For the past seven months, UC Santa Cruz police have had access to the entire contents of third-year Laaila Irshad’s phone. From private emails and text messages, to photos and even location data, authorities had access to over a decade’s worth of personal data.

UCSC police were investigating Irshad over alleged vandalism during last year’s Gaza Solidarity Encampment, but they had requested data reaching back to when Irshad was in fifth grade. 

After nearly two months of litigation, a Santa Cruz County judge, Erika Ziegenhorn, has dramatically narrowed the access authorities have to her phone. 

On April 30, judge Ziegenhorn ruled that the warrant from UCPD was too broad. The ruling modifies the search warrant and limits the UCPD’s access to the phone’s data from April 30 to Oct. 1, 2024. 

The order also called to seal or destroy any communications between the device and Irshad’s attorneys, via text or email.

“Everybody has information on their phone of our private personal lives, our financial records, our medical records, our political associations, our political beliefs, criticisms of our employers,” said Thomas Seabaugh, one of Irshad’s attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). “I think we all recognize that having police search your phone, and all the information on it, is incredibly invasive.”

The warrant was originally presented to Irshad on Oct. 1, 2024, when police approached her outside her dorm while residents evacuated during a fire drill. Authorities stated the warrant was filed to search for evidence as part of an ongoing investigation of suspected vandalism.

In both hearings held on Irshad’s petition against the search warrant, students, faculty, and community members showed up to “pack the courts” in support of Irshad. At the first hearing in Santa Cruz on April 14, about 80 people were present as reported by a community member; in Watsonville on April 30, about 50 people were present.

“Whenever you study any movements for liberation, they try to gunk us up through legal persecution [and] police persecution,” said Christine Hong, a critical race and ethnic studies professor, to the crowd outside of the Watsonville Courthouse. “But this was turned into a movement opportunity. You have come out strong every single time.” 

Arguments

During the second court hearing, Seabaugh argued that the search warrant was “overbroad.” He claimed that UCSC police already knew the date range of the alleged vandalism, yet they asked for all of the information on her phone anyways. The ACLU said the warrant violated the parameters set by the California Electronic Communication Privacy Act (CalECPA), a state law that requires government entities to obtain a warrant that specifies “appropriate and reasonable” time periods for the requested electronic data. 

Victoria Degtyareva, one of the lawyers representing the UC Regents, argued that this search warrant is consistent with “the type of warrant that is filed across the country,” stating that there is “nothing special about it.” 

The warrant is sealed, and UCSC has refused to give any further information on Irshad’s investigation, claiming that it would reveal sensitive details regarding the investigation. In the hearing, the university did not provide reasoning to the gap in time between the alleged vandalism and the service of the search warrant to Irshad in October.

Irshad’s attorneys also speculated that the search warrant may have been retaliatory due to her involvement with a separate lawsuit against the UC Regents, which was dismissed on May 2.

Responding to claims of targeted retaliatory measures against Irshad, Degtyareva argued that “Ms. Irshad’s phone is not being searched because she’s a protester … the phone is being searched because she is suspected of criminal activity.”

In a gathering outside the courthouse after the hearing, ACLU lawyers spoke to supporters, thanking them for showing up to support Irshad and students’ rights to privacy and free speech.

“The university overreached in its attempts to intimidate students, retaliating against students who are serving their legal rights,” Seabaugh said. “We finally got it heard today and we finally got some relief. Of course, one lawsuit won’t cure the reign of terror that’s going on on campuses, but I think it was an important win.”