Sunday, May 15, 2011

Judge Protects Muslim Jew-haters, Issues Gag Order

I hope that Americans are getting as sick of the "special treatment" Islamic supremacists get as I am. They shut those of us up who expose their agenda and use the courts to protect their incitement to violence and oppression.

California Judge Peter Wilson has issued a gag order in the case of the twelve Muslim Jew-haters who were arrested for their Nazi-like intimidation and thuggery at a lecture at UC Irvine where Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren came to talk about U.S.-Israel relations.

Oren was interrupted 10 times while trying to give his speech before 500 people at the UCI Student Center, where there was heavy security. Oren took a 20 minute break after the fourth protest, asked for hospitality and resumed his speech, only to be interrupted again by young men yelling at him every few minutes. Many members of the audience also applauded Oren.

Judge issues gag order in Muslim ‘Irvine 11' case The Orange County Register (hat tip Jean)

SANTA ANA – A judge Friday issued a gag order for both sides in the case of Muslim students charged with disrupting a 2010 speech by an Israeli diplomat at UC Irvine.

Orange County Superior Court Judge Peter J. Wilson's ruling came in response to a motion by defense attorneys filed earlier this month seeking to bar prosecutors from making any more public statements about the case.

Lawyers for the students, known as the "Irvine 11," argued in court papers that prosecutors have violated their clients' rights to a fair trial by making "ethically irresponsible" public statements, including wrongly branding the students anti-Semitic and declaring them guilty.

Deputy District Attorney Stephan Sauer objected to Wilson's order, arguing that the students can use "surrogates" at events "to malign the integrity of the District Attorney's Office."

The court's protective order bars all parties, attorneys, law enforcement agencies, judicial employees and others associated with the case from releasing any information about the matter to the public until the case is over or another order is issued.

Wilson also denied a defense request to compel the District Attorney's Office to remove from its website and iPhone app documents prosecutors filed in opposition to removing the office from the case. Students' attorneys argued that portions of the information already out there could be inadmissible at trial.

"Putting exhibits out there on the web is not what transparency is all about," attorney Lane Liroff said.

Another defense attorney, Jacqueline Goodman, called the exhibits already in the public domain "terribly prejudicial."

"It does no good to say no more when the worst of it is already out there," she said.

Prosecutors said they are unaware of any "privileged" information that has been publicly posted.

Wilson said he found no need to go back and "sanitize the record."

"I don't believe this calls for surgical incision on either side," he said.

In February, the defendants filed a motion asking Wilson to remove the district attorney from the case, saying prosecutors illegally issued subpoenas and referred to the case internally as the "UCI Muslim Case," a term they say is evidence of "religious bias" against them. A hearing on that motion is set for June 17.

Prosecutors have denied having any religious or ethnic bias and say the accusations have little merit.

"You have to do some real mental gymnastics to figure out what they're trying to say," Susan Kang Schroeder, chief of staff for the Orange County district attorney has said. "We don't prosecute people based on their religion or ethnicity; we prosecute people who violate the law, and this case is a clear violation of the law."

In April, the 11 current and former university students pleaded not guilty to misdemeanor charges for disrupting the speech last year by Michael Oren, the Israeli ambassador to the United States, after which all were arrested, cited and released. The case has spawned widespread reaction and garnered national attention.

Each student is charged with one misdemeanor count of conspiracy to disturb a meeting and one misdemeanor count of the disturbance of a meeting. If convicted, each faces a sentence that could include probation with community service or fines or up to six months in jail.

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