An Emory University professor claimed she was arrested at a pro-Palestine protest on campus after she told police officers to stop beating a student.
Noëlle McAfee, chair of the Atlanta school’s philosophy department, was seen on video being led away in handcuffs Thursday afternoon.
She said she was arrested after intervening in an incident in which officers threw a young protester to the ground and beat him.
“I was watching them hit someone and I said, ‘No.’ And they arrested me,” he said. 11Alive.
The professor added that it is a mistake to think that she was there to support the Palestinian protest but that she was “defending the students and their freedom of expression.”
Emory University professor Noëlle McAfee claimed she was arrested at a pro-Palestine protest on campus after she told police officers to stop hitting a student.
Noëlle McAfee, chair of the Atlanta school’s philosophy department, was seen on video being led away in handcuffs Thursday afternoon.
McAfee insisted he was not confrontational during the ordeal, but had to get involved when he saw a student thrown to the ground and beaten by officers.
“The mother in me said, ‘stop, stop,'” she said. And I made sure I was four feet away from them, still, non-confrontational.
“One of the police officers stood up, stood right in front of me and said, ‘Ma’am, you need to step back, you need to step back.’
And I was watching them hit someone and I said, “no.” And they arrested me.’
The professor added that the incident seemed to last an eternity.
‘Hitting and rolling and hitting and hitting, this kid just had his head like that, trying to protect himself. “I don’t know how long it lasted,” he said.
“And when they said, ‘Madam, you must move away,’ no human being will move away.”
She was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct and a court date will be set for next month.
‘Just questioning the power of the police was a violation. My disorderly conduct was that I stayed there,” the teacher said.
Emory University professor Caroline Fohlin shouted “I’m a professor” after police forcibly threw her to the ground during her arrest at a Gaza solidarity protest on campus.
A police officer threw her to the cement after she tried to intervene during the arrest of another protester.
The teacher refused a police order to get on the ground before the officer forced her down.
“I stood on my campus, I stood to stop someone from being beaten to death, so that was disorderly conduct.”
McAfee said people have thanked her for defending Gaza, but they are wrong and that she has “complicated views on the conflict.”
He added that he was simply defending students’ right to protest and that there was a “problem of higher education administrators stifling free expression and delegitimizing any dissent.”
‘He wanted an opportunity for peaceful expression of his views, peaceful dissent. That was my concern.’
The professor stated that it is false to say that there were external agitators in the protest.
“Maybe there were some students from other universities here,” he added.
‘But the students I’ve talked to who are organizing it are Emory students who I’ve known for years.
‘They said outside agitators, I think the outside agitators were the Atlanta police and the Georgia state police. They were the agitators.
McAfee believes Thursday’s scenes, which included an Emory University professor yelling “I’m a professor” as police forcibly wrestled her to the ground, could have been avoided.
Fohlin was later booked into the DeKalb County Jail on charges of disorderly conduct and assault on a police officer.
Police used tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse protesters at the University of Georgia. Fohlin had been trying to intervene in the arrest photographed before his own.
Videos showed Atlanta police officers and Georgia State Police fighting and clashing with protesters, including a student being tasered by an officer as he lay on the grass.
Thursday’s scenes echoed similar ones at universities across the country, as pro-Palestinian students demand that their institutions divest from companies with ties to Israel.
An officer also saw a protester being attacked with a Taser. It is unclear what led to this moment.
Economics professor Caroline Fohlin was knocked to the cement by a police officer after she tried to intervene during the arrest of another protester.
The academic, 57, was among professors arrested at a pro-Palestinian camp at a Georgia university on Thursday, which was dispersed by police using tear gas and rubber bullets.
Fohlin was booked into the DeKalb County Jail on charges of disorderly conduct and assault on a police officer.
McAfee said, “The really bad thing here is that the university president, or his office, did this.”
“The police will do their thing, but the president of the university called them… so the biggest problem is not the police, because the police will be police, but an administration that called the police to our campus.”
Emory’s vice president for public safety claimed police were called after some protesters refused to confirm their connection to the university.
