Biography
Bruce Dancis was detained on May 20, 1969.
On December 14, 1966, 18-year-old Cornell University SDS activist Bruce Dancis tore his draft card into four pieces before a crowd, then mailed the pieces to the Selective Service. His act helped inspire the April 1967 Central Park 'burn-in.' He was indicted and convicted of draft-card mutilation and served about 19 months in federal prison, entering in May 1969; he later wrote the memoir 'Resister.'
The Second Circuit’s January 21, 1969 opinion names Bruce David Dancis and affirms Judge Port’s original Youth Corrections Act judgment. The sentence was indeterminate; conditional-release limits did not establish actual time served. Primary opinion.
