84-Year-Old Nun and Two Peace Activists to be Sentenced for Encroaching Nuclear Weapons Plant

Two Catholic peace activists and an 84-year-old nun will be sentenced in federal court Tuesday, for trespassing into a Tennessee defense facility where nuclear weapons are stored.

Sister Megan Rice, Michael Walli, and Greg Boertje-Obed confessed to cutting fences and encroaching into the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge that holds the country's main supply of bomb-grenade uranium, in July 2012. Initially, their hearing was scheduled for Jan. 28 but was postponed halfway due to a snowstorm.

During the hearing the U.S. District Judge Amul Thapar in Knoxville ordered the protesters to pay $52,953 to compensate for the damage at the nuclear facility. The trio also admitted spray painting peace slogans and hammering on the exterior walls of the facility, reports Reuters.

The facility security guards found Megan Rice, Greg Boertje-Obed and Michael Walli hanging banners, singing and offering to break bread with them. They reportedly also offered to share a Bible, candles and white roses, reports the Associated Press.

The federal jury convicted Rice and the other two protestors last May for damaging national defense premises under the sabotage act that carries a sentence of up to 20 years, and of causing more than $1,000 damage to the U.S. government property. The trio has been in custody since their convictions.

According to the federal sentencing guidelines, Rice might be sentenced to more than seven years in prison; Walli, 65, faces over nine years of jail; and Boertje-Obed, 58, more than eight years behind the bars. But their attorneys argued that all three convicts were entirely "nonviolent" and had spent over nine months in jail already.

People across the world showed their support to the three activists. According to Reuters, they have received more than 2,000 cards and letters so far.

Real Time Analytics