Wednesday could be another tense day in austin where officials are bracing for another rally on the UT campus. The first ended with dozens of arrests during a demonstration supporting Palestine in the Israel-Hamas war. NBC 5’s Meredith Yeomans has more in Austin.
One by one, protestors left the Travis County jail on Tuesday and were immediately shielded by supporters who said the identities of those arrested during a protest at the University of Texas need to be protected.
Many are now represented by attorneys with the Capital Area Private Defenders Service.
“Mass arrests, we see them. One hundred is a lot. That's probably the biggest that I've seen,” said Bradley Hargis, executive director for the CAPDS.
Their release comes a day after confrontations during a pro-Palestinian demonstration where police removed protestors by force for refusing to leave an encampment.
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Dozens now face a criminal trespass charge.
It's the same charge that was dropped for nearly 60 protestors arrested last week over what Travis County Attorney Delia Garza said was a lack of sufficient probable cause.
This time, it appears the charges will stick.
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“We believe it meets the standard for probable cause,” Garza said at a press conference Tuesday.
Garza says her office is reviewing the cases.
With more than 130 arrests over the past week, she's calling on the university and protestors to compromise.
“While we understand the safety concerns of the university, continuing to send protestors to jail on criminal trespass charges, one of the lowest level non-violent crimes our office is presented with, is putting a tremendous strain on our criminal justice resources,” said Garza.
In a statement, the UT System Board of Regents Chairman Kevin Eltife said:
“As I have previously stated, any attempt to shut down or disrupt UT operations will not be tolerated. There is no rationale whatsoever that justifies the endangerment of our students and campus environments. Massive crowds of students, along with outside groups with absolutely no connection to UT, have intentionally caused disturbances with plans to harm our campus community. In fact, the majority of arrests to date have occurred with agitators who are not UT students. These activities will not be allowed.
While free speech is fundamental to our educational institutions, it is violated when it includes threats to campus safety and security or refusal to comply with institutional policies and laws. At UT Austin, I have been working closely with President Hartzell on decisions to protect its entire campus community, and we will not acquiesce to those protections under any circumstance.
I appreciate our campus police officers and we cannot thank the Texas Department of Public Safety enough for all their assistance. We will continue to call upon the DPS to secure our campus when needed. Moreover, we will make every effort to see that students who violate campus policies and outside individuals and groups that violate state law are fully prosecuted.
Nothing is more important than the safety of our students, and we will not hesitate again to use all resources available to us to keep them safe and our UT campuses open.”
With another protest planned on campus Wednesday, UT staff who work in buildings by the south lawn are reportedly being told to work from home and that those buildings will be locked down, as schools across the country struggle to deal with protests overtaking campuses.
