Nun Convicted: 83-Year-Old Sister Guilty Of Sabotaging A National Security Facility

Sister Megan Rice, an 83-year-old Tennessee nun, was convicted along with two accomplices on Wednesday for causing damage to a nuclear defense facility last year, Yahoo News reports.

The convicted nun and her two allies broke into the Y-12 National Security Complex and vandalized the walls of a uranium processing plant. The trio cut through fences, hung banners and crime scene tape and "hammered off a small chunk of the fortress-like Highly Enriched Uranium Materials Facility inside the most secure part of the complex," the Washington Post says.

The charges against the nun and the two other men include, "damaging a national defense premises" and causing over $1,000 in damages to government property. Under the sabotage act the nun, now convicted and awaiting sentencing, could face up to 20 years in prison.

The New York Times said the nun showed no remorse for her crime and was glad to have been able to reach one of the more secure parts of the complex.

"My regret was I waited 70 years," the nun said in court. "It is manufacturing that which only causes death."

Various reports are saying that the defense lawyers called the prosecutors overzealous in their case against the nun because they were embarrassed about the break-in.

According to Yahoo the prosecutors told the jury the nun and those with her "disrupted operations, endangered U.S. national security and caused physical damage to the facility."

After the nun was convicted she and her fellow protesters made a request to be let out of jail until sentencing. A judge is scheduled to make a decision on that, next Thursday. Until that time, the nun and the two men will have to stay in jail.

Reports say that the nun and the others "gave their word not to engage in that kind of activity" if released before they are sentenced.