JAMESTOWN — JAMESTOWN — “Silence is betrayal,” “End chemical warfare,” “Democracy for all” and “Honor Dr. King and the right to protest oppression” were just some of the signs carried by protesters.

Why about two dozen people chose to march two miles on a cold Monday morning from downtown Jamestown into rural Mercer County was straight-forward, according to Werner Lange of the Coalition for Peace in the Middle East.

 “We’re here to try to put an end to one of the major weapons manufacturers whose products have killed countless people,” said Lange, who also is a professor of sociology at Edinboro University of Pennsylvania. “It’s time to put a spotlight on it.”

The protesters picketed peacefully Monday in front of Combined Systems Inc. of Jamestown, a maker of tear gas, smoke munitions, other non-lethal and lethal munitions and crowd-control devices. The company’s production complex is located two miles west of the borough on Route 58.

The company’s security director said Monday that company officials were out of town and would have no comment on the protest. Messages left for company officials by the Tribune on Friday and Monday did not get a response.

CSI’s products are used by armed forces, homeland security agencies, law enforcement and corrections departments around the world.

The protesters chose Monday — Martin Luther King Day in the U.S. — to make a statement against CSI, its tear gas and use of the gas by governments in Egypt, Tunisia, Israel, Yemen and elsewhere. The Rev. Dr. King was a minister who worked through non-violence to improve civil rights in the U.S.

Monday’s marchers sang “We Shall Overcome,” the anthem of the U.S. civil rights movement fostered by King in the late 1950s and early 1960s, several times during their protest.

Scores of people have been fatally injured around the world by CSI’s products — either by being struck by a tear gas canister at close range or an over-inhalation of the fumes, according to the protesters.

“We’re protesting the wholesale slaughter of the innocent by poisonous gas,” Lange said.

As peaceful revolutions have been happening around the world since last spring, armies and police have increased the use of tear gas to try to suppress peaceful protests, said Sandy Kelson of Conneaut Lake, an attorney and Vietnam veteran who was part of Monday’s march.

“These people are victims of their own governments,” Kelson said. “They’re doing a peaceful protest and they’re being killed by less than lethal weapons. The lesson (to the people from the government) is ‘We will escalate if you don’t back down and live in your place.’”

Two friends from Meadville — Jay Hanes, 54, and Grady Minnis, 30, — learned about Monday’s protest through an article in the Tribune last week and decided to join the march.

“I was astonished by it and what they do here,” Hanes said of CSI and its products. “I had to support the protest.”

“They shouldn’t be in operation,” said Minnis.

Leah Humes of Edinboro said she chose to participate because of brutality not only abroad, but here with police clashes with anti-Wall Street protesters around the country.

“This takes it to the source of people who make the weapons that have hurt or killed people protesting oppression,” said Humes.

While CSI’s tear gas weapons may be legal, they’re being used illegally by different governments, according to Ryan Branagan, president of University of Pittsburgh Students for Justice in Palestine.

“They’re violating the human rights of Palestinians, Egyptians, Yemenis and others,” said Branagan. “I have a moral responsibility to stand up for them.”

That, too, was the theme sounded by Ray Nakley of the Arab-American Community Center in Youngstown, Ohio.

“We live in a free country. We have an obligation to protest what is wrong,” Nakley said. “We’re not wanting to cause trouble as much as wanting them to cease production.”

Following the arrival of the protesters at CSI’s gates, the marchers approached  the company’s headquarters and were met by Richard Christoff, CSI’s director of security.

Christoff accepted a small box containing a symbolic birthday cake from Lange and the others. The cake was for Jacob Kravel, the company’s president and founder, whose birthday was Monday, Lange said. The box contained the names of those killed by CSI products, Lange said.

Christoff said CSI would offer no statement about Monday’s protest.

He said Don Smith, CSI’s chief executive officer, and other high-ranking company officers were unavailable as they were to attend the Shooting, Hunting, Outdoor Trade Show (SHOT Show) and Conference in Las Vegas, Nev., this week.

The SHOT Show is the largest and most comprehensive trade show for all professionals involved with the shooting sports, hunting and law enforcement industries, according to the show’s website. The show runs today through Friday in Las Vegas.



Keith Gushard can be reached at 724-6370 or by email at kgushard@meadvilletribune.com.