Peace Women, Convicted of Trespassing, Teach the US Government a Lesson in Diplomacy

It must sound absurd, perhaps even unbelievable, that four peace women were arrested and put on trial for attempting to deliver a peace petition to the US Mission to the United Nations. But while our arrests reflect the "shoot first, ask questions later" style of George Bush and outgoing UN Ambassador John Bolton, we ended up teaching the government a lesson in diplomacy.

On March 6, 2006 CODEPINK organized a group of about 40 women, including a delegation from Iraq, and held a press conference in front of the United Nations in New York City to call for an end to the war in Iraq and commemorate International Women's Day. The group then marched a few blocks to the US Mission to deliver a petition signed by 72,000 women from around the world.

The previous year on International Women's Day, CODEPINK had delivered a similar petition without incident, with government representatives from the diplomatic office coming outside to greet us in a freak blizzard. This year, to our surprise and horror, we found the building had been locked up to keep us out and we were surrounded by armed police and security guards. After an hour of urging them to either let a small group inside or have someone come down to "just accept the damn piece of paper," the four women representatives—myself, peace mom Cindy Sheehan, Gold Star Family member Missy Beattie, and Reverend Patti Ackerman—were handcuffed and dragged to a police wagon. We were booked and kept overnight in the over-crowded, roach-infested jail called "The Tombs." We were charged with trespassing, two counts of disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and obstructing government administration.

Nine months later, the trial of the "CODEPINK Four" started in the Manhattan Criminal Court and dragged on for over a week. Day after day, the prosecution trotted out police officers, security guards and US Mission staff to testify that we never intended to deliver the petition but instead had planned to get arrested as a publicity stunt. They insisted that we were trespassing on private property (the US Mission is a government office but is currently housed in a commercial building), that we blocked the entrance to the building, and that we resisted when the police swarmed in to arrest us.