17 more sentenced in SOA protest

COLUMBUS - Sentencing of protesters against the former Army School of the Americas dragged into the night Friday as the defendants, convicted of illegally crossing onto Fort Benning, filled the courtroom with speeches and songs. <br> <br> U.S. Magistrate G. Mallon Faircloth heard the United States condemned as a country founded on genocide and hate, his court labeled a sham and an arena for injustice, and the federal courthouse as a place that should bear a warning sign: ``Abandon hope all who enter here.&#39;&#39; <br> <br> Faircloth had offered the 35 protesters charged with trespassing after the Nov. 18 demonstration an alternative to prison serving serve six months as students at the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, the target of the protest. <br> <br> The institute replaced the School of the Americas 18 months ago as a Defense Department training academy for Latin American soldiers, police officers and public officials. <br> <br> The offer was rejected by all the protesters Friday. By 8:30 p.m., 15 of 17 protesters had been sentenced to six months in prison and two others to three months. <br> <br> The November demonstration was the 12th annual protest by a group called School of Americas Watch. The group claims that graduates of the School of the Americas have committed atrocities in their own countries, including the slaying of six Jesuit priests in El Salvador in November 1989. <br> <br> Despite the school&#39;s new name and a professed change of its mission, SOA Watch plans to continue protesting until the Western Hempisphere Institute is closed down. <br> <br> Each protester called before Faircloth for sentencing after a week of pleas and trials was given practically unlimited time to have his or her say. <br> <br> One defendant&#39;s pre-sentencing statement lasted 55 minutes. <br> <br> The Rev. Erik T. Johnson, a Presbyterian minister from Knoxville, Tenn., asked his codefendants and court spectators to stand and sing the hymn ``Peace Like a River.&#39;&#39; He also condemned the institute as ``a festering violation, like a cancer&#39;&#39; and no better than the SOA that it replaced. Johnson was sentenced to six months in prison and fined $1,000. <br> <br> The Rev. William J. O&#39;Donnell, a 72-year-old parish priest from Berkeley, Calif., who first suggested that he be sentenced to the institute so that he could return home after six months and tell what really goes on there, said the protesters had decided to reject that plan. <br> <br> ``The SOA Watch community reminds me the primary goal is to shut the institute down today,&#39;&#39; the priest said. ``It&#39;s a far greater honor to be in prison for six months than to be a student in a campus for terrorists.&#39;&#39;