The Great Smoky Mountain Journal
Staff, Wire Reports
Posted: Sunday, January 21, 2018 03:52 PM
Cost Of Free Speech: $60,000 For Ben Sharpiro Protection At UC Berkeley As Five Arrested In Protests During Conservative's Speech
Berkeley Police released the mugshots
and identification of five of the nine people arrested Thursday night
protesting at the University of California, Berkeley during an
appearance by conservative speaker Ben Shapiro.
Four of the five people identified were arrested for carrying a "banned
weapon."
Sarah Roark, 44, of San Francisco, Michael Paul Sullivan, 29, of Hayward
and Eddy Robinson, 44, of Oakland, were all arrested for carrying a
banned weapon.
Follow
KTVU ✔ @KTVU
.@BerkeleyPolice tweeted 5 of the 9 people arrested as part of @benshapiro
speech at @UCBerkeley http://bit.ly/2x2Tyyo
10:22 AM - Sep 15, 2017
Hannah Benjamin, 20, of Fremont, was also arrested for carrying a banned
weapon but she was accused of battery on a police officer, too. Kerem
Celik, 18, of Saratoga, was arrested for “disturbing the peace.”
It was not immediately clear what weapons the protesters were accused of
carrying, nor was it known if any were members of Antifa. Weapons seized
in the past from Antifa extremists have included bricks, hammers, bats,
knives, scissors and chains.
A
picture was circulating on Twitter purporting to show Roark photographed
with Hillary Clinton. In the alleged photo of Roark, the woman is
wearing a pin from Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign. It was not
clear at what event the picture was taken or how Roark allegedly came to
meet the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee.
It was not immediately clear if those arrested were still in custody.
Calls to police were not immediately returned.
Follow
Ben Shapiro ✔ @benshapiro
A lineup of life's winners https://twitter.com/KTVU/status/908697415863091200
…
10:22 AM - Sep 15, 2017
205 205 Replies 664 664 Retweets 2,966 2,966 likes
UC Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof said security measures for the event
may have cost $600,000. Mogulof called the speech “a successful event”
and said the university was interested in hosting speakers similar to
Shapiro, a former Breitbart.com editor, in the future.
Shapiro retweeted the mugshots of those arrested and wrote: “A lineup of
life’s winners.”
UC Berkeley had expected protests ahead of Shapiro’s speech. The
officers were allowed to be armed with pepper spray at the protest --
the first time in two decades officers could carry the spray.
Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, author Milo
Yiannopoulos and conservative commentator Ann Coulter are also slated to
speak on the campus in the coming weeks.
Yiannopoulos was set to appear at the campus in February, but his event
was canceled after protests turned violent. Protesters smashed windows
of businesses and marred walls with graffiti.
SOURCE: FOX NEWS; The Associated Press contributed to this report.
