Gaza activists at UC Santa Cruz see the phone seizure and arrest as a shocking attack on free speech

As protests against Israel’s war in Gaza have resumed at UC Santa Cruz, several incidents this month involving campus police cracking down on student activism left many students at the university angry and on high alert.

On October 1, lawyers claim police “illegally” confiscated a student activist’s phone. On Monday, police arrested a student after she used a megaphone during a rally in Quarry Plaza. The next day, police told the graduate students that if they used one they would be arrested for disturbing the peace.

The attorney for the student whose phone was confiscated, Rachel Lederman, senior attorney at the Center for Protest Law & Litigation, said she sees these incidents as examples of the university punishing students for their activism on Palestine.

“I think college activism has been important throughout history in bringing about social change,” she said. “Universities can crack down and try to suppress student free speech, but I don’t think they will succeed in stopping young people from raising their voices against injustice, and we will do everything we can to to ensure this.” Students can express themselves on topics that concern them.”

The increased police enforcement measures come after the University of California sent a message to its campuses earlier this academic year banning encampments like those at UCSC last spring, blocking pathways and masking to conceal the identity of the Protesters demanded. Although these policies are in effect at all campuses, Lederman and students say the recent enforcement at UCSC appears to be unusual and unique in the UC system.

“Santa Cruz has been one of the toughest in the last year in terms of all the arrests, conduct allegations and everything else,” Lederman said.

Rebecca Gross, president of the graduate union at UCSC, told Lookout that she had been in touch with her union’s statewide leadership about the student’s arrest, as well as her own interaction with an officer at Tuesday’s rally — when she was told that she and others who do so could be arrested for using a megaphone.

“I haven’t heard anything about this happening at other locations this week,” she said. “As far as I know, this is the highest level of repression we’re seeing across the state.”

Fourth-year Nicolas Robles, vice president of student life for the student government, told Lookout that it was “disheartening” to see the university take these latest actions.

“It just makes me angry at the university because they don’t care about the students at all,” he said. “They used excessive force against a single student in a free speech zone in Quarry Plaza.”

Lookout asked campus spokesman Scott Hernandez-Jason and Police Chief Kevin Domby why police approached the student and why enforcement was necessary on her since she was one of several students using a megaphone and one of many who wore a mask. Domby did not respond to requests for comment.

“Campus security officers addressed an individual who violated university policy on Monday afternoon,” Hernandez-Jason wrote via email. “The individual refused to identify himself to officers and attempted to leave. When officers attempted to arrest the individual, the individual resisted and physically attacked the officers. The individual was arrested and transported to the county jail.”

He pointed to the university’s “time, place and manner” conduct policy, which sets limits on behavior, including when people can participate in “expressive activities.”

Hernandez-Jason did not respond to repeated requests to clarify the specific charges police had given the student, but wrote that “the police investigation is ongoing and arraignment is expected to occur next week.”

He also did not respond to questions about the behavior that allegedly violated university policy, when and why police involvement was necessary and whether clarification was required during a rally that reportedly took place without public safety incident instead of enforcement was attempted.

Lookout has filed a request for records of the officers’ body camera footage during the arrest.

Rally for graduate students

On Tuesday, the day after the arrest, Gross said she and about 50 other graduate students gathered to hold a rally to criticize the administration for calling on police to raid the Palestine Solidarity Camp in the spring, as well as the university’s declarations of intent to fire four graduate students for their participation in the spring strike.

They were about to begin their rally in Quarry Plaza and line up with a speaker and microphone when Dean of Students Garrett Naiman told them they could be violating student misconduct policy if they used the microphone.

Gross said while she was relaying the message to the group of graduate students, UCSC Police Lt. Greg Flippo approached her.

“[He] came up to us while we were having our little meeting on the sidelines and threatened us with arrest. He also informed us about the time, place and behavior restrictions. I said, ‘Well, I was just told by the administration that this was just a violation of student conduct and not a violation of any law,'” she recalled. “And he said, ‘No, it would be a violation of Penal Code 415’.” [disturbing the peace].”

Gross said while she was talking to the officer, Naiman returned. Then he and Flippo walked away from the students. Despite these interactions, the graduate students continued their rally and used the megaphone without any further interactions or enforcement actions, according to Gross.

“I feel very well protected – [while] stand up for free speech – through the union,” she said. “I got to the point where I felt like if they tried to arrest me or slap me for student behavior for just talking in a public part of campus, then I would let them have it. “

The “illegal” confiscation

Lederman, the attorney for the student whose phone was confiscated, is part of a legal team representing her, another student and a UCSC professor in a lawsuit filed last month against the university over campus bans imposed on them following her arrest in Year 2010 protests were imposed last spring.

“Because there are definitely attorney-client telephone communications related to our lawsuit, and we are suing both the police chief and the UCSC administration in the lawsuit, we don’t believe they should be allowed to look at these things. ” she said.

Lederman said her client, Laaila Irshad, is one of three students whose phones have been confiscated by police so far this year. She said the other two students’ phones were confiscated in June, but she did not have details about those cases.

Lederman said she filed a motion Friday as part of that lawsuit asking the court to vacate the search warrant for the phone, unseal the search warrant because most of it is sealed, and order police to destroy the contents they used . I received it from the phone.

“All we know is that they claim this search is related to some type of vandalism incident, but that’s all we know about it,” she said. “And the thing is, the search warrant is just incredibly broad. There is no time limit. It covers everything from the moment she first acquired the phone to the present, and essentially it entitles her to view everything on her phone.”

Lederman said the judge “should not have signed the warrant” because it did not set a time limit and did not specify what police could take from it.

She said Irshad had not been tried or charged with vandalism. She was among the students arrested May 31 when UCSC dispersed the Gaza protest camp on campus and received a citation for failure to disperse, but prosecutors have not yet filed formal charges.

“We truly believe this is an act of retaliation against them,” Lederman said. “(A) because she was a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the university for its illegal banning of students and faculty from campus and/or (B) because it retaliated against her for her activism against the war on Gaza.”

Lederman said a judge could rule on the motion at a Dec. 19 hearing in that lawsuit.

Lookout asked UCSC Chancellor Cynthia Larive, campus Provost Lori Kletzer and Police Chief Domby about the phone seizures, Monday’s arrest and Tuesday’s rally, but did not immediately receive a response.

Do you have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor as part of our policy. Guidelines here.