FARMINGTON — It took a jury less than 15 minutes Tuesday to find two environmental activists guilty of failing to disperse during a protest of the Kibby Mountain wind power project last summer.

During the sentencing in Franklin Superior Court, Justice Michaela Murphy said the activists went beyond peaceful protest when they helped to block a tractor-trailer that was delivering a massive wind turbine blade. “This could have turned into a very dangerous situation,” she said.

Willow A. Cordes-Eklund, 27, of Minneapolis and Erik J. Gillard, 27, of Plainville, Vt., were sentenced to serve 10 days in the Franklin County Detention Center and pay $500 fines.

Both are members of the Earth First! movement, which planned the July 6, 2010, protest in which dozens of protesters clashed with police on Route 27 in Chain of Ponds Township.

Murphy said the sentence, which exceeded what the prosecution requested, had to send a message about endangering innocent bystanders during protests. It wasn’t a peaceful protest, she said, because the truck driver was threatened for “just trying to make a living.”

Cordes-Eklund used a bicycle lock to chain herself by the neck to the tractor trailer, and was arrested after police had to cut the lock. Gillard jumped onto the tractor-trailer by the driver’s door, and was arrested by a U.S. Border Patrol agent.

Other protesters surrounded the two Maine State Police troopers who were escorting the delivery to the site of the TransCanada wind power project.

Leaving the courthouse, Gillard’s attorney, Lynne Williams, said the sentence was not supported by evidence presented at trial. It also goes against certain First Amendment rights for protesters, she said.

Franklin County Assistant District Attorney James Andrews asked the court for lighter sentences, with the activists paying $500 fines or choosing to serve 100 hours of community service in Maine.

The misdemeanor charge of failure to disperse has a maximum sentence of 364 days in jail.

 

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