After weeks behind bars, Clint Brant and Matthew James Kunkel were released Thursday into the arms of family members and friends.
The pair of Mohawk protesters, who had been incarcerated since last month, were released this week after a two-day bail review by Superior Court judge Julianne A. Parfett determined neither represented a danger to the community.
"By releasing them, the judge did not believe that they represented a danger to the public," said defence lawyer Sarah Dover Thursday.
Dover said the judge determined the previous detention orders against the pair did not consider the Tyendinaga community.
"And that would be a true measure of whether or not someone would be a danger to the public ... the people of the Tyendinaga community had to be included," in the decision, she said.
There is a court-imposed publication ban on the evidence presented during the course of the review.
Both Brant and Kunkel were released on a range of conditions, including not to attend the quarry on Deseronto Road, which protesters have occupied since early last year.
Brant, 29, is facing six criminal charges following native blockades and heated confrontations in April with police in Deseronto.
Brant's charges stem from three incidents, two of which occurred on the same day.
Charges of dangerous driving, obstructing police, assaulting a police officer and mischief were laid in connection to allegations surrounding the native blockade of several roadways in Deseronto on April 21. On the same day, he was charged with mischief in connection to an incident at the site of a blockade on Slash Road involving an elderly couple.
Brant is also facing an additional charge of uttering threats during an incident along Deseronto Road on April 25 in which provincial police and native demonstrators clashed in the wake of the arrest of well-known protester Shawn Brant.
Twenty-one-year-old Kunkel, meanwhile, is facing three counts of assaulting a police officer, two counts of assault with a weapon (brass knuckles), possession of a prohibited weapon, assault causing bodily harm, wearing a disguise with the intent to commit a criminal offense and resisting arrest.
Initially, he was released after a bail hearing last week, but turned himself in only a few days later after violating his conditions.
The two protesters are among the 16 people facing upward of 60 criminal charges in connection to "events that occurred in and around Deseronto," between April 21 and 26, said provincial police.
The vast majority of those accused are expected to appear in Napanee court later this month to face the charges.