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Note #8105 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

Retired minister going to prison
04060
February 4, 2004

Retired minister going to prison

Tennessean trespassed on Army base during November protest

by Evan Silverstein

LOUISVILLE - A retired Presbyterian minister has been sentenced to a federal
penitentiary for trespassing during a non-violent demonstration at a Georgia
military base last November.

On Jan. 26, the Rev. Donald Beisswenger, 73, of Nashville, TN, was sentenced
in U.S. District Court to six months in a minimum-security prison and fined
$1,000.

However, Beisswenger said he isn't sorry for what he did.

"I do not regret it," he told the Presbyterian News Service on Feb. 3. "In
fact, I feel proud and happy about it. It seems right, congruent."

Beisswenger, a professor emeritus of church and community in the divinity
school at Vanderbilt University, was arrested for going onto federal property
at Fort Benning, near Columbus, GA, on Nov. 23. He has not been told when or
where his sentence will be served.

"They just said within 30 to 60 days they'll let me know," he said. "Then
after that I have two weeks to self-report."

Beisswenger said he must also pay a refundable $260 "prison fee" and is
permanently banned from entering the military post. He also will lose his
Social Security benefits while he is incarcerated.

He was one of 27 protesters who appeared last month before U.S. Magistrate G.
Mallon Faircloth on trespassing charges related to the November demonstration
against a military training facility at Fort Benning long known as the School
of the Americas (SOA). It has been renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute
for Security Cooperation (WHISC).

The maximum punishment is six months in prison and a $5,000 fine.

About 60 Presbyterians are believed to have taken part in the protest, the
14th annual demonstration demanding the closing of the combat school.

The demonstrations are held to mark the anniversary of the Nov. 19, 1989,
deaths of six Jesuit priests in El Salvador. Opponents of the school claim
that some of the people responsible for the priests' killings had been
trained at the Fort Benning institute, which in the past has offered
instruction in practices such as extortion, execution and torture. The
Department of Defense says the curriculum no longer includes such training.

Police estimated the number of demonstrators at 7,500 to 8,000. School of the
Americas Watch (SOAW), the group that organizes the protests, said about
10,000 people took part. Last year, more than 6,000 people turned out and 88
were arrested.

Beisswenger said he was one of about 35 participants in last year's
demonstration representing the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship (PPF), which has
opposed WHISC for years. The protesters also included a number of students
from Presbyterian-related Warren Wilson College in Asheville, NC. Beisswenger
is believed to be the only Presbyterian arrested.

Two Presbyterians arrested during the 2002 protest - Marilyn White, of
suburban Houston, TX, and Ann Huntwork, of Portland, OR - served six-month
prison sentences for trespassing and were released in October.

The Rev. Clifford W. Frasier, the United Church of Christ minister who is
coordinator of Presbyterian Welcome, the New York City regional affiliate of
That All May Freely Serve (TAMFS), also was arrested last year. He also got a
six-month sentence and was released in November.

SOA Watch, founded in 1990, is a grass-roots national organization committed
to non-violence. It has offices in Columbus, GA, and Washington, DC, and
local chapters in communities and on campuses around the country.

The PPF is an affinity group of the PC(USA) that promotes peace and
non-violence. It receives no funding from the Presbyterian Church (USA), but
sometimes works hand-in-hand with the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program. The
1994 General Assembly called for the closing of WHISC.

Beisswenger said he's working to form an anti-SOA group in Nashville to raise
awareness of the controversial school and to lobby lawmakers in Washington to
investigate the institution and shut it down.

"We're going to reach out as a group to influence the system," he said.

Beisswenger taught at Vanderbilt from 1968 until his retirement in 1996. He
has served PC(USA) congregations in Arkansas, Ohio, Illinois and Iowa. He is
now a parish associate at Hillsboro Presbyterian Church in Nashville and a
member of the Presbytery of Middle Tennessee.

Beisswenger has taken part in the WHISC protests several times. In 1999 he
was banned from Fort Benning for five years.

The Army acknowledges that some graduates of the school - a few hundred out
of more than 60,000 who have attended in more than half a century - have been
involved in abuses. It says all WHISC students now receive instruction in
human rights, and claims that the institute is largely responsible for the
spread of democracy in Latin America.

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