March 17, 2014

PEACE GROUP’S ATTEMPT AT INJUNCTION OVER NEW Y-12 SECURITY FENCE TURNED AWAY

By ExchangeMonitor

The Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance got its day in court Friday, but the activists came away empty-handed. The peace group and 18 individuals filed a suit in U.S. District Court in Knoxville, hoping to get a temporary restraining order to force the National Nuclear Security Administration to take down a newly assembled fence blocking access to a traditional protest area in front of the Y-12 National Security Complex. However, Judge Curtis L. Collier didn’t issue such an order during the hearing and actually called an end to the proceedings before arguments were heard because he said he didn’t think his court had jurisdiction for such a case.

Collier gave the attorneys for the peace group two weeks to do more research regarding jurisdiction or modify their complaint, which said the NNSA was using the fence to silence critics and take away freedom of speech and assembly. The attorneys said they planned to pursue the legal case, even though they missed their chance to get a restraining order. In the meantime, the barriers installed along Y-12’s front lawn on Scarboro Road remained in place for the group’s scheduled protest the next day, Saturday. About 75 protesters showed up for a series of protest events, including a march from an Oak Ridge park to Y-12, where police directed the protesters away from the plant’s entrance and to the other side of the road—where they chanted slogans and displayed signs with anti-Uranium Processing Facility signs. The protest was targeted at the planned construction of the multi-billion-dollar UPF.

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