Penn Occupy members acquitted of charges

Three members of the Penn community arrested during the Occupy eviction on Nov. 30 were acquitted of their charges at their trial on April 26.

The case is now closed for School of Policy and Practice assistant professor Toorjo Ghose, College senior Ellie Dugan, former Penn student Will Darwall and 28 other Occupy Philadelphia protesters who were arrested that day. They had faced charges of conspiracy, failure to disperse and obstructing a highway.

“I think we were really in the right constitutionally on all of the issues,” Ghose said.

Attorney Lawrence Krasner represented the members of the Penn community pro bono. Krasner has been dealing with similar cases for the past 10 years.

“We were pretty sure we’d get off,” Ghose said. “I did not think there was any constitutional right the city had to evict us the way they did, to arrest us the way they did.”

Two groups of protesters were arrested on Nov. 30. Most, including Darwall and Dugan, were arrested on North Broad Street in what Krasner called a “procedural issue.” Police had told the group if they moved onto the sidewalk, they would not be arrested. However, when they moved onto the sidewalk, they were still arrested, Krasner said.

Ghose and Pennsylvania AFL-CIO Vice President Jim Savage were arrested in front of Dilworth Plaza. Ghose, unlike most of the others arrested, explicitly refused to move when asked to by police to showcase his First Amendment rights. The police gave Ghose a warning and then arrested him, Ghose said.

“[Ghose and Savage’s case] was tougher because they were more directly defiant in that they weren’t going to move,” Krasner said.

Ghose said he was surprised that he and Savage were not asked to prove their cases more than the group arrested at N. Broad St.

“I’m happy to say the judge thought exactly the way we did, which is that this was the basic Constitutional issues of free speech,” he said.

Krasner expressed a similar sentiment.

“Simply put, free speech is alive and well in Philadelphia and so is Occupy,” he said.

Two other Penn students — College junior Moshe Bitterman and College sophomore Emma Johnson — were arrested on Nov. 30 and charged with the same offenses.

Johnson and Bitterman chose to take the court’s offer to partake in the Accelerated Misdemeanor Program, which required them to pay fines of $199.50 and complete 12 hours of community service. Only 30 percent of the defendants chose to take the AMP option, according to Krasner.

Krasner said his firm has had several defendants from Penn “at all levels.”

“For me, it’s refreshing to see a great academic institution that has people of conscious who are willing to do things that could risk their bright futures,” he said. “Penn should be proud that is has people like that in its midst.”

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