Biography
Mark Peter Colville, age 56, KBP7 defendant; 18 months federal prison. Mark Colville is an American social justice and Catholic Worker activist. He is the founder of the Amistad Catholic Worker community in New Haven, Connecticut, which works on issues including homelessness, housing justice, and anti-war organizing.
Colville has been involved in anti-military activism for years, including protests outside U.S. drone bases. In April 2018, he was one of the seven members of the Kings Bay Plowshares 7 who entered the Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base to symbolically protest nuclear weapons. For this action he was convicted on federal charges alongside his co-defendants, and he chose not to seek bail on conscience grounds.
Colville has also been recognised locally for his activism and community work, including as a New Haven Register “Persons of the Year.” The Prince of Peace Plowshares was a six-person nonviolent direct-disarmament action at Bath Iron Works in Bath, Maine on February 14, 1997. Philip Berrigan, Susan Crane, Stephen Kelly S.J., Mark Colville, Steve Baggarly, and Tom Lewis-Borbely entered the shipyard and hammered on, and poured blood on, the Tomahawk cruise-missile vertical launching system installed on the destroyer USS The Sullivans (DDG-68) under construction. They were charged in U.S. District Court for the District of Maine with conspiracy and damage to government property, with prosecutors alleging $28,000 in damage. All six were convicted; in addition to prison, each received two years of supervised release and a $4,000 restitution fine.
The November 12, 2019 NYC Anarchist Black Cross compilation reproduces reporting on the Kings Bay Plowshares 7 jury verdict of October 24, 2019: conspiracy, destruction of property on a naval installation, depredation of government property and trespass. It describes the defendants other than Stephen Kelly as free at home awaiting sentencing, while Kelly remained jailed. The reported twenty- or twenty-five-year maximum was a possible penalty, not an imposed term or actual service. Later dispositions remain separately recorded. Source: https://nycabc.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/updates-12-nov-2019-1.pdf#page=2
Initial Hancock custody, October 25, 2012
The Upstate Coalition statement dated October 25, 2012 named Mark Colville among thirteen people still held in jail late that afternoon after a blockade of Hancock Field near Syracuse. The statement reported trespass and disorderly-conduct charges and bail between $250 and $1,000. Four other named participants had already been released on their own recognizance. It does not establish the physical release day for the thirteen still held. This initial October 2012 custody must not be extended through later 2014 sentencing or conflated with other protest cases. No new release date or measured days imprisoned are inferred from this report.
