Biography
Johnny Baranski was a haiku poet and Catholic Worker activist. His resistance to war and nuclear weapons led to several imprisonments, during which he wrote prison poetry.
Historical photograph source
Portrait of poet and Catholic Worker peace activist Johnny Baranski; added by Kaypeg on February 4, 2018. Find a Grave photograph 165928949.
Separate Vancouver White Train case
The published primary opinion in State v. Aver, 109 Wn.2d 303 (November 5, 1987), names Johnny Wayne Baranski among the petitioners and affirms their train-obstruction convictions under RCW 81.48.020. Its facts identify Vancouver arrests by city police at a White Train protest, prosecuted in Clark County. This is distinct from the later Snohomish County jail stay. Primary opinion; Published opinion with full petitioner list.
The Berkeley-held Peace Law index, entry PL-33/28.6, identifies Washington v. Johnny Baranski and dates the White Train arrests July 24, 1984; it reports September convictions and differing fines. The exact arrest is recorded as a separate case. The available indexed passage was read, but the original PDF returned an access denial and was not visually verified. No individual fine, jail admission, release or time served is inferred. Peace Law index, PL-33/28.6.
The appellate decision date is not a new arrest or a release. Existing 1987 year-precision imprisonment remains unchanged; the sixty-day sentence does not establish an exact discharge day or a complete actual-custody total. His identified portrait and earlier cases are retained.
A contemporary January 1981 release report
The March 1981 newsletter, page 1, reports that Johnny Baranski had actually been released the previous January after a six-month term for fence climbing at Trident. This supplies a January 1981 release report but no exact discharge or initial admission day. The link to the profile’s 1979 Bangor case still requires original case documentation, so no structured endpoint or counter is changed from this report alone.
Retrospective prison-time estimate
Michael Dylan Welch's memorial in Frogpond 41:1 (2018), printed page 104, reports that Baranski died January 24, 2018 at age 69 in Vancouver, Washington, corroborating the recorded death date. It describes repeated nonviolent anti-war and Trident protest imprisonments over many years and estimates an aggregate two to three years in prison. This retrospective range is not one continuous sentence, does not identify exact custody endpoints and is not converted into a precise duration or added to existing case counters.
Mid-January 1981 reporting confirms release from Lompoc, without an exact day. January 5 had been a forecast.
