Inside the effort that led to dismissal of all 57 arrests
The calls started coming into the Austin Lawyers Guild arrest hotline around 2:30pm on Wednesday, April 24, shortly after University of Texas police officers began arresting demonstrators at a peaceful, pro-Palestine protest held on campus.
By early evening, Skip Davis and George Lobb – two criminal defense attorneys who would later play a critical role in transforming the initial bond effort into an effort for an outright dismissal of the arrests – were on-scene at the jail, trying to get appointed as defense counsel to clients who had been booked into the jail. Within a few hours, they had begun the bond process on a half-dozen or so arrests that had received the stamp of approval from city magistrate judges.
Separately, Travis County Judge Denise Hernández, who has overseen County Court at Law No. 6 since 2023, volunteered her time. Hernández, who runs the county’s Transformative Youth Justice diversion program for defendants between the ages of 17 and 20, emailed criminal defense organizations to inform them that she would be available that night to look over arrest and bond paperwork. She arrived at the courthouse later that night, sources say, to expedite that work.
George Lobb Palestine Protest Paul Quinzi Skip Davis UTPD
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