At UCI, anti-Israel disruptors will face DA

Campus police at University of California Irvine plan to refer anti-Israel event disruptors to Orange County prosecutors, as soon as campus police investigation concludes, according to a UCI spokesperson.

If so, UCI will be the second UC campus, after UCLA, to refer loud and raucous anti-Israel disruptors to prosecutors for violation of California’s statutes prohibiting disruption of public meetings, disturbing the peace, and conspiracy to do either.

After the police referral relating to a disruption on May 3, 2018, it will be up to District Attorney Tony Rackauckas to decide whether prosecution should ensue. Rackauckas previously made news with the 2011 prosecution and conviction of the “Irvine 11,” who disrupted Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren in 2010 when he spoke at UCI.

About 40 minutes into a UCI College Republicans-hosted panel discussion with Israeli Reservists on Duty, a parade of anti-Israel agitators filed in to stage a well-orchestrated and unruly disruption, using a bullhorn and shouting derogatory chants. The disruption was documented in videos. After the disruptors were ushered out, the noise continued to disrupt from the corridor, according to the videos.

If the UCIPD refers the case for prosecution, it will be an enormous turnabout for a campus where many feel the university administration itself stage-manages such disruptions.

“To many of us in the room, it seemed very suspicious — as if the entire disruption was pre-arranged in advance with the administration and the UCIPD,” said Kimo Gandall, president of the College Republicans. “The disruptors were allowed in, protested loudly for about 10 minutes, and then all left on cue when given a hand signal by the UCIPD to leave.”

Debbie Glazer, a leading local attorney in StandWithUs’s pro bono legal network who attended the event, echoed a similar sentiment, stating it appeared the UCI police or administration “enabled” or “helped to facilitate” the disruptive incident.

In one of the videos, at minute 43:08, UCI Dean of Students Rameen Talesh can be seen casually whispering to one of the main disruptors. A little more than a minute later, the student puts his hat on and prepares to leave. Twenty seconds later, the disruptors begin a room-wide coordinated exit en masse, with police simultaneously giving a hand sign pointing to the corridor. Protestors then continued their loud disruption in the corridor, overseen by uniformed UCI police.

A UCI spokesperson explained that Talesh said he had “asked the protesters to stop disrupting the speaker and the event, or else the situation would escalate to UCIPD action, given the amplified sound and disruption of the club event.”

A May 31, 2017 special UCI Senate report on campus police conduct describes an entrenched system designed to enable protest and even shield protestors from criminal referral. 

A university spokesperson stressed that the UCI Senate probe is “just a report written for the academic UCI Senate. It does not reflect official police policy.”

Pro-Israel activist Barry Forman filmed his attempt to lodge an official complaint with a policeman during the May 3 disruption. He can be heard on the tape — over protestor tumult — quoting legal statutes. In addition, Forman’s efforts to get Talesh to instruct police to act were also rebuffed, as seen on one of Forman’s unpublished videos.

“In the middle of the event, they asked me what to do? I asked for police to take action,” Gandall recalled. “An officer responded, ‘If they had to detain somebody, they would have end our event.’ Later, I spoke to a different officer who asked me what happened? I told him in words what he could see in front of his own eyes.”

In 2010, when Ambassador Oren spoke at UCI, police immediately removed protestors without giving them time to cause a disruption.

Critics have suggested that police were willing to take action only at large and prominent events, such as the 2010 Oren speech that was sponsored by the Jewish Federation.

A UCI spokesperson insisted there was no advance collaboration between the disruptors and the UCI police or administration, adding, “The event management tried to de-escalate that day. But, now, we are actively taking steps.”