On July 1, Orange County Superior Court Judge Peter Wilson ordered the district attorney’s office to remove four officials in the case against the “Irvine 11.” Lead investigator Paul Kelly, Senior Assistant District Attorneys William Feccia and Rebecca Olivieri, and Assistant District Attorney Mike Lubinski were all removed from the Irvine 11 case after Wilson found that the prosecution had obtained privileged documents belonging to the defense and their attorney Reem Salahi. It’s a move that promotes greater fairness in what has been a highly controversial case.
In February 2010, Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren was scheduled to give a 30-minute speech, followed by a brief question-and-answer session, at UCI. Shortly after beginning, however, Oren was interrupted by protests from eight current and former members of the UCI Muslim Student Union and three students from UC Riverside. The students were immediately reprimanded by a school faculty member and soon after, surrendered themselves to police. The Orange County District Attorney’s office charged each of the Irvine 11 with one misdemeanor count of disturbance of a meeting and one misdemeanor count of conspiracy to disturb a meeting. If the defense is found guilty, the Irvine 11 will each face up to six months in jail or probation with community service and fines.
The case hit a snag, though, when Wilson found that the prosecution had somehow gotten hold of attorney-client documents that were classified as privileged. Salahi stated the prosecution had 20,000 privileged documents in their possession and called for the judge to dismiss the case altogether. The judge ignored the request and instead called for the four attorneys to be dismissed from the case immediately. With the attorneys gone, the case will continue as the next hearing is scheduled for July 21 at the Central Justice center in Santa Ana and the trial is set for August 15. Removing the four attorneys from the prosecution was a move that needed to be made in order to give the Irvine 11 a proper and fair trial.
This case has made headlines for a few reasons. First Amendment rights are constantly up for debate in legal cases. What constitutes a violation, what’s covered, what isn’t? This is one of those cases. Clearly the Irvine 11 has a right to free speech, but so does the speaker, Michael Oren. What this case seems to boil down to is whose rights trump the others. Obviously, Oren had the right to speak during his scheduled half-hour speech. The Irvine 11 also had the right to protest. The timing and location of their protest is what made this a controversy. The students decided to protest right after Oren began his speech and they did it from a close enough distance that made it difficult for Oren to continue. Had they protested from a block away, this would be completely different.
What also makes this interesting is the belief that the prospective punishment is too harsh for the actions committed. Should students face up to six months in jail for a protest that didn’t even last ten minutes? And then there’s the fact that these are Muslim students protesting an Israeli speaker. Some have asked if there would even be a trial if these were Caucasian students. Could this be a case of veiled racism? These questions have all contributed to making the Irvine 11 case an interesting one to watch. Ultimately, students have the right to free speech and the right to a fair trial. The fact that the case had been corrupted by the prosecution obtaining privileged documents makes it impossible for these students to receive a fair trial. Therefore, it is absolutely the right decision for Wilson to dismiss the four attorneys.
