Biography
Ed Kinane is an Upstate New York anti-war activist arrested repeatedly at Hancock Field Air National Guard Base in Syracuse for protesting Reaper drone operations.
Birth-year sources
- School of the Americas Watch prisoner roster — identifies Syracuse activist Ed Kinane as 53 at the November 17, 1997 action.
- Mondoweiss profile — identifies the same Syracuse organizer and former SOA prisoner as 74 on August 6, 2019. The two dated ages establish 1944 as his birth year; no unsupported month or day was assigned.
Earlier line-crossing sentencing context distinct from sign alteration
Lorraine Krofchok’s January 21,1998 trial report, printed in the May 1998 newsletter on original page3, individually quotes this defendant in the Fort Benning line-crossing proceedings. It reports six-month terms and $3,000 fines in the collective sentencing account, with twenty-two to go to jail alongside three previously sentenced. This is not the separate September 1997 SOA sign-alteration prosecution currently recorded with a later 1998 prison phase. The article’s subsequent twenty-person March 23 reporting roster does not include this name; its common intake date must not be copied here. A remark in a collective sentencing report is not by itself a physical-prison admission or proof of a completed six-month term. No actual release, individual exact sentence date, new jail interval or numeric counter is inferred.
Grandmothers for Peace International, May 1998 newsletter, original pages 3–4.
The Pardon Attorney’s April 15, 1998 letter says Bichsel, Eilerman, Kinane and Trotochaud had not yet begun the November 1997 protest sentences while awaiting sentencing in another case. It is therefore unsafe to copy the other defendants’ common March 23 intake date onto these four. Mike Lowry’s October 21 letter distinguishes the September 1997 sign-alteration prosecution and reports that their six-month line-crossing terms were ordered consecutive to the sign-case terms. A clemency request is not a grant, and nominal consecutive sentences are not proof of an equivalent amount of actual service.
The legacy sign-case row’s September 1997 arrest cannot also be the start of uninterrupted imprisonment through 1999: the April 1998 Justice Department letter says he was still awaiting sentencing and had not begun the sentence. That row’s unsupported admission and 671-day counter are removed. The other detailed custody row and its endpoints remain separate pending reconciliation; neither row should be added as a second served term for the same events.
Clinton Library, April 15, 1998 Pardon Attorney letter, PDF page 58.
The clemency petition identifies October 5, 1998 as Kinane’s actual federal prison entry. It distinguishes a six-month trespass sentence from an additional ten-month property-damage term.
The Nuclear Resister individually names Ed Kinane among nine people arrested on November 13, 2023 during a blockade of the General Dynamics–Electric Boat engineering complex in New London, Connecticut. The report gives charges of criminal trespass, criminal mischief and breach of the peace. It states that those arrested were processed at the New London police station for up to seven hours and then released; that group maximum is not assigned as this person’s individual completed duration. The November 27 arraignment was prospective, not a documented outcome. No overnight jail admission or imprisonment-day total is inferred. The Nuclear Resister, November 14, 2023.
Upstate Drone Action’s same-day report names Ed Kinane among six people arrested and taken to jail on September 24, 2019 while standing at Hancock Field’s main gate in Syracuse. Their protest followed a U.S. drone strike that killed Afghan pine-nut workers. The report does not establish the individual charge, jail location, court outcome or release date.
Upstate Drone Action statement reproduced by The Nuclear Resister, September 24, 2019.
Upstate Drone Action names Ed Kinane among eight people arrested at Hancock Airbase on June 20, 2019. Ed Kinane’s participant account says the group was handcuffed, held at the sheriff’s north station, then taken to the downtown Syracuse Justice Center, booked and placed in jail clothing. In the early evening, public defenders entered not-guilty pleas before a judge identified only as Murphy. All eight faced trespass and disorderly-conduct violations and misdemeanor obstruction of government administration. After returning to the holding cell they were physically released on their own recognizance sometime after 10:30 p.m. that same day. No conviction, sentence or numerical time-served total is established here; the scheduled June 25–26 hearings were prospective.
Upstate Drone Action and Ed Kinane, reproduced by The Nuclear Resister, June 20, 2019.
The October 25, 2012 Hancock report names Ed Kinane among four arrestees released on their own recognizance after DeWitt Town Court hearings. All seventeen had been charged with trespass and disorderly conduct and served with protection orders concerning Earl A. Evans. This account does not assign Kinane the jail custody it describes for thirteen other protesters.
A separate December 14 report says Judge Jokl convicted Ed Kinane and ten other defendants of trespass on December 13 over the June 28 Hancock action. Kinane received fifteen days in jail and began serving immediately at Onondaga County Jail. The report supplies no actual discharge date or completed duration for that later sentence phase.
The September 25, 2017 Upstate Drone Action account individually names Ed Kinane among seven people arrested at Hancock Air Force Base while delivering an indictment and blocking the entrance with a large dollar-sign prop. The report states that all seven were released within an hour and charged with trespass and disorderly conduct. It announces future October arraignments, without establishing any jail admission, conviction or sentence. No complete day of imprisonment is inferred.
The contemporary Jerry Berrigan Memorial Drone Blockade report individually names Ed Kinane among twelve people arrested at Hancock Field on January 28, 2016. It reports one misdemeanor and two violations for each participant without naming those offenses. An individual jail admission, physical release, imposed sentence and completed custody duration are not established by this account. Contemporary report, The Nuclear Resister.
The contemporary roster individually names this participant among 27 people arrested on the White House sidewalk on April 10, 2011 during a die-in calling for closure of the School of the Americas. The report does not specify an individual charge, jail admission, release date or detention duration. Contemporary report.
The editor’s note accompanying Kinane’s April 18, 2011 essay reports that he had recently been arrested with more than thirty others at Quantico while protesting Chelsea Manning’s captivity. It supplies no individual arrest day, charge, jail admission, release date or detention duration. Essay and editor’s note.
The sheriff’s roster reproduced with the April 22, 2011 Hancock Field protest report individually named Ed Kinane among the people arrested outside the base in the anti-drone demonstration. The article reports trespassing and obstruction-of-justice charges. It describes handcuffs, a wait, and boarding a bus intended for Justice Center processing; it does not establish an individual jail-admission or release time.
Sources: The Nuclear Resister, report 893.
The March 2017 report states that a New York jury acquitted James Ricks, Daniel Burns, Brian Hynes and Ed Kinane of all charges arising from their March 19, 2015 protest at Hancock. The article does not state the exact calendar day of the verdict. Contemporary report, The Nuclear Resister.
The contemporary report names John Amidon, Ed Kinane, Jules Orkin and Bev Rice among those arrested at Hancock on December 23, 2016. Its update reports their later release with trespass, two disorderly-conduct counts and obstruction of governmental administration charges; it does not give a precise physical-release day. Contemporary report, The Nuclear Resister.
The September 21, 2015 Hancock drone-base report individually names Ed Kinane among five people arrested during the gate blockade and released around noon that day. The reported charges were trespass and disorderly conduct. The announced October 14 hearing was prospective; no final court outcome or measured whole-day imprisonment is established here.
Sources: Contemporary report.
The March 19, 2015 Hancock report names Ed Kinane among seven people arrested after blocking the base gate with oversized books representing anti-war and human-rights texts. It does not establish this person’s individual statutory charge, release date, admission date or detention duration. The activists’ citizens’ indictment is distinguished from an indictment issued by a court.
Sources: Contemporary report.
