Three men involved in pro-Palestianian protests on the UC Irvine campus nearly two years ago refused to leave as ordered by law enforcement, a prosecutor told jurors Monday, but the defendants’ attorneys said the police had no right to end the demonstrations.
Adel Shaker Hijazi, 42, Malik Alrefai, 25, and Jacob Andrew Hernandez, 33, are all charged with misdemeanor refusal to disperse from the May 15, 2024, protests on the campus.
Deputy District Attorney Matthew Bradbury said the three are among 49 arrested when law enforcement shut down protests, which started April 29, 2024, in the aftermath of Israel’s response to the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks.
The protests at UCI were peaceful and included students camping out with tents in the physical sciences quad, Bradbury said. But that changed on May 15, 2024, when a lecture hall was barricaded, he said.
The protesters began using “items” from their protest to “block the police, and the administration, from getting into that building,” Bradbury said in his opening statement of the trial. Campus police responded and worked to “try to figure out why this lecture hall is being barricaded,” Bradbury said.
The prosecutor pointed to a “human chain” and wooden pallets used to block the way into the building. He also showed jurors how the doors had been tied shut from the inside.
Police ultimately issued a dispersal order about 3 p.m., Bradbury said.
The prosecutor also showed jurors video of a protester replacing a wooden pallet blocking a door after police removed it.
“This is no longer a peaceful, passive protest of rights,” Bradbury said.
He noted that law enforcement did not immediately move to arrest protesters.
“They had been monitoring, watching, taking notes,” he said. “Now it was time to go home. … And that is what this case is about.”
The law enforcement response was “highly, highly restrained,” Bradbury said, but he said the three defendants “repeatedly refused” to leave the area.
Alrefai was still on scene at 6 p.m, Hernandez was there at 7 p.m., and Hijazi was at the protest at 7:24 p.m., Bradbury said. There was no evidence they resisted police, “but that’s not what this case is about,” he added.
Melody Haddad of the Alternate Defender’s Office, who represents Hijazi, said, “This case rests on our First Amendment rights to free speech and assembly.”
Haddad said the only violence on the day in question came from law enforcement.
“They’re not a threat to public safety,” she said of protesters. “It was not an unlawful assembly. They’re acting within their First Amendment rights.”
James Henshaw of the Alternate Defender’s Office, who represents Alrefai, said, “In this country, law enforcement doesn’t get to decide how long someone can express their First Amendment rights.”
Henshaw said law enforcement that responded on May 15 “made assumptions” about what was happening in the lecture hall “and a rush to judgment.”
He said evidence in the case will show prosecutors cannot prove the protest was an “unlawful assembly.”
Henshaw showed jurors photos of the protest suggesting it was as tranquil, as it had been since it popped up on April 29 of that year. One of the first responders “knows there’s no classes going on in that” lecture hall, Henshaw said.
There was no violence or threat of violence before law enforcement responded to the scene, Henshaw said.
The gathering took a disturbing turn about 5:45 p.m. when “hundreds of law enforcement came to the scene” as they responded to calls for assistance from the UCI police, Henshaw said.
Madeline Hart of the Orange County Public Defender’s Office, who represents Hernandez, said her client was on scene as a photo journalist.
The three defendants should be found not guilty “because they were present at a lawful, peaceful protest,” Hart said.
And that is especially true for Hernandez, the defense attorney added.
“He was there to take photos,” she said.
“And as a member of the press he cannot be charged with a failure to disperse,” Hart said.
Hart showed jurors video of her client being arrested as he was struck with a baton and zip-tied.
“Five or six officers tackling my client,” she said. “The only `weapon’ he had was a camera. … He’s walking by and grabbed by police, tackled and beaten.”