Jerome Zawada

Father Jerome 'Jerry' Zawada OFM was a Franciscan friar of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Province (later the Sacred Heart Province) and a peace activist whose six decades of ministry included extensive work in the Philippines, in Nicaragua during the Contra war, and at U.S. military installations. He was arrested dozens of times across his life, primarily for SOA Watch line-crossings at Fort Benning, Georgia, and for protests at the Nevada Test Site, serving multiple short federal sentences. He died in 2017 at age 80.

Convicted in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Georgia under 18 U.S.C. § 1382 (entering a military reservation) for participating in the School of the Americas Watch (SOA Watch) annual nonviolent civil-disobedience action at Fort Benning, Georgia on September 2002. The action targeted the U.S. Army Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC) — formerly the School of the Americas — which had trained Latin American military officers later linked to assassinations, torture, and massacres including Romero, the four U.S. churchwomen, the Jesuits in El Salvador, El Mozote, and Plan Cóndor. Defendants typically received 3 to 6 months in federal custody plus a fine.