Nuns sentenced to jail time
AP / David Zalubowski
Dominican nuns, from left, Ardeth Platte, Carol Gilbert and Jackie Hudson listen to speakers before addressing a crowd outside the federal courthouse in downtown Denver, Friday, July 25, 2003, as the three head in for sentencing. The women were convicted in April of obstructing the national defense and damaging government property for swinging a hammer at the silo and smearing their blood on it in the form of a cross.

By Jim Hughes, Denver Post Staff Writer
A federal judge today sent three nuns to prison for an October 2002 act of civil disobedience at a Weld County missile silo -- but for lesser sentences than government prosecutors had requested.

Though he said he disagreed with those who have called the nuns heroes for breaking into the site to protest nuclear weapons, the sisters did not deserve sentences of six to eight years in prison, Judge Bob Blackburn ruled.

Instead, pointing to a 1998 case also heard at U.S. District Court in Denver, he exercised his judicial discretion to depart from federal sentencing guidelines.

Blackburn sentenced Ardeth Platte, 67, to serve 41 months in prison; Carol Gilbert, 55, to 33 months in prison; and Jackie Marie Hudson, 68, will spend 30 months in prison.

The sentences are different for each nun because each has a different criminal history - similar acts of civil disobedience across the country dating back to the 1980s.

The nuns, who spent about months as inmates at the Clear Creek County Jail while awaiting trial, will receive credit for time served.

"Let me state the obvious," Blackburn told a courtroom so packed with supporters of the nuns that they spilled over into and filled to overflowing an adjacent courtroom to listen to an audio feed of the proceeding. "This is not a win-win politically correct situation where everyone will leave this court feeling warm and fuzzy. Some will criticize (the sentences) for being too harsh, perhaps, and others, for being too lenient."

There were some grumbling and chants of "Close the silos! Free the nuns!" afterward the sentencing.

But among the nuns' supporters there were far more smiles than frowns.

Terry Greenberg of Nederland, who said she came to court Friday morning prepared to form a new protest group "Jews to Free Nuns," praised the judge.

"It made me feel hope," she said. "It gave me hope in the very hopeless world we live in these days."

U.S. Attorney John Suthers also applauded the sentences.

"I think the sentence that Judge Blackburn has imposed is imminently fair and reasonable," he said.