Not Guilty
Speaking Truth to Power
Betty Krawczyk
Born and raised in the bayous of Southern Louisiana, Betty Krawczyk is the mother of eight children, an equal number of grandchildren, and a great-grandchild. She has spent her entire life engaging in social issues, dating back to the Civil Rights struggles in her home state, and she was cofounder of one of the first women’s centres in Canada.
On January 25, 2001, ‘Grandma K’ Betty Krawczyk was freed alter serving four months of a year-long sentence imposed upon her for her actions in blockading logging roads in the Elaho Valley of Canada. Her trial judge justified the lengthy sentence as due to her criminal contempt. Vancouver judges Donald and McKenzie overturned the sentence.
What follows are excerpts from the transcript of her original sentencing hearing. Krawczyk is responding to a challenge from the judge, who has asked her to ex plain why she blocked a road and why she doesn’t respect the law.
« …I hear so often from friends and people who love me, ‘Why do you do this ? It’s not called for ». Let things work out as they will,’ but if everybody did that, the society would never evolve. We wouldn’t get anywhere, ever. I know the difference between lawlessness and responsibility, and the only way things ever change is through responsibility and the willingness to take on the consequences of the actions when one is trying to make change. It’s just that it strikes a point with me because my little granddaughter says, ‘Grandma, why don’t you leave those trees alone and come play with me?’ She doesn’t understand it, either.
About sentencing, specifically my own sentencing. Sir, I can only say that I am responsible for my own actions. The devil didn’t make me blockade Interfor logging trucks, and God didn’t make me do it either. Neither did PATH [People’s Action for Threatened Habitat] or FAN [Forest Action Network] or Friends of the Elaho. I told me to do it.
In my opinion, my attempt to try to help stop Interfor’s rapid destruction of the Elaho Valley by standing in front of the logging trucks was not an evil, criminal, crazy thing to do. In my scheme of things, it was the eminently sane thing to do. I believe it to be crazy and insane to stand by mutely while our collective life support systems are being destroyed.
I do not regret my actions in the slightest. And when I am in jail I consider myself a political prisoner and I act accordingly. But, in reality, the only real freedom that anyone actually finds is with the confines of one’s own mind and spirit. It sounds trite, I know, but that kind of freedom really can’t be imprisoned.
« You can put me in jail, sir, but I will not be your prisoner. I will not be Interfor’s prisoner, or a prisoner of the Attorney General, or a prisoner of these nice deputy sheriffs, or a prisoner of BCCW [Burnaby Correctional Centre for Women]. I am only a prisoner of my own conscience, sir, and that makes me a free woman, a free person.
And, as a free person, I refuse to enter into any sort of collusion with this court in terms of potential house arrest or electronic monitoring as part of my sentence. I will never be a party to assisting in my own punishment in ways that would force me to internalize prison, to internalize confinement, to internalize guilt, to internalize the power of Interfor and the Attorney General’s office to punish me for trying to protect public property, property that every citizen has a right, not only a right but also a duty to protect and enjoy and love.
« As well, sir, I will not accept any kind of community service as part of punishment. I have done more than my share of community service in my lifetime. I have done it freely and as a labor of love, and I will not have it imposed on me as punishment. I will also resist paying a fine, however small. To pay a fine, at least for me, would be tantamount to admitting guilt. This would imply that my actions in the Elaho were harmful and antisocial and must be atoned for. And again if I pay the fine, however small, I would have to internalize a sense of guilt that I do not feel.
« There have been actions in my life that I truly regret and feel sorry for, but trying to protect the ancient forest of the Elaho is not one of them. I love the Elaho. I love all of the old-growth forests of British Columbia. To fight to preserve what one loves is to act in harmony with oneself and with nature.
So, sir, I refuse anything that would dilute the reasons of why I am here, of why I tried to stop the logging of the Elaho. I refuse fines, community service, and the internalized guilt of a shamed and shameful compliance. You must lock me up, sir, or let me go. Thank you. »
Excerpt from
« Global Uprising, Confronting the Tyrannies of the 21st Century
Stories from a New Generation of Activists »
by Neva Welton & Linda Wolf
NSP, 2001
