A colonel for the 174th Attack Wing of the New York Air National Guard has been granted an order of protection against 17 peace activists.

DeWitt town judges granted the order last fall after Col. Earl Evans, mission support group commander, requested it.

For the third time, Evans wrote, protesters had come to the base unannounced and blocked the main gate on Molloy Road and a second gate on Thompson Road. The base was forced to open a third entrance, which it does not normally use. Staff called 911 right away to report the incident, Evans wrote in court papers.

“I request that the court issue an order of protection against each and every defendant arrested such that they are to stay away from Hancock field and I request prosecution to the fullest extent of the law,” he wrote.

The protesters wrote about the protective order on their website.

“We hope you’re sitting down. Or you might fall down laughing,” resister John Hamilton wrote on the group’s blog. He said the police issued restraining orders as the peace activists stood quietly outside the barbed wire before armed guards.

Four protesters are suing two town judges in state Supreme Court, saying the order goes too far, violates their First Amendment rights and treats Evans like a crime victim when they do not even know him.

Pilots inside the air base are operating the controls that fly unmanned, armed Reaper drones over places like Afghanistan. The pilots say most of their missions are essential eyes in the sky to give intelligence to troops on the ground. But they do sometimes have to strike.

It’s a change in direction the military applauds as safer for pilots, but it infuriates people like Syracuse resident Ed Kinane.

Kinane and five others arrested in October say the United States violates national and international human rights laws when it targets and kills people in Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen and Pakistan. They say there is no legal basis for defining the scope of where drones can be used, no criteria for deciding who will be targeted, no safeguards to ensure the accuracy of the kills and no mechanisms for accountability.

They also say having a drone operation base near Syracuse makes the region a target.

At least twice a month, peace activists hold signs across Molloy Road as the air base staff changes its afternoon shift. They have a permit from the DeWitt Police Department that allows protests across the road.

On occasion, however, they walk up to the barbed wired gates and read what they call an “indictment” to the armed, uniformed guards. Sometimes, they read it over and over.

“The drone attacks either originating at Hancock or supported here are a deliberate murderous violation of international law, and as such are a felony violation of Article VI of the U.S. Constitution,” they read. “By giving material support to the drone program, you as individuals are violating the Constitution, dishonoring your oath, and committing war crimes.”

The protesters believe they are exercising their First Amendment rights.

But that kind of activity leads the guards at the base to call 911.

Col. Greg Semmel, commander of the 174th Attack Wing, said local police suggested the order of protection as an avenue. He does not know if other bases have taken similar measures.

Semmel said it was necessary to keep the flow of traffic open and safe for staff.

“We have not interfered at all with their protesting if they’ve been off our property and across the street,” he said. “We very much respect that right for them to be out there to communicate their opinions.”

Semmel said he would not get into a discussion about the legality of using drones. He said the staff at Hancock is executing the mission of this country.

“We are supporting, doing the mission of the Air Force and our country with this aircraft and supporting our soldiers, sailors and airmen who are on the ground in Afghanistan,” he said.

Jeff Brown, base spokesman, said Col. Evans put his name on the restraining order because he is in charge of security forces at the base.

Kinane and others were holding signs across the road again Tuesday afternoon. A DeWitt police officer stopped by to say someone called 911 to report the protesters were blocking traffic. The officer said he did not have a problem with the way they were standing along the road.

Six protesters have another court appearance Thursday night and, if found guilty, expect to be sent to jail that night. They are representing themselves in court for the sixth time.

“In one sense, it’s laughable that the base needs protection from explicitly peaceable activists who are unarmed,” Kinane said.

Kinane spent 8 days in jail last December on trespassing charges. If he expects to be arrested on any given night, he will ask his partner Ann Tiffany to bring some books for him to read in jail.

Kinane, 68, has had a series of jobs, including flower picker, dishwasher, deck hand, encyclopedia salesman and day laborer. But he has not had a career. He lives on $460 a month on Social Security. He shares a home on Midland Avenue with Tiffany and a third friend. He said he has never owned a car. He has never had a credit card. He has no children.

He expects to continue protesting along with other members of the group Upstate Drone Action.

“It’s right in our backyard. So if folks around the base don’t protest what’s going on at the base, I don’t know who will,” he said.

Kinane said it is hard to measure whether the protests are changing anything.

“When we began about three years ago, no one seemed to know what drones were,” Kinane said.

Now, he said, people outside the peace community are starting to see their point of view.

Anti-drone outrage is also becoming more mainstream as the details about drone strikes make the news. The New York Times reported last year that President Barack Obama was making the final decisions on a secret list of people to be killed by drone strikes. In a new book, New York Times reporter Mark Mazzetti writes about the first C.I.A. drone strike in Pakistan, in which the American military killed an enemy of Pakistan in exchange for access to its airspace for drones.

Much of the military’s missions remain a secret. But the military does try to explain its unmanned aircraft in a promotional campaign. The 174th Attack Wing had a display at the New York State Fair this year that allowed adults and children to sit in a mock-up cockpit and pretend to fly a drone. It included taped footage of troops chasing and capturing a man.

Col. Earl Evans, of the 174th Attack Wing of the New York Air National Guard, requests order of protection...

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ED KINANE’S CLOSING STATEMENT

DEWITT TOWN COURT

JUDGE ROBERT JOKL PRESIDING

18 APRIL 2013 TRIAL FOR “TRESPASS”  AT HANCOCK AIR BASE 5 OCTOBER 2012

JUDGE JOKL, FELLOW DEFENDANTS, MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC:

TONIGHT THE CHARGE, YET AGAIN, IS “TRESPASS.” BUT TONIGHT IS REALLY ABOUT DRONE ASSASSINATIION AND TERRORISM –

ABOUT A TRESPASS SO VILE THAT UNTIL RECENT YEARS IT COULD ONLY BE THE STUFF OF CHEAP SCIENCE FICTION.

WHAT TONIGHT IS REALLY ABOUT IS THE RESPONSIBILITY OF A COURT IN THE FACE OF WAR CRIMES

BEING COMMITTED WITHIN ITS JURISDICTION -- IN OTHER WORDS, ON TRIAL TONIGHT IS THE INTEGRITY OF THE JUDICIAL PROCESS:

DOES THIS COURT – OR DOES IT NOT – RESPECT THE HIGHEST LAW OF OUR LAND? OR, EVEN MORE TO THE POINT:

DOES THIS COURT – OR DOES IT NOT – HONOR JUSTICE….?

YOU, SIR, FOR BETTER OR WORSE, ARE NOW A PLAYER IN AN HISTORIC PROCESS WHEREBY CITIZENS -- IF THEY ARE TRULY CITIZENS –

ARE IMPELLED TO TELL OUR ELECTED GOVERNMENT THAT IT HAS EXCEEDED THE BOUNDS OF WHAT IS HUMANLY PROPER.

YOU, JUDGE JOKL, MUST NOW DECIDE WHETHER YOU ARE ON THE SIDE OF LAW… OR ON THE SIDE OF LAWLESSNESS...

WHETHER YOU ARE ON THE SIDE OF DECENCY… OR ON THE SIDE OF BARBARITY. WHILE I AND MY FELLOW DEFENDANTS THINK GLOBALLY,

WE’RE IMPELLED TO ACT LOCALLY. IT IS HERE WHERE WE MUST CONFRONT THE LAWLESSNESS THAT EMENATES FROM A MILITARY BASE

ALL TOO CLOSE TO OUR HOMES. IT PAINS ME THAT MY HOME TOWN HOSTS HANCOCK AIR BASE – THIS REGIONAL HUNTER/KILLER REAPER DRONE BASE.

JUDGE, WE’VE EACH PONDERED HOW WE SHOULD TO USE THIS OPPORTUNITY TO SPEAK TO YOU TONIGHT. WE DON’T REALLY NEED TO TELL YOU MORE ABOUT WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT WEAPONIZED DRONES AND ABOUT WHAT THEY DO TO HUMAN FLESH, OR HOW THEY DEMOLISH HOMES,

HOW THEY DEMOLISH COMMUNITIES, HOW THEY PUT TENS OF THOUSANDS TO FLIGHT, OR EVEN WHAT THEY SEEM TO DO

TO THE SOUL OF THOSE WHO DEPLOY THEM. JUDGE, YOU SURELY MAY HAVE NOTED THE DEBATE NOW EMBROILING

THE CONGRESSIONAL AND EXECUTIVE BRANCHES OF OUR GOVERNMENT. THAT DEBATE PIVOTS ON THE MORALITY, LEGALITY, AND WISDOM –

OR LACK THEREOF -- OF U.S. DRONE POLICY. SO I DON’T THINK I NEED TO REHASH THESE MATTERS. THOUGH I DO HASTEN TO SUGGEST ONCE AGAIN THAT,

IF YOU HAVE NOT DONE SO ALREADY, YOU EXAMINE SOME READILY ACCESSIBLE AND RIGOROUS DOCUMENTATION: I MEAN, IN PARTICULAR,

THE STANFORD AND NYU LAW SCHOOLS’ SEPTEMBR 2012 REPORT. IT’S CALLED, “LIVING UNDER DRONES: DEATH, INJURY, AND TRAUMA TO CIVILIANS

FROM US DRONE PRACTICES IN PAKISTAN.” EVERYONE HERE IN COURT THIS EVENING SHOULD KNOW THAT “LIVING UNDER DRONES” CAN BE DOWNLOADED FREE AT THE WEBSITE OF THAT SAME NAME: WWW.LIVINGUNDERDRONES.ORG. WE’VE BROUGHT WITH US TONIGHT BOUND COPIES WHICH

I WOULD LIKE TO PRESENT TO YOU ANDTO MR McROBERTS, OUR ASSISTANT DISTRICT ATTORNEY.

JUDGE JOKL, MAY I ALSO CALL YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MORNING’S SYRACUSE POST-STANDARD? ON PAGE 3 – AND CONTINUED ON PAGE 5 – IS AN ARTICLE BY LOCAL JOURNALIST, MICHELLE BREIDENBACH, ABOUT OUR ONGOING DEMONSTRATIONS AT HANCOCK AIR BASE. I PARTICULARLY WANT TO HIGHLIGHT THE PHOTO ACCOMPANYING THAT ARTICLE. THAT PHOTO PORTRAYS TWO OF OUR PERSISTENT DEMONSTRATORS HOLDING SIGNS ACROSS MOLLOY ROAD FROM HANCOCK’S MAIN GATE. EACH PITHY SIGN CONVEYS TRUTHS WHICH I HOPE YOU, JUDGE, AND EVERYONE ELSE IN THIS COURTROOM WILL PONDER.

MY FRIEND, HERM BIELING’S SIGN READS: “BOMBING PEOPLE CREATES TERRORISTS.” JULIENNE OLDFIELD’S SIGN READS: “DRONES FLY…CHILDREN DIE.”

18 MONTHS AGO DURING THE “HANCOCK 38” TRIAL HERE FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL RAMSEY CLARK TESTIFIED ON OUR BEHALF.RAMSEY, WHO KNOWS A THING OR TWO ABOUT THESE MATTERS, DECLARED UNDER OATH THAT THE HANCOCK REAPER WAS BEING DEPLOYED

IN VIOLATION OF INTERNATIONAL LAW. RAMSEY WENT ON TO NOTE THAT THE HANCOCK 38 HAD ACTED CONSISTENT WITH THE NURMBURG PRINCIPLES

(OF WHICH THE UNITED STATES WAS A SIGNATORY).  AFTER MR. McROBERTS HAD FINISHED QUESTIONING THIS HUMANE MAN, YOUR COLLEAGUE, JUDGE GIDEON, POSED A QUESTION. IT WENT SOMETHING LIKE THIS (I’M PARAPHRASING):“MR CLARK, IF YOU WERE JUDGE,  HOW WOULD YOU DEAL WITH THE KNOTTY ISSUE OF INTERNATIONAL LAW IN THE CONTEXT OF A DOMESTIC LEGAL FRAMEWORK THAT TENDS TO IGNORE THAT LAW.” RAMSEY, BEARING IN MIND ALL THE VICTIMS OF THE REAPER DRONE, SIMPLY REPLIED,  “I’D CONSIDER WHAT’S BEST FOR THE CHILDREN.”

THANK YOU.