HUMAN RIGHTS SOA activist cites satisfaction in time served BY STEVEN STYCOS

Released in time to celebrate the Fourth of July, Providence protester Katherine Brown says her three months at the federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut, contributed to the campaign to close the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation at Fort Benning, Georgia.

Brown, a former Creighton University anthropology professor who now works as a writer and consultant, was among 86 people arrested last November during a non-violent protest at the institute, formerly known as the US Army School of the Americas (SOA). Demonstrators who trespassed at the school were given a choice — plead guilty and serve one year’s probation, or plead not guilty and risk time in jail. Brown admitted walking onto US Army property, but pleaded not guilty, stating, "It wasn’t trespassing. It was an offering." As a first-time offender, she received a three-month sentence.

To explain her decision to serve time, Brown relates that on the night before her arrest, a 20-year-old Colombian man spoke emotionally to thousands of protesters about his father’s arrest by the Colombian military. His father, a social worker, has never been seen again, Brown says, one of thousands of "disappeared" people in Latin America.

The next day, Brown recalls, the same young man appeared as she was about to cross the Fort Benning fence and be arrested. He softly told her, "Thank you," Brown says. This quiet appreciation reinforced Brown’s belief that her arrest was a correct act. "It certainly helped him," she says, "He knew he wasn’t alone — people in the United States care about him and others like him." And she says, "It was the least I could do."

Brown then chose to serve jail time, calling it, "the more dramatic witness in terms of public view." During her three months inside, she says, she wrote letters to her father, who, in turn, e-mailed them to family, friends, and supporters, educating them about American policy in Latin America.

For many, the SOA symbolizes misguided US military involvement in Latin America. Annual demonstrations commemorate the anniversary of the 1989 murder of six Jesuit priests, their housekeeper, and her daughter in El Salvador. Of the 26 people implicated in the murders, 19 received military training at the SOA, according to Amnesty International USA. Other human rights violators, including former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega, have similar credentials. Like the Catholic-led demonstrators, Amnesty calls for suspension of the school’s operations pending an independent investigation of its activities.

The US Army, however, says it’s unfair to blame several weeks of US military training for subsequent human rights violations.

A second Rhode Islander, Judd Schiffman of Providence, was also arrested at the SOA. He pleaded guilty, he says, because, "I didn’t feel I was an expert on the school enough to put myself in jail for three months." He also worried prison time would jeopardize his college plans.

This year’s SOA demonstration will be November 21-23. Brown promises to be present, although she will not volunteer for arrest again. Schiffman is not sure whether he will attend.

The SOA Watch campaign is also lobbying Congress to close the school and establish a congressional task force to assess US training of the Latin American military. Sponsored by US Representative James McGovern of Worcester, Massachusetts, the SOA closure bill has 80 cosponsors, including US Representative Patrick Kennedy and Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio). In 2000, the House came within 10 votes of closing the school.