Activists, University Clash in Sentencing Hearing

University officials and three prominent student activists clashed in a crossfire of bitter accusations yesterday over the fate of the students' punishment for their conduct at a campus anti-war protest last spring.

The students face sanctions after a code of conduct committee found them guilty of disturbing the peace and failing to comply with an official during the March 20 Sproul Hall takeover where 119 students were arrested decrying the first U.S. bombs that fell on Baghdad.

Two of the protesters, Rachel Odes and Snehal Shingavi, face up to 20 hours of community service. Michael Smith could be suspended from the university for a semester.

The panel, composed of faculty, staff and students will decide on sanctions next week and send its recommendation to Dean of Students Karen Kenney, who must approve of the punishment.

In a frenzy of finger pointing, Neal Rajmaira, director of Student Judicial Affairs, detailed the activists' past student code violations to justify the proposed sanctions.

Shingavi and Odes had been arrested multiple times in campus protests, Rajmaira said, incurring extensive disciplinary records.

He said Smith deserved a harsher punishment because he had been involved in a "racially motivated" altercation with a "group of Asians" and a police officer outside of a bar on Telegraph Avenue two years ago.

Smith called Rajmaira's characterization of the incident "disgusting and founded in lies," sending the committee into closed session to examine the university report.

The committee found no mention in the report of racial motives for Smith's actions.

"The idea that Rajmaira would put that into his report just shows that he isn't into the truth," Smith said. "I'm yelling and I'm angry because it has been adjudicated that that wasn't the case."

The tenor of the hearing remained heated.

The three students-among the organizers of the spring anti-war protest-questioned why they had been singled out from the more than 100 arrested that day.

Rajmaira said his staff found they were the only students with documented disciplinary records.

"I am not backing off one inch what these records indicate," Rajmaira said. "Make no mistake about that."

Rajmaira said the students accused the university of a number of unfounded allegations in the media and to the public.

"The patented dishonesty of these students is obvious. It is appalling and astounding," Rajmaira said.

The students and their supporters-limited to 25 for safety concerns-called the hearing a "kangaroo clinic."

In an effort to restore order, hearing committee chair and physics professor Robert Jacobsen implored everyone to check their emotions.

"We're grown-ups and we're going to try and find the best way forward," Jacobsen said.

Even before the hearings began, the students, armed with a banner that read "Defend the Berkeley 3" rallied outside of the hearing room in Clark Kerr Campus to clear their name. The crowd of 60 supporters included former Green Party gubernatorial candidate Peter Camejo, Odes's mother and Jack Heyman of the longshoremen's union.

"The university should give these students an award for trying to defend the rule of law," Camejo said. "These students are victims and an example of the battle for democracy that is going through America."

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