Irvine 11 Found Guilty On All Charges

10 of the defendants in the Irvine 11 case have been found guilty of conspiracy and disturbing the peace and were sentenced to three years probation and 55 hours of community service (see the Occupy California website). The other defendant had his charges dropped in exchange for community service after it was found that some of his charges resulted from a confidential email between him and his attorney, obtained by the District Attorney’s office, that should not have been made available to the court.

The Irvine 11 are Muslim students from UC Irvine who were arrested for disrupting a speech on campus by Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren. It should be pointed out that they only heckled the ambassador for a few minutes, while Oren cut his own speech short in order to attend the LA Lakers game.

The idea that they were guilty of conspiracy and disturbing the peace is absurd. Heckling is a time honored form of free speech. While it may be offensive to some, it was done nonviolently and politely, as the students consistently referred to Oren as “Sir.” It should also be pointed out the Zionist students have disrupted Muslim Student Union events and heckled their speakers while police have looked on, without arresting or charging the Zionist students for conspiracy, disturbing the peace or anything else.

Students Face Up To 2 Years For Heckling

The Irvine 11 trial began this week in Southern California (for background, see here, here and here). The Irvine 11, Muslim students from the University of California Irvine and Riverside, face up to two years in prison (according to the Electronic Intifada), for heckling the ambassador from Israel, Michael Oren, when he spoke at UC Irvine last year. Interestingly, both the prosecution and defense are arguing free speech.

The prosecution is arguing that the protestors prevented Oren from exercising his free speech rights, while the defense is arguing that they the defendants were exercising their free speech rights by heckling him. The prosecution says that there were clearly articulated rules for debate delineated before Oren’s speech and that the protestors violated these rules, according to the Daily Pilot. However, heckling, by definition, knows no rules, yet it is still a time-honored and judicially defensible form of free-speech. Furthermore, the defendants, all of whom are Muslim, seemed to be singled out because of their faith, rather than their actions, considering that Israeli and Jewish protestors on campus who had engaged in similar tactics were never charged or prosecuted.

Aside from the fact that it is a horrendous waste of resources to prosecute these students at all simply for heckling someone, let alone threaten them with two years in prison for it, it is highly unlikely they can receive a fair trial in conservative Orange County. Out of a pool of 400 potential jurors, several expressed outright hostility toward Muslims and Arabs. Furthermore, the overwhelming consensus in this country, perpetuated by politicians and the media, is that Israel is completely justified in doing whatever it sees fit to “protect” itself from “terrorism” by Palestinians, despite the fact that the blockade of Gaza is illegal under international law, and the Israeli siege of Gaza resulted in the slaughter of 1,400 Palestinians, most of whom were innocent children, women and men.

Small Victory for Irvine 11

The Irvine 11 won a small victory this week when an Orange County Superior Court judge ordered the district attorney's office to remove its main investigator and three top deputies from the case. The dismissal of the prosecutors came in response to the D.A.'s unauthorized use of privileged documents to build a case against the UC Irvine and UC Riverside students who are charged with conspiracy to disrupt a speech by Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren.

The lead investigator, Paul Kelly had inappropriately obtained 20,000 pages of privileged communications between the students and their defense attorney, Reem Salahi, the Los Angeles Times reported today. The documents were being used to bring new charges against one of the students. Now the Orange County district attorney must prove that none its evidence was obtained through privileged information, Wilson ruled.

(For more on the Irvine 11 case, please see here and here).

Free Speech Loses Again—Irvine 11 Case Will Not Be Tossed

A judge last week denied a motion to dismiss charges against the Irvine 11, a group of students from the University of California Irvine and Riverside campuses who disrupted a speech by Israeli ambassador Michael Oren at UC Irvine in February, the Daily Pilot reported today. The defense argued the laws cited by the Orange County district attorney's office were not applicable because the law only prohibits disruptions of meetings that are not political or religious in nature. Oren’s speech on U.S.-Israeli relations was clearly political. Judge Peter Wilson, however, disagreed.

The students, members of the Muslim Student Unions at UCI and UC Riverside, had been arrested and were later released. The university administration also temporary suspended the clubs and forced the students to perform community service. The D.A. also filed criminal charges accusing the students of conspiring to disrupt the public meeting. However, the students claim they had not planned on disrupting the meeting.

Students Protest Grand Jury Subpoenas of the Irvine 11

In conservative Orange County, California, more than 50 protesters — some with tape over their mouths — protested in front of the district attorney's office Tuesday, trying to stop the subpoenas and grand jury investigation against 11 students who disrupted a speech by the Israeli ambassador last year.

The Irvine 11 had disrupted a talk by Micheal Oren, the Israeli ambassador to the U.S., by shouting over him, forcing him to stop in the middle of his speech. Eventually they were arrested and removed by the police.

The dean of UC Irvine’s law school, Erwin Chemerinsky, said that what the students did was “not freedom of expression. . . I favor them being punished by the university because what they did was wrong.” However, it was freedom of expression; he just didn’t happen to like their message or style. What the students did was heckle the ambassador, a form of protest with a long tradition in this country, engaged in by many, including politicians of both parties. To his credit, though, the dean did contest the use of a grand jury, stating that the university’s discipline was sufficient.

As a result of the incident, the Muslim Student Union was suspended by the university for one year, one of the only times that the school has banned a student group for anything other than hazing  or alcohol abuse. This excessive disciplinary action by the university, and especially the use of the grand jury by the county, is already having a chilling effect on student free speech. Many have expressed shock at the excessiveness of the response and are questing whether it is safe to particpate in protests in the future .