By Fr David

From the June 1988 Newsletter

Wells St Magistratet’s Court
5 May 1988

‘I am charged under the Metropolitan Police Act 1839 with “marking a wall without the owner’s consent”.

Yes, I did mark a wall, the Ministry of Defence in Horseguards Avenue.

With a cross.  It was Ash Wednesday. 

But in English law, to be guilty of a crime requires both a prohibited action and a guilty frame of mind.

I admit the prohibited action. 
I deny the guilty frame of mind.

On the contrary, my action was done to alert people to the wrongness, madness and unlawfulness of what is being planned in the Ministry of Defence, in our name.

This court has a duty to uphold the law, not just the Metropolitan Police Act, but the more fundamental laws of our country.  It is unlawful to plan the mass murder of innocent people.

It is unlawful to intend to pollute and devastate the earth on a scale that would inevitable follow a nuclear strike.

It is unlawful (and, I submit, criminally negligent) to risk the lives of our own citizens with a defence policy that invites a similar or worse retaliation.

This court, and you Sir, have a choice:

to uphold the letter of the Metropolitan Police Act 1839, or
to uphold the more central principles of law to which I and others were witnessing on Ash Wednesday. 

I ask you to reaffirm in this court the great tradition of English law  which protects innocent life, cherishes the earth, and refuses to be subservient to passing Government policy.

Does this court want to line up with courts in another country in 1940, which would have found someone guilty for marking a cross (without the owner’s consent) on the outside of a truck heading for Dachau?

I am a Christian and a priest.
I am charged to proclaim the law and the love of God, and to preach the gospel of Christ. 
I am also charged to care for my people. 
I am trying to do all these things, and in this court I am asking the law to protect us.

If you choose to see only a mark on a wall, so be it.

And God help us all.

Verdict: CASE PROVED
Sentence: ABSOLUTE DISCHARGE

Same verdict and sentence for two co-defendants: Pauline Condon, a Quaker nurse; and Ezio Roattino, missionary priest.

The court found us technically guilty as charged, but the sentence affirms our action and its moral purpose. A small but famous victory. But we remember the 60 other defendants who received sentences, which they are now serving or resisting.