December 2003    

We print below a report on the fourth day of the trial of  Hostos Community College student leader, Miguel Malo, which continued on Thursday, December 4.

Today, testimony in the frame-up trial of Miguel Malo began. Opening statements were made by the prosecution and the defense. Assistant District Attorney Terry Gensler portrayed Malo as a troublemaker who used the “forum” of Hostos College to “create chaos, disruption and disorder,” supposedly injuring “peace officers” and causing “inconvenience” to others. She preposterously claimed he “threw himself to the ground, so he could not be arrested,” saying he “walked among students handing out leaflets” (!) in the 3rd floor atrium at Hostos protesting cuts in ESL (English as a second language) programs at the school. 

Defense attorney Ron McGuire exposed this caricature, noting that this case was about exercising the right of free speech, that Miguel Malo was “handing out flyers and holding a sign, like so many people have done in this country, like so many people have done in that very atrium for so many years.” McGuire noted that Miguel had been elected vice president of the student senate at Hostos, and following his arrest in August 2001 he was elected president. He had a right to be there to express his concerns about the actions of the campus administration, and any arrest of him for doing so was illegal.

Miguel Malo was arrested by campus cops in August 2001 and is facing a year in jail on no less than ten trumped-up charges of assault, resisting arrest, disorderly conduct and harassment for daring to protest against cuts by the City University of New York (CUNY) which gutted programs for non-native English speakers, who represent more than 40 percent of the NYC population. CUNY students, faculty and campus workers as well as trade-unionists and immigrants have protested against this ominous frame-up. On Friday, December 5, there will be a demonstration at 9 a.m. opposite the Bronx Criminal Court, located at 215 E. 161st Street in the Bronx, protesting against the vicious attempt to railroad Miguel.

The first witness put on the stand by the prosecution, and the only one heard today, was Hostos security chief Arnaldo Bernabe. He claimed that as a result of demonstrations in May of 2001 that “got out of hand,” he changed the rules concerning demonstrations to ban protests inside campus buildings. What got “out of hand” from the point of view of the Hostos administration is that they were forced to backtrack on their planned cuts (see “Day Three of the Miguel Malo Trial”). Bernabe claimed that a “Public Security Announcement” was distributed and posted in Hostos on 15 August 2001 announcing this ban.  Yet students who were present at Hostos that day insist that no such PSA was leafleted or posted, and that Barnabe’s claim is a fiction. And even if it did exist, it would be a gross violation of democratic rights. 

Under the guidance of assistant D.A. Gessler, the Hostos security honcho argued that he had received reports that there would be disruption of the registration on August 15. The administration acted as if Hostos were about to be stormed. Bernabe, who controls a contingent of 45 security guards and “peace officers” deputized by the NYPD, called in a number (at least eight or nine) of members of the SAFE team, a highly paid and heavily armed elite squad of CUNY cops. He also formed several “arrest teams” and stashed these squads out of sight, ready to pounce. All this in order to repress a grand total of three (3) Hostos students who were carrying signs and leafleting in the building that day! 

The prosecutor kept claiming that Miguel Malo was shouting, but Bernabe said only that the student senate vice president was “talking loudly” and “working the line” of students who were registering. He also said that a number of students “came over the ropes” to hear what Malo had to say and talk with him. Although the prosecution claimed that Malo’s protest “disrupted” the registration, the only disruption reported (and even that is dubious) came as a result of the violent arrest ordered by Bernabe. The ban on protest in the atrium not only violated Malo’s right of free speech, it violated the students’ right to hear him, as a number of them evidently wanted to.

While the prosecution claimed that Miguel Malo “threw himself to the ground” in order to prevent his left arm from being handcuffed, Bernabe said that Malo’s arms “flew up” and were “flailing about” and his leaflets went all over the floor. (It’s a wonder they didn’t charge Miguel with littering along with everything else!) On top of this absurdity, Bernabe said that Malo “tried to run” to a wall, even as a cop was tightly holding his handcuffed right arm. He stated that Malo tried to pin his left arm against the wall, and he then saw him “slide down the wall” to the ground where he allegedly started kicking. And all this, according to Bernabe, took place inside of “one minute”! 

Anyone with an ounce of common sense, and certainly black and Latino New Yorkers who are all too familiar with the brutal tactics of the police, would react with utter disbelief at the idea of someone throwing themselves on the ground or voluntarily sliding down a wall in order to resist arrest and assault a cop. The security chief’s story is unbelievable because it is false. Miguel Malo was slammed against the wall and thrown to the ground by three cops, and photos of his back showed multiple welts as a result of this brutal manhandling. Despite their claims of assault, none of the cops suffered any visible injuries.

As we have reported, Judge Robert Torres’ rulings have stacked the deck against Miguel Malo, excluding a whole series of witnesses and any reference to the context, which was a cop rampage. Miguel was only one of a number of arrests that day of anyone who dared to protest the cutbacks at Hostos, part of an ongoing racist purge of immigrant and minority students at CUNY. Yet the more the cops talk on the stand, the more the contradictions and utter incongruities of their concocted story come out. “Testilying” is an established police practice, but from the first day of testimony, it’s evident that CUNY campus cops are not very accomplished “testiliars.” 

All the other arrests on August 15-16 were dismissed. Miguel Malo is on trial today, two years later, first because he was singled out as a student leader who cared about the administration’s attacks enough to dare to oppose them; and second, as a test case for the plans to regiment colleges and schools around the country. Hostos already is a miniature police state, your campus will be next. The time to stand up against this onslaught is now!

The persecution of Miguel Malo is a threat to all. It is part of the crackdown on democratic, minority, immigrant and workers rights in the ongoing imperialist war, and a longstanding plan to regiment colleges and universities in order to put a clamp on mass protests. While using every legal avenue of defense, revolutionaries tell the truth: the capitalist injustice system is part of the machinery of ruling-class repression, and ultimately it can only be defeated by the revolutionary mobilization of the superior power of the workers and oppressed.

Come out to demonstrate support for Miguel Malo on Friday, December 5, at 9 a.m. sharp, across the street from the Bronx Criminal Court, 215 East 161st Street in the Bronx, located one block east of Grand Concourse (take the 4 or D trains to the 161st Street stop). Then show your support by attending the trial in Jury Room 7.

See also:
Defend Miguel Malo! (November 2003) 
Day One of Miguel Malo Trial  (1 December 2003) 
Day Two of Miguel Malo Trial  (2 December 2003) 
Day Three of Miguel Malo Trial  (3 December 2003) 

Click here to download flyer for December 5 demonstration (requires Acrobat Reader)