Members of Portland’s Surge Protection Brigade—a group
of politically active senior citizens, who have become known as the
“Raging” or “Pissed-Off Grannies”—are taking their campaign
against the war in Iraq to the district attorney’s office, arguing that
protesting is not a crime.
Sara Graham, 67, and four other women over 60—along with a
56-year-old raging grandpa—were arrested on Friday, April 6,
outside the military recruitment center on NE Broadway, after daubing
the walls and floor of the center with water-soluble fake blood, made
from corn syrup and food coloring. The blood symbolized both Good
Friday, and the blood of the soldiers in Iraq.
The protesters were initially charged with offensive littering
(later altered by the district attorney to unlawfully applying
graffiti) and criminal mischief in the third degree, a misdemeanor
carrying a possible 30 days in jail.
In September, the district attorney’s office offered to downgrade
those charges to “violations” and have them processed in community
court—removing the threat of jail, but also the protesters’ right
to a jury trial—if the six agreed to pay $100 in restitution to
the recruiting center to repair the damage.
“But we’re not sorry,” says Graham, who along with the other
protesters continues to plead not guilty to the more serious charges,
and looks forward to a jury trial in December. She adds: “We don’t want
to give any money to them. The way the military recruiters responded to
the protest, it was as if they’d never seen blood before.”
Graham and another protester, Bonnie Tinker, were arrested again on
June 9 after lying down in front of a tank during the Rose
Festival.
“It’s not right, at a time of war, to have a tank on the streets of
this city,” says Tinker.
The pair were arrested initially for disorderly conduct and
“interfering with a parade,” a law which does not actually exist.
Graham, whose charge was later changed to interference with a peace
officer, says she simply offered passive resistance to her arrest by
crumpling to the ground. Both women are pleading not guilty.
“It’s extraordinary to me that the district attorney’s office should
arrest an old lady for protesting a war that began very illegally,”
says Thaddeus Betz, Graham’s attorney. “Why not arrest Dick Cheney when
he walks into town?”
“We fight just as hard as anyone else to protect free speech,” says
District Attorney Mike Schrunk. “But sometimes people go beyond the
bounds of what is reasonable and most of the time people are willing to
accept the consequences of what they have done. We try to resolve these
issues at the lowest possible level in community court—but of
course people have the right to go to trial, and I understand what they
are doing.”