Arrested development

The Michigan State University Board of Trustees meeting is packed with people who registered to speak in opposition to Will. Later in the meeting the board takes up a proposal to increase President Lou Anna K. Simon’s salary from $520,000 a year to $750,000 a year.

Noah Saperstein, 23, spoke up. He had not registered to speak on Simon — it wasn’t on the agenda.

“I said something to the effect of, ‘We have adjunct professors, why not an adjunct president?’” Saperstein told City Pulse.

Saperstein would be arrested moments later. The charge? Violation of an MSU disorderly conduct ordinance: “Disruption of normal campus building or area activities.” He faces 93 days in jail, he said, for speaking out of turn at a public meeting. Officials say he interfered with the operation of a building and he breached the peace.

Saperstein is a union organizer for the Graduate Student union funded by the American Federation of Teachers. The union represents 1,400 teaching assistants in 70 departments at MSU.

He said he stood up, and was joined by Spencer Perrenoud, 24, another organizer, but Perrenoud did not speak. Both men said they are known to MSU Trustees and administration as organizers.

Joshua Covert, Saperstein’s attorney, believes that Saperstein was arrested for reasons other than his speaking out.

“I believe that his union organizing was part of why he was charged with a crime,” Covert said. “I think it was done to silence Noah and to teach him a lesson, so to speak.”

The misdemeanor charge reads: “No person shall obstruct, hinder, or impede the normal use or operation of any campus building or area which has been assigned or scheduled for educational or extracurricular activities, including, but not limited to, dramatic or musical presentations, lectures, athletic events, military exercises, orientation meetings, commencement ceremonies, and placement activities.”

Jason Cody, a spokesperson for MSU, declined to comment on the case except to say Saperstein has been charged. He acknowledged he was present at the meeting but is uncertain what happened to cause the arrest.

Joel Ferguson, chair of the MSU Board, did not return phone calls seeking comment for this story.

Covert said the Ingham County prosecutor’s office is reviewing the case.

Saperstein said he and Perrenoud were asked to leave. Saperstein said he complied, while Perrenoud said he questioned why he was being asked to leave a public meeting. He said he questioned the order three times, he says, before he voluntarily left.

The two said they were followed into the hallway by plain-clothes officers of the MSU Police Department. Once in the hallway, Saperstein said he stood in such a way as to prohibit the door to the meeting being closed.

“I was concerned what was going to happen with these people who escorted us out,” Saperstein said. He said officers did not identify themselves as law enforcement until much later in the confrontation.

Officers asked him to move so they could close the door, and Saperstein says he refused until he was told why he why he had been asked to leave the public meeting.

Both men said officers placed their hands on Saperstein and moved him to a separate wall.

“It was unnecessarily violent,” Perrenoud said.

At that point, the door to the Board room was closed. Both Saperstein and Perrenoud said the situation was diffusing. Then another officer came from the Board room and said Saperstein needed to be placed under arrest.

The MSU Police report supports their story, with one exception. The report alleges Saperstein used his shoulder “to push” an officer back, preventing the Board room door from closing.

“Subject Saperstein began yelling in the doorway and causing a disturbance again in the hallway,” the report said.

Open Meetings Act

The MSU Board of Trustees is considered a public body under the state’s Open Meetings Act. That law prohibits excluding a person from a public meeting, except when they have caused a “breach of the peace” in that meeting. While breach of the peace is not defined in the law, Robin Luce-Hermann, a lawyer with the Michigan Press Association and Butzel Long, said she does not believe asking a question out of turn to be a breach of the peace.

“In my view, someone speaking up does not amount to a breach of the peace,” Luce- Hermann said. “If someone stands up and comes towards a public official and says ‘I’m going to kill you,’ that’s a breach of the peace.”

“I would hope that members of a public body would take a step back and realize people in the meeting may not have the understanding of the Open Meetings Act, or the same information that they have of the issue being discussed,” she said, “and would allow people to make comments on things that happen in the meeting.”