Gohill was one of 13 people arrested on June 5 when protesters broke into the president’s office and barricaded themselves inside before law enforcement later entered and removed them. Gohill, who was reporting on the incident for The Stanford Daily, was booked into Santa Clara County Main Jail on charges of burglary, vandalism and conspiracy.
The Bay Area-based First Amendment Coalition and the Virginia-based Student Press Law Center received a letter from Stanford President Jonathan Levin on Monday that said the school’s disciplinary process regarding Gohill “is complete and resulted in no disciplinary action.”
KQED News obtained a copy of the letter. The San Francisco Chronicle first reported the development on Wednesday. Levin was replying to a Jan. 17 letter from the two press freedom organizations, which have advocated for ending all disciplinary and legal action against Gohill.
“Because of the university’s disappointing and very public role in this ordeal, we request that you publicly confirm that Gohill will face no university disciplinary action and that you urge the Santa Clara District Attorney’s Office not to pursue charges against him,” the letter to Levin said.
Gohill has also received support from The Stanford Daily editors and school alumni groups.
The school’s previous president, Richard Saller, and Provost Jenny Martinez, said in a June 10 statement that they believe Gohill “acted in violation of the law and university policies and fully support having him be criminally prosecuted and referred to Stanford’s Office of Community Standards along with the other students.”
However, in his response to advocates backing Gohill this week, Levin said he’d leave the judgment of whether to prosecute Gohill up to the Santa Clara County district attorney.
Jean-Paul Jassy, an attorney for Gohill, said Stanford’s actions don’t make any sense.
“They should be saying, ‘We were wrong, we never should have encouraged the district attorney to pursue any prosecution against Dilan,’” Jassy said. “Why wouldn’t they say that? They don’t even think that they have grounds for discipline, and they think that there could be a crime proven beyond a reasonable doubt?”