Brockman Hillsborough Nc

Behind closed doors | Religious Left | Independent Weekly

Judge Edgar Barnes had had enough. At a Dec. 5 trial, Beth Brockman of Durham told the Currituck County district court judge it was ironic that she and six co-defendants were facing jail sentences for trespassing at the North Carolina headquarters of Blackwater USA, while Blackwater's mercenaries in Iraq were protected from prosecution for allegedly killing civilians. 

Barnes ordered the bailiffs to close the courtroom to everyone except court personnel and the defendants, who acted as their own attorneys. Six defendants were tried, convicted and sentenced in secret, which, as the American Civil Liberties Union noted, violated their Sixth Amendment right to a public trial. One defendant was tried and convicted before the courtroom was closed.

Barnes also gave the boot to reporters from television stations and newspapers, including the Indy .

Brockman, a 45-year-old mother of two, and a member of Durham's First Presbyterian Church, was convicted of trespassing and resisting arrest, charges stemming from a protest last fall at Blackwater's Moyock headquarters near the Outer Banks.

Brockman's six codefendants, four of whom are connected to Catholic Worker communities along the East Coast, were convicted of similar charges. All seven received suspended jail sentences and were fined $100 and required to pay court costs. They appealed the decision and are due back in Superior Court Jan. 22 for a jury trial.

Blackwater, which recently changed its name to Blackwater Worldwide, has been under intense scrutiny since Sept. 16, when one of its security details fired on civilians in Baghdad's Nisour Square, killing 17 civilians, in an attack witnesses said was unprovoked.

The Oct. 20 protest was intended to symbolically reenact the Nisour killings. Protesters drove a stationwagon riddled with faux bullet holes and splattered with red paint past Blackwater's gate. The protesters pretended to be dead, which led to the resisting arrest charge when the police had to carry them to nearby squad cars.

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