4 minute read
Richard Hasen will lead the Safeguarding Democracy Project
Friday, July 15, 2022
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From the UCLA Newsroom:
Taking on one of the most urgent issues in American political and legal life, UCLA School of Law Professor Richard Hasen has launched the Safeguarding Democracy Project to focus on ensuring that elections in the U.S. remain free and fair.
Hasen, a renowned election scholar who joined the UCLA Law faculty this month — 31 years after earning his law degree here — assembled a diverse set of scholars and election law experts for the project. They are united by the desire to fend off threats to free elections posed by false claims that the last presidential election was stolen and the controversial election audits and legislative proposals that followed.
Project board members include UCLA professors Lynn Vavreck and Adam Winkler, noted election lawyers Ben Ginsburg and Floyd Abrams, University of Michigan law professor Leah Litman, retired federal appeals judge J. Michael Luttig and NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund president Janai Nelson, who is a UCLA Law alumna.
The goal of the project is to promote research, events and advocacy aimed at ensuring election integrity. Hasen answered questions about the project and his return to UCLA...
Full news release at https://newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/richard-hasen-safeguardingdemocracy-project.
CNN interview at:
Or direct to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDMjZ-L9k58.
Disturbing Article on Shooter Threat to UC-Irvine: Maybe Regents Ne...
Saturday, July 16, 2022
You may have seen the lead article in the print edition of the LA Times' California section dealing with an individual who has threatened a mass shooting at UC-Irvine. The article suggests that there is a deficiency in available remedies in such situations. The UC Regents are meeting next week and will meet again in September.
The governor, an ex officio regent, is interested in gun control legislation in response to a recent US Supreme Court ruling. Other ex officio regents include the lieutenant governor (technically the presiding officer of the state senate), the speaker of the assembly, and the superintendent of public instruction. All of these officials have an interest in gun control, particularly on university campuses. It may be that additional legislative remedies are needed in cases such as the one described below:
He’s behind bars again — for now: Prosecutors believe former student still plans to commit mass shooting at UC Irvine.
By Hannah Fry, LA Times, 7-15-22
Sebastian Dumbrava seemed like an ordinary UC Irvine student, studying computer science and applying for summer internships. Then his life unraveled, beginning with several Reddit posts that led campus police to place him on a psychiatric hold, even though he denied writing them. He sued the University of California Board of Regents, angry that his prospects of working for the federal government had probably evaporated. He tweeted about suicide and about “serious consequences.” He shared a quote about “blood on your hands” from the gunman who killed 32 people at Virginia Tech in 2007.
In January 2020, Dumbrava was arrested after police found a trove of ammunition, largecapacity magazines and the parts to build an AR-15 in his bedroom. Orange County prosecutors believe he intended to shoot up the UC Irvine campus. Because he had not committed violence or explicitly threatened it, Dumbrava was convicted only of having the ammunition and unlawfully possessing a gun. He was released from prison after seven
months. The judge in the case expressed deep misgivings that Dumbrava was not getting the mental health help he needed and was still a danger to others.
Days after his release, Dumbrava emailed a University of California official and an attorney, demanding $50,000. Now he is behind bars again, facing new charges. Prosecutors think he still intends to commit a mass shooting at his alma mater. The new charges — encompassing the emailed monetary demand, which prosecutors characterize as attempted extortion, as well as a revival of previous charges for possessing large capacity magazines — carry a maximum sentence of four years and four months. Dumbrava’s case highlights the challenges of preventing a mass shooting — even after a potential shooter has come to law enforcement’s attention...
In one of Dumbrava’s last tweets before his latest arrest, he hinted that mass murder was on his mind. A few years ago, he noted, he had vacillated about his plans, concluding that it would not “feel good to kill students at UC Irvine.” Now, he wrote, “things are very different.”
Full article at https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-07-15/man-suspected-ofplotting-a-mass-shooting-at-uc-irvine-is-behind-bars-again-for-now.
Blog readers from UCLA will recall a suspension of classes on campus when a related situation developed - although it turned out in that case that the individual was out of state at the time:
https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/02/remember-one-day-shutdownupdate.html.
Another such situation arose at UC-Berkeley earlier this year:
http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/04/follow-up-on-lockdown-that-tookplace.html.
Although we have posted it before, here is UCLA's official guidance video for mass shooter situations:
Or direct to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrbqmzCZS_A.
