{"id":9735,"date":"2017-11-08T07:03:55","date_gmt":"2017-11-08T12:03:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/?p=9735"},"modified":"2017-11-08T07:03:55","modified_gmt":"2017-11-08T12:03:55","slug":"case-dropped-activist-laughed-jeff-sessionss-hearing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/2017\/11\/08\/case-dropped-activist-laughed-jeff-sessionss-hearing\/","title":{"rendered":"Case Is Dropped Against Activist Who Laughed at Jeff Sessions\u2019s Hearing"},"content":{"rendered":"

By MAYA SALAM<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

The Department of Justice this week dismissed its case against a human rights protester who, clad in pink as Lady Liberty, was arrested after she laughed during Attorney General Jeff Sessions\u2019s confirmation hearing in January.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat a relief,\u201d the protester, Desiree A. Fairooz, posted on Twitter on Monday night. \u201cGuess they\u2019ve got enough \u2018laughing\u2019 matters to deal with!\u201d<\/p>\n

William Miller, a spokesman for the United States Attorney\u2019s Office for the District of Columbia, said in statement on Tuesday that his office dismissed the case against Ms. Fairooz on Monday, but he declined to comment further because the office does not discuss charging decisions.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did not see this coming,\u201d Samuel A. Bogash, Ms. Fairooz\u2019s lawyer, said on Tuesday. \u201cI\u2019m really surprised.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Mr. Bogash said that he spoke with a prosecutor late last week and that she was working on the prosecution\u2019s argument for a retrial, scheduled to begin Nov. 13. Mr. Bogash said he felt that \u201cthe decision was made after I spoke with her Friday.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Fairooz was arrested on Jan. 10 with two other demonstrators with Code Pink, a woman-led rights group, on charges of disorderly and disruptive conduct, and parading or demonstrating on Capitol grounds \u2014 both misdemeanors carrying a maximum possible sentence of six months in jail and $1,000 in fines. In May, a jury convicted Ms. Fairooz of both counts.<\/p>\n

But in July, Judge Robert E. Morin of the United States Superior Court of the District of Columbia ordered a <\/a>retrial<\/a> for Ms. Fairooz. He rejected the notion that her laughter alone could be a sufficient basis for a conviction, as federal prosecutors had argued at the trial. And the judge was uncertain if she had been convicted because of the laughter or because of her outburst as she was led away, Mr. Bogash said in July.<\/p>\n

During Mr. Session<\/a>s<\/a>\u2019s confirmation<\/a> hearing, Ms. Fairooz, who at one point held a sign that said, \u201cRefugees Welcome \u2014 Stop Sessions,\u201d laughed when Senator Richard C. Shelby, Republican of Alabama, said Mr. Sessions\u2019s record of \u201ctreating all Americans equally under the law is clear and well-documented.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Fairooz was immediately removed by officers. She did not go easily. Her outburst as she was dragged out of the room \u2014 \u201cJeff Sessions is evil!\u201d she yelled, among other things \u2014 was captured on video and used against her at trial.<\/p>\n

The United States Attorney\u2019s Office had argued in a motion that Ms. Fairooz had \u201clet out a loud burst of laughter, followed by a second louder burst of laughter.\u201d The police then tried to \u201cquietly escort\u201d Ms. Fairooz from the room, but she \u201cgrew loud and more disruptive, eventually halting the confirmation hearing,\u201d the motion said.<\/p>\n

The two other demonstrators, Tighe Barry and Lenny Bianchi<\/a>, were dressed as Ku Klux Klan members and stood up ahead of the hearing. They were acquitted on a count of disorderly conduct but were convicted on charges of parading or demonstrating, and were each sentenced to 10 days in jail with the time suspended on the condition that they successfully complete six months of unsupervised probation.<\/p>\n

As for Ms. Fairooz, she is \u201chappy and relieved,\u201d Mr. Bogash said on Tuesday, though he added that she felt it was a waste of resources. \u201cShe feels that she didn\u2019t do anything that merited the amount of government time and money that went into trying this case.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt solidifies her political opinion against the people she\u2019s protesting,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Ms. Fairooz did not immediately respond to calls on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Ms. Fairooz said in July she hadn\u2019t let out a \u201cburst of laughter,\u201d but rather that it was a giggle. \u201cI just couldn\u2019t hold it,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was spontaneous. It was an immediate rejection of what I considered an outright lie or pure ignorance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Fairooz said she had not intended to disrupt the hearing. \u201cNone of us planned to get arrested,\u201d she said. \u201cWe just wanted to be a visible symbol of dissent.\u201d She also said she would continue to protest the Trump administration.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Source (also shows video of protest)\u00a0 nytimes<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By MAYA SALAM The Department of Justice this week dismissed its case against a human rights protester who, clad in pink as Lady Liberty, was arrested after she laughed during Attorney General Jeff Sessions\u2019s confirmation […]<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":9736,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[4406,3492],"class_list":{"0":"post-9735","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"category-usa","9":"tag-desiree-a-fairooz","10":"tag-jeff-sessions","11":"pmpro-has-access"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9735","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9735"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9735\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9740,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9735\/revisions\/9740"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}