University of Virginia Library

Two Convicted Of Sit- In Charge

By Rob Pritchard
Cavalier Daily Staff Writer

David Giltinan, a University student
and Cavalier Daily columnist, was
sentenced last Friday in Washington's
Court of General Sessions on a charge
stemming from a sit-in last June.

Also sentenced was Michael Russell,
former University student and presently
employed by the War Resister's League.
Both Mr. Giltinan and Mr. Russell were
given 15 days suspended sentences, $100
fines, and one year's unrestricted
probation.

The case, which went to trial
September 9, attracted the attention of
the Washington press by raising
constitutional and moral issues involving the
Selective Service, and by Judge McIntyre's
decision to permit the defendants to present
their cases without legal counsel.

The charge of unlawful entry arose from an
action taken against the District Selective
Service System, in which Mr. Giltinan and Mr.
Russell, along with four others, occupied the
Director's office for an afternoon. According to
Mr. Russell, they intended to "stay until the
war was over, the draft ended, he [the director]
resigned, or we were removed. Obviously we
were removed."

Their defense was based on the question of
civil disobedience and the right of the jury to
acquit defendants in spite of and in opposition
to the instructions of the judge. Permitting the
defendants to present their own cases without
legal counsel, Judge McIntyre also allowed
them to "introduce testimony regarded by
many other judges as irrelevant."

On a decision handed down in 1735, in
which the jury "refused to enforce the law
where the conscience of the community was at
stake," Messrs. Giltinan and Russell based their
defense.

They maintained that since the draft was,
according to them, "violating the
Constitution," and the Vietnam War was
likewise unconstitutional, the jury could and
should find the defendants innocent of charges.

Although the defendants were found guilty,
they nevertheless succeeded in bringing the
focus of the trial onto the larger issue of civil
disobedience, and the legal complications
involved in a defense of such a stand.