NAPANEE - Robert Lovelace holds a dignified presence even when he is dressed in an orange, correctional service centre jumpsuit.
He stands up straight, offers a smile and a nod from behind the glass of the visitor's booth, and politely waits for a Citizen reporter to introduce himself before he begins to speak.
The retired Ardoch Algonquin First Nation chief has been in the custody of the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services since Feb. 15.
Mr. Lovelace, 59, was found guilty of being in contempt of court and sentenced to six months in jail, because he defied a court order by staging protests at a potential uranium mining site near Clarendon Station during the fall and late summer of last year.
"I'm not in jail for a crime," he said in an interview from Napanee's Quinte Detention Centre on Thursday.
An Oakville-based company, Frontenac Ventures Corporation, is exploring the 5,000-hectare site to see if mining for uranium will be possible.
But the company has faced opposition from the Ardoch Algonquin and Shabot Obaadjiwan First Nations, as well as from area residents, every step of the way.
Last summer, protesters from both aboriginal groups formed a "tent city" and blockade at the entrance to the site, preventing Frontenac Ventures from accessing the property.
They were eventually ordered by Justice Douglas Cunningham to leave the site, and Frontenac Ventures began civil contempt proceedings against them last fall.
On Feb. 15, Mr. Lovelace, along with his Ardoch Algonquin co-chief, Paula Sherman, were each found guilty of being in contempt of court.
Ms. Sherman, who is a single mother of three, was fined $15,000, but was not required to serve time in jail, after agreeing to obey the wishes of the court.
Mr. Lovelace was fined $25,000 and was required to serve six months in jail.
They undertook a defence based on the premise that the Ontario Mining Act was unconstitutional, but it was thrown out in court. And because they were found in contempt by the judge, Mr. Lovelace has little recourse he can pursue in the courts.
"Because I was found in contempt, our counterclaim and our defence was thrown out of court," he said.
"Judge Cunningham won't even hear them."
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Since being placed in custody, Mr. Lovelace said he has heard whispers that Frontenac Ventures brought drills to the Clarendon Station site, which sits about 12 kilometres north of Highway 7.
A drive to the Sharbot Lake-area site finds fewer protest signs lining homes along the side of Highway 509 than were there a few months back; but several remain in place.
On Thursday afternoon, an OPP cruiser sits across the road from where the former tent city used to be.
The two on-duty officers say they are "monitoring" the site, something OPP officers have been doing every day since the initial protest last summer.
It is a convenient place: the Sharbot Lake police station, housed in a converted bungalow, is just east of Highway 509 on Highway 7.
The on-duty officers can't confirm if drills have been brought on site, but they said they don't believe any have arrived yet.
Frontenac Ventures president and chief executive officer George White denies that drills have been brought to the site.
"It hasn't happened," he said yesterday.
On the west side of the road where the tent city was in full swing last summer, the signs and temporary buildings are gone. The remnants were removed after the jailing of Mr. Lovelace, as part of the conditions the other protesters agreed to last week in order to avoid being jailed.
A black and yellow sign on a wire fence at the entrance reminds passersby that the "area (is) under video surveillance."
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The facility where Mr. Lovelace is staying is surrounded by a barbed-wire fence.
Inside the exterior fence, each yellow-sided building is individually surrounded by razor wire.
Inmates are allowed visitors two out of three visiting days per week. In Mr. Lovelace's case, he can see visitors on Thursdays, Saturdays and Mondays.
As of Thursday afternoon, he had two visitors since he began living there: A colleague from Queen's University, where he teaches aboriginal studies, and a visit from a Citizen reporter.
But there have been other forms of support: Amnesty International and members of the Green party have spoken out about his jailing, and a protest is scheduled to be held outside the Quinte Detention Centre today from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Friends have had to take over his classes at Queen's University and Sir Sandford Fleming College because he won't be finishing his teaching duties this semester.
Mr. Lovelace said he is "holding up," but admits it has caused some hardship for his family and friends.
"I guess the thing I miss most is -- I miss my kids," he said. "I miss my wife, I miss my friends, I miss my students."
He and his wife, Stephanie, talk on the phone each night, but the arrangement hasn't been easy.
She says her family is "shocked and really upset."
"I'm just trying to take care of the kids," she said, when she answered her husband's cellphone on Thursday. "It's been really difficult."
The couple have four children, ranging from six to 14.
As Mr. Lovelace noted, the centre where he is staying lacks a visiting facility for families. In that respect, it lags behind the Dairy Queen that sits across the street, which is equipped with an indoor playground.
To pass his time, he is doing a lot of thinking and even a little reading. At present, he is working his way through two selections from the detention-centre library cart: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, by 19th-century German scholar Max Weber, and a Western novel by Louis L'Amour.
"I've always wanted to read some L'Amour, so, it's OK."
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The way Mr. Lovelace sees it, his conviction is the result of "the court being used as a political tool by the corporation," and "archaic" legislation -- the Ontario Mining Act -- which leaves him fighting for the underdog, or the people living in the Sharbot Lake area.
"It's an act that basically gives advantages to a privileged class of people," Mr. Lovelace said. Specifically, he says the act supports businesses such as Frontenac Ventures, or those with the "money to explore, spend and create an open-pit mine more than 30,000 acres in size."
But he admits his decision to keep protesting after a court ordered him and his fellow protesters to stop was a conscious one.
"I didn't anticipate getting six months," he said. "It was a choice that we made."
But according to Mr. White, Justice Cunningham told Mr. Lovelace, his lawyer Chris Reid and Shabot Obaadjiwan representatives Paula Sherman and Chief Doreen Davis last fall that jail was a distinct possibility if they disobeyed the ruling.
"They had fair warning ... and they agreed to disagree, and he is suffering the penalty," Mr. White said yesterday.
There is a way out: The judge told him that if he agrees to recant his opposition to the drilling by Frontenac Ventures, and if he counsels his people not to form any protests at the site, he "can walk free."
"I'm not about to do that," Mr. Lovelace said.
When asked what he thinks people would want to know about his story, Mr. Lovelace said the people in the Ottawa Valley need to think about the future of their land, to oppose any measures they see as being unfit for it and "to love it well."
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Hours after Mr. Lovelace spoke to the Citizen on Thursday, he was moved to the Central East Correctional Centre in Lindsay -- for reasons a Quinte Detention Centre staff member described as "standard procedure."
Mr. Lovelace's lawyer, Chris Reid, said yesterday afternoon he had not been informed his client would be moving facilities.
A message left for Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services spokesman Stuart McGetrick was not immediately returned.