The Occupy Wall Street activist who was found guilty of felony assault for violently elbowing a cop in the eye in Zuccotti Park in March 2012 was sentenced to 90 days in the slammer on Monday.
The felon, Cecily McMillan, received credit for the two weeks she has already served since her conviction, reports the New York Daily News. With good behavior, she won’t have to serve the full three months.
McMillan, who showed up to her Manhattan Supreme Court sentencing hearing sporting a hot pink dress, is the northeast regional organizer for the Young Democratic Socialists of America as well as a graduate student at The New School for Social Research, according to Democracy Now.
In addition to her time in prison, McMillan, 25, must submit to a mental health evaluation.
She’ll also spend the next five years on probation.
Sentencing judge Ronald Zweibel declared that McMillan is “capable of making a positive contribution to society” but stressed that she “was convicted of assaulting a police officer.”
The Occupy Wall Street socialist has been living within the confines of Riker’s Island since her May 5 conviction for sending a sharp elbow into the eye socket of New York City cop Grantley Bovell. He was attempting to arrest her as she was demonstrating on the six-month anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street protests.
McMillan has claimed that the police officer was groping her right breast so she clocked him in a defensive response.
(The blurry video below shows the scene.)
Prosecutors called the self-defense claim a “a fabrication clearly designed to manipulate the system” that “undermined the claims of genuine assault victims,” according to The Village Voice. Prosecutors also suggested that McMillan needs therapy to manage her “anger issues.”
The defense team introduced medical records showing that has been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of the elbowing incident.
Over 50 court security officers showed up for the hearing.
Outside the courthouse, a throng of supporters chanted mantras, sang and waved signs and puppets — just like old times.
A Change.org petition urging leniency had gathered some 169,000 signatures prior to the sentencing.
McMillan was defiant at the hearing.
“As a young girl my mother told me, ‘Cecy, everything you see, your home, your loved ones, even your life, can be taken from you at will. But no one can strip you of your dignity without your consent,'” she said, according to the Voice.
She also spoke about her commitment to nonviolence.
You can read McMillan’s statement in full here.
Prosecutors had sought only a 90-day sentence for McMillan. They also asked for but did not receive a five-hour community service requirement and a fine of $5,000.
The maximum penalty McMillan faced was a seven-year prison sentence. (RELATED: Should Violent OWS Activist Cecily McMillan Go to Prison?)
McMillan’s attorneys have vowed to appeal her conviction.
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