A San Francisco visitor accused of harassing an anti-abortion protester at a 2022 pro-choice march was acquitted Wednesday of criminal harassment in Honolulu District Court.
Judge Summer Kupau-Odo, after hearing testimony and taking time to watch the incident on video recorded during the June 2022 Waikiki march, found Aleada “Saber” Minton not guilty of harassing James Kelii Wallace, said Daphne Barbee-Wooten, Minton’s attorney.
Wallace used a megaphone to protest the march and claimed Minton assaulted him by hitting his megaphone with a video camera, causing his megaphone to hurt his lip, but not enough to seek medical attention since he was not bleeding.
Prosecutors filed a criminal third-degree assault complaint Aug. 18 in Oahu Circuit Court, alleging Minton caused bodily injury to Wallace using a dangerous instrument. But after the defense demanded a jury trial, the state moved to have the misdemeanor charge reduced to harassment, a petty misdemeanor, which would not qualify for a jury trial and sent it to the lower court.
“I think police overreacted because my client was Black and queer,” Barbee-Wooten said. She said a tiny camera is not a dangerous instrument, and police photos of Wallace show no injuries.
The Department of the Prosecuting Attorney said in a written response to questions about the case and reaction to the verdict: “As in every case we charge we felt we could prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. In this case we presented evidence to prove harassment. The judge found the defendant not guilty.”
Barbee-Wooten said witnesses testified Wallace handed her client pamphlets depicting baby parts, and called her and other pro-choice individuals satanic and murderers. Barbee-Wooten also said witnesses testified that Wallace called Minton, who is Black and a lesbian, a racial epithet, and said, before police arrived and during her arrest, that she should commit suicide because her mother had her.
Minton said she was walking to the beach on Kalakaua Avenue a block from her vacation rental with her video camera on when Wallace, standing on the street corner, began engaging with her.
She and her partner, Candice Perrault, were in Hawaii after Perrault’s stepmother’s death to take video for her memorial service, but police confiscated the camera with video footage for that and police didn’t return the camera until after the service.
Minton said she was offered to pay $150 to settle the matter, but “that would be admitting guilt, and I wasn’t guilty.”
She said they were “trying to bully me into silence.”
“I feel like the verdict was just and right because we got this person, Mr. Wallace, to admit on the stand to five years (of protests), but he has been harassing these people for 15 to 20 years,” Minton said, and that it continued even after the first day of trial in February. “He’s escalated. He feels like he’s protected now, and is more aggressive toward pro-choice people.”
Wallace claimed to be afraid after the alleged incident, but Sharon Uyeno and others testified he showed up to pro-choice marches and rallies carrying signs of aborted fetuses, using a megaphone, and recording video of pro-choice marchers, and has frequently harassed people at pro-choice events and in front of the Planned Parenthood office, Barbee-Wooten said.
Minton said “I think people are more aggressive towards me and make a lot of assumptions based on my queerness and blackness. I’m not going to stop being myself, but they were more assertive and aggressive,” she said of police.
Perrault said six police officers were there to make the arrest, yelling, “Grab her.”
“I’m terrified because of historically what happens more in the news to Black people and queer people,” Perrault said.
While Minton was being handcuffed, Wallace was walking behind with a megaphone saying “Lock her in a zoo like the monkey she is,” Perrault said.
Minton estimated the couple spent more than $7,000 in flights, food, accommodations and loss of income to attend the trial, which began the afternoon of Feb. 24 and was continued to June 14. (The court in February prioritized in-custody defendants over the Minton trial and could not reschedule it to the next day.)
Reacting to the verdict, Liz Rees, spokesperson and organizer for Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights and Refuse Fascism Honolulu, said: “It’s the first step. To have the actual harasser putting charges against her is outrageous, and luckily the judge saw it for what it was.”
