by Carolyn Hudson

Tuesday afternoon of Holy Week (March 18), I sat in the front row of a Kingston, ON courtroom.  The court had just sentenced six Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (KI) community leaders to six months in prison for resisting mining in their area.

Five weeks earlier, a judge had imposed a six-month prison sentence and $25,000 fine on Robert Lovelace, former Chief of the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation (AAFN), for his role in protecting traditional lands from Frontenac Venture Corporation's (FVC) uranium mining exploration.  Co-chief Paula Sherman escaped a jail sentence, but still faced a $15,000 fine.

I sat with my husband, Rev. John Hudson, and two other non-Aboriginal colleagues - fellow CPTer David Milne, and our neighbor, Frank Morrison - wondering if the court would impose similar sentences on them.  It didn't.  FVC and the Ontario courts declined to prosecute the non-Aboriginal men even though they faced identical contempt of court charges as the First Nations members.

I was relieved that my husband did not have to go to jail and we did not have to mortgage our home to pay fines or court costs.  But we did not feel like celebrating.   The voices of our aboriginal brothers and sisters had been dismissed, and they received exceedingly high fines.

John said afterwards, "This feels like a hollow victory because I was unable to voice my concerns, and it was obvious that the treatment of non-Aboriginals was very different from that of the First Nations leadership."