UPDATE: All three peace activists who vandalized Y-12 are out of prison. Attorney Marc Shapiro said Michael Walli and Greg Boertje-Obed were released from prison Saturday afternoon. Sister Megan Rice, 85, was released a several hours later.
The release comes after the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals dropped their conviction of sabotage last week. They were convicted with trespassing, damage to government property, and sabotage after spray painting walls and throwing blood on a uranium storage building at Y-12 in Oak Ridge in July of 2012.
"They don't regret doing it at all," said their attorney Bill Quigley, "They are happy that it got the message out about the dangers about nuclear weapons. They are also happy that it got the message out about how vulnerable our nuclear materials are to people who could really do the nation harm. "
"Yes these folks had broken the law. Yes, they had trespassed and done damage to property," said Quigley, "But sabotage was just too much, the United States was not more vulnerable to attack because of their actions."
Quigley and his team filed an appeal to get the sabotage conviction dropped, but it wasn't till this March that the argument was heard.
"The sabotage is an extremely criminal charge," said Quigley, "We always felt that that charge was too serious for people who were non-violent protesters."
The trio will still be re-sentenced on the lesser charges, but it could mean they are out of prison for good for the time already served. Quigley says they are thrilled with the decision and still stand by their actions.
"They had planned to do it, they prayed before they did it, they knew that they were going to be arrested, they knew that they would likely be tried, they expected it," said Quigley.
PREVIOUS STORY:
NASHVILLE - A court has ordered the immediate release of an 85-year-old nun and two fellow anti-nuclear activists who trespassed and defaced a uranium storage building at the Y-12 nuclear weapons complex, an attorney in the case said Friday night.
It wasn't immediately clear Friday night when they might leave prison, where they've been held since May 2013.
Lawyer William Quigley told 10News the court put down the order Friday night.
Attorneys are trying to talk with the U.S. Bureau of Prisons to determine when the actual release will occur.
It could be later Friday or it could be some time this weekend, Quigley told 10news.
Sister Megan Rice is at a facility in Brooklyn, New York; Michael Walli is at a Pennsylvania prison; and Greg Boertje-Obed is being held at Leavenworth Prison in Kansas.
They face re-sentencing July 8 in U.S. District Court in Knoxville, where they were tried.
Last week, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a sabotage conviction against the three for their July 2012 actions at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge. The court left in place a lesser charge.
Attorneys for the defendants on Thursday promptly asked that their clients be released pending resentencing.
Lawyers argue the defendants likely already have served enough time for the convictions that remain in place.
The motion says Rice, 85, suffers from health problems that are not grave but are causing her pain.
On Friday, the government responded that it did not object to their release pending the July hearing, if the court "determines that the potential risk of the defendants over-serving their likely guideline sentences on their remaining convictions constitutes 'exceptional reasons' " under federal law.
