Press Releases & Updates 2003

Tove Ladberg (21), came specially from Stockholm for her trial today in Helensburgh District Court to face a charge of breaching the peace at the mass blockade of Faslane naval base on 22nd April. Defending herself she linked the nuclear arsenal at Faslane to the dropping of the first atom bomb on Hiroshima.

When she summed up her case with a range of quotations on international law Justice of the Peace Viv Dance interjected and said: “This court has had many history lessons. This accused is charged with one offence and we want to hear about that, not the background history, which we are very familiar with.” Tove continued, referring to the duty of citizens, as enshrined in the Nuremberg Principles, to act so that the mistakes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki would not be repeated.

Finding her guilty JP Dance said that this had been a “deliberate and calculated act”. Although she told the JP that she was a student on a grant, Tove was fined £150. People on the public benches could not help making comparisons with cases heard earlier in the day when a man who had broken a car window to steal someone’s handbag was fined £80 and another found guilty of doing 60 mph in a 30 mph limit was fined £150.

Trident Ploughshares comment: “ JP Dance was well out of order with her comments during the summing up. She should know that every case is to be heard on its merits and she should know that the reason an accused acted as they did is relevant to the charge. Her lenient response to the other offences that were in one case traumatic for the victim and in the other potentially lethal show how little she has understood the Faslane question, in spite of the many opportunities she has had to do so.”

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