Free Speech Hearing for Palestinian Student Facing Mob Action Charges
Yafa Issa, 18-year-old leader in UIUC Students for Justice in Palestine, takes the stand.
On Friday, January 10, 2025, about 50 people were in the courtroom to support Yafa Issa, U of I Junior and member of Students for Justice in Palestine, charged with felony mob action for the pro-Gaza demonstration on campus. Her lawyer Evan Bruno filed a motion to dismiss citing the First Amendment. After two campus police testified at the hearing, Issa took the stand to testify and bravely defend her actions that day.
A majority of the people in the courtroom were from the local Muslim community. Watching the prosecutor try to get the 18-year-old young woman indict herself on the stand, as a courtroom of Muslim friends and family members looked on, was bad optics.
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Another crowd showed up Wednesday morning, January 15, to support Yafa Issa at a hearing to dismiss charges of mob action against her in defense of the First Amendment.
The prosecutor called a Facilities & Services supervisor to testify that campus workers were called in to dismantle 4-6 tents for concern about damage to the grass. UIPD Sgt. Grant Briggs was the second to testify for the prosecution. He admitted he was not present during the demonstration, but he was asked to respond to video footage of the protest. Yafa’s attorney Evan Bruno got him to admit that police pushed through the protesters. Sgt. Briggs also confessed that there was no method of enforcing a campus policy, which was different than law enforcement, and that this was the “first situation” in his experience.
Bruno argued that the mob action charges had a “chilling effect” on the First Amendment. He claimed the university policy on outdoor structures explicitly said it DID NOT include “tents” or “canopies.”
State’s Attorney Julia Rietz watched for a short time from the back of the room.
Judge Webber will give his ruling on Friday, Jan. 24, at 3:30pm in Courtroom A.