Nine months after student journalist Dilan Gohill was arrested while covering a protest at Stanford University, prosecutors confirmed today that they will not pursue criminal charges against him.
“This Office supports a free press and recognizes that the law gives reporters latitude to do their jobs in keeping the public informed,” Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen said, as reported in the Columbia Journalism Review. “We have no evidence that this student did anything other than cover this event as a journalist.”
Gohill, reporting for The Stanford Daily, was arrested June 5 while covering a pro-Palestinian demonstration where students barricaded themselves inside the president’s office. Gohill was held in jail for a few hours and faced charges of felony burglary, vandalism and conspiracy.
The Student Press Law Center, with the First Amendment Coalition and 24 other free speech and press organizations, sent a letter to Rosen in June calling on him to decline charges against Gohill.
SPLC celebrated today’s news.
“We are relieved that Dilan can finally move past this ordeal and be a normal student again,” said SPLC Senior Legal Counsel Mike Hiestand. “We thank District Attorney Jeff Rosen for acknowledging what everyone but Stanford seemed to realize several months ago: Dilan was there as a journalist and should not have faced felony charges for the act of reporting the news. Dilan is proof that student journalism is not a stepping stone to ‘real’ journalism — it is real journalism, with the same potential to inform, to challenge and to inspire.”
Gohill told the Columbia Journalism Review that he learned about the decision as he was leaving class today.
“No journalist should ever have to endure a nine-month-long threat to their academic, social, and professional future for simply doing their job,” he said. The university and prosecutors “all allowed the possibility of multiple felonies to hang over my head.… I’m glad they finally realized that journalism is not a crime.”
Shortly after Gohill’s arrest, former Stanford President Richard Saller and Provost Jenny Martinez said they “fully support having [Gohill] be criminally prosecuted and referred to the office of Community Standards.”
In January, current Stanford President Jonathan Levin confirmed to SPLC and FAC that Gohill will not face campus disciplinary action after more than seven months of that possibility. Levin, however, declined to rescind the university’s previous endorsement of criminal prosecution of Gohill in response to SPLC and FAC’s calls for him to do so. Instead, he deferred to the District Attorney’s Office.
Gohill told the San Francisco Chronicle in January that the university had not informed him the disciplinary process had concluded.
This Saturday, he will share his story with hundreds of student journalists as a keynote speaker at the Associated Collegiate Press conference in Long Beach, California. Later this month, Gohill will receive a Golden Sledgehammer Award from the Northern California chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists for his reporting on the protests.
Read the latest coverage in the The Mercury News, Columbia Journalism Review and the San Francisco Chronicle.
Prior SPLC coverage and advocacy:
- Arrested reporter won’t face university discipline, Stanford tells SPLC, FAC (Jan. 23, 2025)
- SPLC, FAC urge Stanford to call for DA to decline charges against student journalist (Jan. 17, 2025)
- Arrested Stanford reporter still in limbo six months later (Dec. 18, 2024)
- Coalition calls on DA to decline charges against Stanford student journalist (June 20, 2024)
The Student Press Law Center promotes, supports and defends the free press rights of student journalists and their advisers. As the nation’s only legal nonprofit focused on the rights of student journalists, SPLC provides information, training and legal assistance at no charge to high school and college student journalists and the educators who work with them.