Court Reinstates Case Against UCSD Student in Biting of FBI Agent

A federal appeals court has reinstated a felony assault charge against Kristen Crabtree, the UC San Diego student who bit the finger of an FBI agent when the agent tried to grab her camera during a campus protest a year ago.

But the court also chastised the San Diego U.S. attorney’s office for pursuing the case, saying it ought to direct its efforts toward “more meritorious prosecutions.”

In an opinion filed late Friday, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said U.S. District Judge Gordon Thompson Jr., chief of the southern district, exceeded his authority when he threw the indictment out before trial.

Thompson had said it was the aggressive conduct of the agent, Marene Allison, that provoked the incident and that “no reasonable juror could find that Ms. Allison was acting within the scope of her official duties when she grasped the strap of Ms. Crabtree’s camera.”

Message on Acquittal

The appeals court said it “sympathized “ with Thompson and that he “may well be correct” in finding that there was insufficient evidence to charge Crabtree with assault. Further, the appeals court said that, if the case goes to trial, “a judgment of acquittal could well be warranted.”

Nevertheless, that decision can be made only after prosecutors have presented their full case, the court said. Thompson had dismissed the charges during hearings on a pretrial motion brought by Crabtree’s lawyer, who alleged that outrageous government conduct created the crime.

The incident occurred May 14, 1987, when Crabtree and about 20 other students were protesting the participation of FBI, CIA and military recruiters in a campus job fair. When Crabtree tried to photograph Allison, who was seated at the FBI table, Allison grabbed at the strap of Crabtree’s camera. During a brief scuffle, Crabtree bit the agent’s finger.

At a pretrial hearing in August, Allison acknowledged that she knew Crabtree had a right to take her picture. Allison said she decided to stop Crabtree because she and a companion were wearing checkered scarfs she associated with the Palestine Liberation Organization.

Prosecution to Proceed

Assistant U.S. Atty. Bruce Castetter, head of the appeals division, said Monday that the government plans to proceed with the prosecution and that the appeals court was not aware of all the facts in the case, which will come out at trial.

Attempts to reach Crabtree for comment were unsuccessful but her lawyer, Barton Sheela III, said Thompson could still throw the case out before trial on technically valid grounds. The appeals court sent the case back to Thompson for further hearings, which have not yet been scheduled.

“To the extent that the district court sought to send a message that its docket and the efforts of the U.S. attorney should be devoted to more meritorious prosecutions, it is a message with which we are hard put to disagree,” the appeals court said.

But the district court’s power to dismiss charges “does not extend to clearing its docket of properly obtained--even if groundless--indictments,” the court concluded.