COMMENTARIES ON THE DRYWALLERS’ DISPUTE : Mass Felony Arrests Show Builders’ Clout With Sheriff, D.A. : 150 workers were jailed for conspiring to achieve the American dream: just wages and benefits from a secure job.

On July 2, 150 men in search of the American dream--the right to a job that pays enough wages to feed their families and provide them with job security and benefits--headed out to a job site. They hoped to persuade other workers to join them in demanding union representation. Instead they dreamed their dreams in the Orange County Jail.

This unprecedented mass arrest of construction workers trying to recruit other laborers to organize a union leads me to question the influence of special interest groups on the Orange County sheriff and district attorney. While the 1992 presidential campaign has people looking at who the financial backers are behind the candidates, not enough attention has been focused on elected officials charged with serving the public without bias.

Dist. Atty. Michael R. Capizzi claims that the builders have not had direct contact with his office regarding these cases. But if you believe that money talks, you have only to look at the list of contributors to his and Sheriff Brad Gates’ campaign funds to see why they wouldn’t even need to spend a dime. So long as the sheriff receives more than one third of his donations in a single year from the construction industry and one developer can generate contributions of as much as $45,100 for the district attorney, developer money will determine law enforcement handling of labor disputes. There will be no evenhandedness of law enforcement against those who work for equitable wages in the building industry.

The statistic that really tells the story is that 90% of the people arrested were either released without charges or allowed to plead to the minor infraction of disturbing the peace.

Emotions ran high as these decent, hard-working family men took their cause to the streets. Many of them lacked the education to read, even in Spanish, much less comprehend the significance of the trespass signs at the construction site.

A handful of these men, in the heat of the moment, overreacted. Angry words led to angry actions. These dozen or so men pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges and were released after 18 days in jail.

While the INS usually takes little interest in misdemeanors, it placed holds on all those arrested who could not prove their legal status. To not jeopardize future attempts to gain legal status, 23 were voluntarily deported, without demanding their right to an immigration hearing; 25 more were deported after a hearing.

The mass arrests stand as an anomaly in our law enforcement system because the workers were not individually screened by the deputies for criminal responsibility at the time of the arrests. Blanket $10,000 bails initially set for all of the more than 150 workers speak for themselves. The bail was so pricey because of the inflated felony charges, which were eventually resolved in dismissal or pleas to minor offenses. The vast majority of those arrested remained in custody until their cases were dismissed, they were released on their own recognizance or sentenced to time already served.

The most powerful economic lever in the county, the building trades lobby, used the muscle of county law enforcement in union-busting against the most disenfranchised segment of our society, whose work as drywall hangers is not even dignified by minimum wage. The effect was not to enforce the law, but to discourage and intimidate those workers from organizing a union.

Of the 150 Latinos who were involved in this job action, after seven days in jail, 45 had their charges dismissed because the district attorney had no case against them. If no probable cause exists that these men committed even a misdemeanor trespass after seven days of crime investigation by the district attorney staff, how likely is it that on the day of the arrests the sheriff’s deputies had reason to believe they committed felonies?

Why were these men subjected to felony arrests? The deputies did not arrive until the workers were driving off, so they could not arrest them for a misdemeanor, which requires that the police officer witness the act. Instead, they chose to arrest all 150 people leaving the site.

Legally, this means that they believed that each person driving away had committed a felony. Peace officers with a reasonable belief that a person committed a felony may arrest them, even when they did not witness the crime. Time spent in Orange County Jail and facing felony charges are convenient tools to keep protesters away from job sites and to intimidate them from further organizing activities.

As a taxpayer, I am outraged when I look at the mind-boggling costs for deputies assigned to the drywall labor dispute, which were more than $24,000 for just the booking fees, not to mention the actual per diem cost of needless incarceration, or the costs of courtrooms, attorneys, investigators and bailiffs.

As a human being, when I look at the paltry plastic bags of emergency relief food on the floor of the union hall, a carton of eggs and a pound of cheese, I wonder how many hungry young mouths this must feed and for how long. As a society we must take the reins and decide where to apply our financial resources.

The drywall independents were arrested for conspiring to achieve the American dream.

Builders and developers with the money to make $1,000 contributions to the campaigns of Capizzi and Gates have the power to buy the American dream. They must not be permitted to rob others of the reality of that dream--decent wages, job security and benefits.

Despite the hardships of deportation, unjustified incarceration and prolonged separation from loved ones, there is a unity of spirit, a brotherhood among those who know their cause is just. It is a tribute to the indomitable human spirit that whatever the personal cost, these men will be out on the picket lines tomorrow.