls for heroes," he told the court. "Your honor has the opportunity, and maybe even the obligation, to join that number.

"You have determined that the Nevada Test Site is within your jurisdiction. The Nevada Test Site is being used to develop new weapons of terror and maintain old weapons of terror. The government that has these weapons has used them against non-combatants in the past, killing perhaps a quarter million human beings. I believe there is a very real possibility that government will use them to kill again, and I believe there is a certainty such weapons will be used to create a threat of terror.

"I was arrested on the anniversary of our slaughtering 40 or 50 times as many Japanese as were killed on September 11. Officers of your county determined that my presence... constituted trespass. You have the authority to now speak for your county - and for all of humanity - and say that your resources will not be used to harbor an organization engaged in developing weapons of mass destruction...[nor] to support terrorist activity. The law that you must uphold also provides you an opportunity to do so, by recognizing the primacy of international treaties, which are co-equal with the constitution as the highest law of this land.

"I know that such a finding will not be easy; that is why I am asking you to be heroic. Most, maybe all, true heroes do not go gladly into the fray. They do what needs to be done... Our country was founded by such heroes. Our country has been reformed by such heroes. Our country needs such heroes again, this time for a reformation that will make us less hated around the world. Please join this honorable cast and provide the moral leadership for your citizens."

The judge declined the invitation, convicting Thompson and sentencing him $25 fine and 10 hours community service. Thompson's was the first simple line-crossing at the test site to be prosecuted in over a decade.

For more information, contact the Las Vegas Catholic Worker, 500 W. Van Buren, Las Vegas, NV 98106, (702)647-0728 or Nevada Desert Experience, POB 46645, Las Vegas, NV 89114, (702)646-4814.