Justine Garcia says her main concern the day she and eight of her friends chained themselves to the old state Capitol building in Phoenix was uniting a community.
Garcia, a journalism and justice studies senior, was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct on April 20 while protesting Senate Bill 1070, the state’s controversial immigration legislation.
The charges were dropped in mid-June by Interim Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley, a Republican who said the disorderly conduct charges were inaccurate.
A long-time opponent of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, Romley recently lost his party’s nomination to keep his seat as county attorney to former Deputy County Attorney Bill Montgomery, who was endorsed by Arpaio.
With no Democrat running for county attorney, Montgomery is expected to win the seat, and that has some SB 1070 opponents worried.
“Knowing the support Montgomery has behind him from Arpaio, it’s a step backward in terms of where we’re going,” said Garcia, who started a Downtown campus chapter of M.E.Ch.A, an activist group that promotes Chicano culture, this semester.
Montgomery, who resigned as deputy county attorney in order to run, said he does plan to return to the practice of charging those smuggled into the country by coyotes as co-conspirators in their own smuggling, a practice performed by former County Attorney Andrew Thomas and discontinued by Romley.
“You’ve got a coyote and their client, negotiating for their services and paying for the smuggling,” Montgomery said. “That’s a classic conspiracy.”
After Thomas resigned his office in early April to run for Attorney General, the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors appointed Romley to the seat.
The charges against Garcia and her friends were dropped without prejudice, which means they can be re-filed at any time.
Romley was unavailable for comment.
Garcia said she is frustrated and disappointed by Montgomery’s victory in the primary election.
“Montgomery has said he is going to bring back the same sanctions of Andrew Thomas,” she said.
Thomas is known for supporting tougher immigration enforcement.
Even though Montgomery has such a strong lead already, it’s going to be an important race to watch, Garcia said.
“Knowing what Montgomery stands for, it’s important to watch that race and raise awareness of what he’s about,” she said.
Libertarian Michael Kielsky is Montgomery’s only opponent in the general election.
Kielsky said if elected, he would not prosecute “victimless crimes.”
“I would focus the resources of the County Attorney’s Office on prosecuting those who have caused identifiable harm to victims,” Kielsky said.
Garcia said she didn’t want to see Maricopa County revert back to its old ways, especially after actions like the April 20 protest had made so much progress in the community.
Garcia said she and her friends had planned the April 20 protest after receiving no response to their repeated calls and e-mails to Gov. Jan Brewer asking her not to sign Senate Bill 1070.
“We needed to step up,” Garcia said. “We needed to let the community know what would happen if this went into place.”
U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton withheld several provisions in the immigration bill on July 28 pending the outcome of various lawsuits filed against it. One such provision would have required police officers to check a suspect’s immigration status if there was reasonable suspicion that suspect was in the state illegally.
Knowing the national media would be at the Capitol, Garcia said she and the other protesters wanted to use this opportunity to get their message out to the community.
The Capitol Nine, as they became known in the media, chained themselves to the Old Capitol Building, blocking access to the building. They were there for about half an hour before officers used bolt cutters to remove their chains and put them under arrest, Garcia said.
The nine college students — seven of them from ASU — were taken to the Maricopa County Fourth Avenue Jail in downtown Phoenix and later charged with disorderly conduct.
Garcia said she and her friends felt no regret at all as they waited in jail.
“When we were inside the jail walls, we could hear people chanting,” Garcia said. “We could hear them supporting us.”
Protesters had followed the arrestees to the jail and continued their protest outside, beating on drums, chanting and giving testimonials.
Garcia was released at 2 a.m. to find friend Jassaka Adame waiting for her.
Adame, an education sophomore at Estrella Mountain Community College, had been at work when she received a phone call from a friend who said he had seen Garcia get arrested on TV.
“I didn’t even tell anybody; I just left work to be there for Justine,” Adame said. “It was amazing to see the support that they got for doing this action.”
Adame said she stayed until Garcia was released
“It was really exciting to see her walk out of those doors at 2 a.m.,” Adame said. “We just went up to her and hugged her. I was so proud of her that day.”
Garcia said she was glad the students’ arrests sparked a discussion in the community about the bill. The goal was not to be in the courts fighting the charges, she said.
“We wanted to wake up our community,” Garcia said.
Reach the reporter at ymgonzal@asu.edu
