Biography
House painter from Hartford, CT; took part in the 1982 Trident Nein action aboard the USS Florida at Electric Boat, Groton, CT, boarding the submarine by canoe and hammering on missile hatches.
Tim Quinn was 28 at the time of Trident Nein, an expectant father working as a house painter in Hartford, Connecticut. No further sourceable biographical detail was found.
Trident Nein dates and separate proceedings
Participant Art Laffin dates the action and arrests to July 5, 1982. The contemporary sentencing report dates the original disposition to November 9, 1982. A sentence is not treated as a verified prison-admission date.
Sources: Art Laffin, July 2022 eyewitness retrospective; Revolutionary Worker, November 12, 1982, pages 1–2.
Original archival custody and release evidence
The Nuclear Resister issue 12 names all nine participants and reports seven weeks in jail followed by August 26, 1982 recognizance release. Initial custody is July 5–August 26, not an uninterrupted stay through 1983.
Issue 13 records the November 9 sentence as suspended to time served. Issue 15 documents February 2, 1983 revocation and renewed imprisonment. The intervening recognizance period is excluded from time imprisoned.
Actual later prison release: 1983-05-27. This is not the end of the entire sentence.
Sources: issue 12, October 18, 1982, printed page 4 (PDF page 6); issue 13, November 30, 1982, page 4; issue 14, January 14, 1983, page 3; issue 15, March 9, 1983, printed page 6 (PDF page 8); issue 16, April 17, 1983, printed page 10 (PDF page 11); issue 17, June 6, 1983, page 5.
Separate April 14, 1981 Hartford protest detention
The May 9, 1981 support newsletter, page 4, names Tim Quinn among eight activists arrested at the United Technologies stockholders meeting in Hartford on April 14, 1981. It reports processing, fingerprints and photographs at Hartford Police Station, followed by release: six on recognizance and the other two within two hours after bail or identification was provided. It does not identify which two faced those conditions. The original breach-of-peace charge became disorderly conduct at arraignment; May 7 was a scheduled pretrial hearing. This distinct brief detention is not merged into the later Trident Nein custody or earlier Plowshares Eight prosecution. No new short-stay case, sentence-service claim or counter is created.
The September 19, 1981 newsletter individually identifies Tim Quinn of the Hartford Atlantic Life Community, arrested June 17 at Electric Boat with John Bach for attempting to attach a peace symbol to the USS Ohio during its launch. Both were released that same day. Charges were subsequently dropped at arraignment, whose day is not given. This brief detention is separate from the already documented April 14, 1981 Hartford protest and July 5, 1982 Trident Nein prosecution. Only arrest and actual release dates are recorded; no admission or extra day of imprisonment is inferred.
