Hundreds of students, faculty and community members attended the sit-in at Tommy Trojan on Monday and heard eloquent and fiery Nate Howard and members of the USC Six address the crowd about their arrests at a weekend party that ended with massive police presence and several arrests.

By the end of the day, however, several of those arrested students said they regretted their decision to speak to a Neon Tommy reporter who produced video profiles that accompanied posted coverage of their complaints of alleged racial profiling and misconduct by Los Angeles Police Department officers who shut down their party Friday, May 3.

They asked Neon Tommy editors to remove the videos and to remove their names from published stories. We declined their requests.

We believe such information must be shared with the public as part of a full airing of the tumultuous events last Friday.

The students said they had been advised by their lawyer not to talk to media and that their spokesman was Nate, the party host and first student handcuffed but not arrested. They said the posted Neon Tommy interviews could complicate the eventual dismissal of any charges filed against them and make it harder for them to get a job if a prospective employer were to do a Google search and turn up their arrests.

Three of the students, in a 12:30 a.m Tuesday conference call with one of Neon Tommy’s faculty advisors, said they would have rejected Neon Tommy’s requests for interviews had they known they would be identified as among those arrested at the party.

The students’ concerns weighed heavily on the minds of Neon Tommy’s reporting staff and faculty advisors. The journalists share a great deal in common with the USC 6, and they could identify with them and their request. Some are involved with the same campus advocacy groups.  Neon Tommy contributor Rikiesha Pierce is president of Students Organizing for Literacy, Inclusion and Diversity, which organized Tuesday night’s LAPD forum on racial profiling. To some, denying the students’ request seemed heavy-handed and reminiscent of the media arrogance of old, with journalists acting as if only they know best.

The question of naming the students deserves more than the predictable response: that such information is deemed public by California law.  And it skirts our responsibility at Neon Tommy and the USC Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism to point out that the information is available on social media sites as well as government websites.

Consider why the information is public. It is vital for the health of our democracy and for public institutions that information as basic as arrest data be shared with the broader community in a timely manner.  Such facts help us hold the police department accountable and show in painful and precise terms who is the subject of a police action.

Without a public airing of recent events, with the players and their roles in the community fully identified, it would be even more challenging than it is to monitor the performance of an institution as crucial to our democracy as law enforcement.
 
Naming names and learning as much as possible about the involved parties help us evaluate the way police officers performed their jobs on the night in question. Knowing the students’ standing in the community, for example, enlightens members of the public who may have preconceived notions when they hear about the arrest of someone of color.

An array of troubling questions arose during Tuesday night’s forum with the LAPD. A white student who attended a party across the street told the panel that officers treated the African-American students like animals and hurled the n-word at them.
 
She did not get a response from the panel. In the coming weeks, as the LAPD and other investigations shed more light on the events of May 3, our coverage will provide as much detail as possible about the police response and officers’ interactions with students, including the USC 6.

The community deserves the LAPD’s detailed answers to all allegations made against officers that night. Even if the investigation finds the massive show of force of nearly 80 officers in riot gear was warranted, did students face racist and demeaning actions once so common during the era of Police Chief Daryl Gates?

Our democracy, our community and the police will be stronger to the extent that we have all the answers, and that any shortcomings in the police response and conduct of officers that night are addressed. And crucial to the integrity of the process is the full identity of  the USC Six and all who so vehemently insist that they suffered wrong at the hands of officers sworn to honor the law.

Prof. Alan Mittelstaedt
Managing Editor,  Annenberg Digital News

Prof. Marc Cooper
Director, Annenberg Digital News