Five protesters were arrested for trespassing in front of a military recruiting center in Lansing as part of an anti-war rally Monday afternoon.
About 30 members of the No More War, No More Lies anti-war campaign organized the two-hour protest at the U.S. Army Recruiting office in Edgewood Plaza, at the corner of South Cedar Street and Miller Road.
Protesters blocked the front door to the center. Military officials who were unable to enter the center tried to pry the blocked front door open.
A small squabble broke out, and the front door handle to the recruiting center broke off after enraged bystanders and nearby business owners attempted to move three of the protesters out of way from impeding the center's entrance.
In addition, protesters John Masterson and Kathie Kuhn used their own ladder to gain access to the roof of the recruiting center.
In an effort to protest the ongoing Iraq war and military recruiting practices, the two Lansing residents waved a banner reading, "Recruiting for Lies, Based on Lies."
After refusing to cooperate with police, a Lansing Fire Department ladder truck was called in to get them down.
"We want to bring the troops home," Masterson said. "We care about the people in Iraq. The troops and the people deserve the truth about what's going on.
"We're in this for the long haul."
Masterson, a retired MSU mathematics professor, Kuhn and the three protesters blocking the door were apprehended peacefully and placed into custody, said Lansing police Lt. Bruce Ferguson.
"They were given a choice to leave, and they didn't want to," Ferguson said. "It was their choice to be arrested."
Sayrah Namaste, Mike McCurdy and Charlie Nash were the remaining three arrested for obstructing the center's entrance. The arrested protesters are all Lansing residents, except Namaste, who is from East Lansing.
The protest was in unison with other anti-war rallies held throughout the country marking the three-year anniversary of the Iraq war.
Statistics reading "42 percent of your income tax goes to the military" and "72 percent of troops in Iraq want to go home" were emblazoned on the center's tinted glass window by the protesters.
Officials at the recruiting center were not available to comment later Monday afternoon.
Jim Kowalski, owner of Cobra Force Street Self-Defense Academy, 6250 S. Cedar St., believed that the group was entitled to their opinions, but saw that the protest crossed the line.
"They have no right, I mean absolutely no right to paste those plastic signs onto the window," Kowalski said, who was one of the many urging the protesters to move. "That's vandalization."
With his self-defense academy a couple stores down, Kowalski's main concern was that the demonstration disrupted other businesses surrounding the recruiting center, including his own.
"Protest all you want, just get out of the way," he said.
Local businessman Todd Aldrich saw the display and wanted to buy some coffee for the people inside the recruiting center for "putting up with the protesters."
Aldrich was visibly shaken after getting into a heated shouting match about the rally's implications and tactics with one of the protesters.
"What (the protesters) are doing is just attempting to prolong the war," he said. "Our current situation in Iraq does resemble Vietnam. But it's plain and simple that our troops need our support to persevere."
