Convicted Branch Davidians Defy Judge : Courts: With sentencing expected today, defendants hurl insults, challenge the legal system’s authority over them. Their lawyers plead for leniency.

Convicted members of the Branch Davidian cult, awaiting sentencing for their roles in the deaths of four federal agents, hurled insults at a federal judge Thursday and blamed the government for the ill-fated raid on their compound outside Waco, Tex., last year.

The defiant courtroom statements by the cult members followed pleas from their defense lawyers to U.S. District Judge Walter Smith Jr. that he show leniency toward them for their convictions on weapons violations last February.

Following a seven-week trial, 11 Davidians were acquitted of the most serious charges of murder and murder-conspiracy. But the same jury convicted eight of them on lesser charges of voluntary manslaughter and carrying a weapon in the commission of a crime. Some of the Davidians could receive prison terms as long as 40 years. Smith said that he would impose sentences this morning.

Diminishing their lawyers’ pleas for leniency, some of the cult members challenged Smith’s right to sentence them. One compared him to Pontius Pilate, the Roman official who sentenced Jesus Christ to be crucified.

“We do not feel that justice has been done,” said Livingston Fagan, 34, a former British social worker. “This court does not recognize--as another court failed to recognize 2,000 years ago--the spiritual aspects of this situation.”

Another cult member, Renos Avraam, 29, a former British businessman, asked Smith: “How can I believe you’re an impartial judge? You know, judge, you are going to be judged. And I hope your record is squeaky clean.”

Declaring that “I would like to bring back the jury and ask them some questions,” Avraam demanded of Judge Smith: “Are you saying you are the constitutional officer?”

“I have jurisdiction over crimes committed here,” Smith replied evenly. But when the defendant demanded answers to more questions, an exasperated Smith shook his head and told him sternly: “Make statements but don’t ask me questions.”

Although none of the defendants took the witness stand at their trial, seven addressed the court Thursday.

All defended their resistance on Feb. 28, 1993, when dozens of Treasury Department agents stormed their compound in an effort to serve a search warrant on cult leader David Koresh for alleged possession of illegal weapons. After a 51-day standoff, the FBI entered the compound with armored vehicles and tear gas. A subsequent fire, which the government says the cult members started, burned down the frame buildings. Koresh and more than 80 of his followers died, some shot by their own weapons, according to a government report.

Fagan brought applause and cries of “amen” from a courtroom packed with family members and friends of the defendants when he said: “We do not accept this notion, this facade, that somehow we have agreed with this sentencing. We know we are innocent.”

Among those who spoke in court, the most conciliatory was Kevin Whitecliff, 32, who told the judge: “I hope you show as much mercy as you can on all of us in the group. I think that law enforcement officers should have considered there were mothers and babies in there.”

Smith explained to the cult members and their supporters that federal judges no longer have “unlimited discretion” in imposing sentences since Congress has adopted sentencing guidelines setting minimum and maximum punishments for most crimes.

On the firearms charges, for example, Smith said that the range is five to 30 years in prison, depending on his determination of whether the cult members deliberately sought out automatic weapons. Voluntary manslaughter, the other charge involved, carries a maximum punishment of 10 years.

Defense attorneys argued that the firearms charges should be considered in the lower range in view of the jury’s determination that no conspiracy to murder federal agents existed.

Outside the courtroom Sara Bain, the jury forewoman, told reporters that the jury did not have a clear understanding of what was involved in the firearms charges.