But on most days the defendants' support group is anchored by Mary Smith, the mother of Thomas and Brian Smith.
The trial of the three activists — Liu Ping, Wei Zhongping and Li Sihua — has drawn attention as a gauge of how far the Chinese Communist Party will go to stamp out the nationwide New Citizens Movement, which the three defendants supported.
Before sentencing, the soldiers' private lawyers pleaded for leniency, saying some of the defendants supported aged parents, others were the sole breadwinners in their family, and some of them had served in the army for 10 years, including in foreign peacekeeping missions.
He left room, however, for a right to counsel to be found in other situations, like a hearing where a state lawyer presses a defendant for support payments owed to the state.
Jurors in the federal trial of alleged Silk Road mastermind Ross Ulbricht heard testimony Thursday from a friend who said he offered the defendant technical support early in the site's existence and later purchased drugs through the dark net marketplace.
The 11 defendants – nine support workers and two nurses – admitted 38 charges of either neglect or ill-treatment of five people with severe learning difficulties after being secretly recorded by a reporter for the BBC's Panorama programme.
Part of the appeal for prosecutors is that they do not have to prove that the defendants actually supported terrorist attacks, only that they helped a group tied to terrorism.
Kenneth Carr, acting for two of the defendants but supported by all counsel, made an application in camera for the men's names to be withheld from publication under section 11 of the Contempt of Court Act.
They differed, though, about the role the First Amendment had to play in analyzing the law and whether it should be read to apply only where a defendant intended to support a designated group's terrorist activities.
An appeals court vacated one defendant's "material support" verdict on the grounds that at the time of his actions, they were not recognized as international war crimes.
