Protesters hold hands in a circle as law enforcement officers raid the Cal Poly Humboldt campus in the pre-dawn hours of April 30, 2024. | File photos by Andrew Goff.

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The office of Humboldt County District Attorney Stacey Eads has decided not to prosecute a majority of the protesters who were arrested during or after a multi-agency law enforcement raid at Cal Poly Humboldt on May 30. 

In emailed responses to questions from the Outpost, Eads said her office received a group of referrals from Cal Poly Humboldt’s University Police Department (UPD) requesting charges against 39 people, but after evaluating the cases her office rejected 27 of the 39 referrals “based upon insufficient evidence to prove a crime beyond a reasonable doubt and/or interests of justice grounds.”

The other 12 cases remain pending, but they’ve been referred back to the UPD for “further investigation, information and/or documentation,” Eads said. These charging decisions were first reported by the North Coast Journal earlier today.

At least 35 activists were arrested on campus after more than a week of demonstrating in support of Palestine. Protest activities included the occupation and barricading of Siemens Hall and the application of graffiti across campus, including inside the office of then-University President Tom Jackson.

While the demonstrators defended their actions on free speech grounds, university administrators accused the activists of “lawless behavior,” including theft, vandalism and trespassing, and they issued a hard closure of campus after a failed initial attempt to break up the demonstration.

Last week, an independent review of law enforcement’s April 30 response to the campus demonstrations found that the UPD, in particular, showed a lack of effective planning and command. 

The protest at Cal Poly Humboldt was among a nationwide wave of campus demonstrations in support of Palestine.

In the wake of the local police raid, Cal Poly Humboldt’s faculty union condemned the arrests as a “dangerous escalation” in response to “a peaceful campus demonstration.”

But others, including California Sen. Mike McGuire and Assemblyman Jim Wood, said the arrests were justified in light of the vandalism, destruction of school property and antisemitic hate speech.

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