Eighty-nine student organizations, faculty and Northwestern community members signed a letter to the editor published by North by Northwestern Friday calling on Students Publishing Company — The Daily Northwestern’s parent company — to drop a criminal complaint against two Black students connected to the distribution of imitated front pages of The Daily.
The students were charged in November with theft of advertising services — a Class A misdemeanor in Illinois — by the Cook County State’s Attorney Office in relation to their alleged involvement in the incident after the complaint was filed with University Police.
The charge carries a maximum sentence of one year in jail and a fine of up to $2,500. Under Illinois law, the state’s attorney has prosecutorial discretion to bring or dismiss criminal charges.
Title III, Part C, Article 16 of the Illinois Criminal Code of 2021 defines theft of advertising services as an incident in which an individual “knowingly attaches or inserts an unauthorized advertisement in a newspaper or periodical, and redistributes it to the public or has the intent to redistribute it to the public.”
The letter calls the charge a “gross overcharge” symptomatic of the over-policing of Black students on campus.
“This situation is yet another instance of a widespread effort to silence pro-Palestinian voices, disproportionately impacting people of color,” the letter reads.
Its signees include student organizations including NU’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, Jewish Wildcats for Ceasefire, the Middle Eastern North African Student Association and NU’s newly formed chapter of Educators for Justice in Palestine. It also includes faculty from Black studies, political science, Middle East and North African studies, and several other departments.
The letter also criticizes the behavior of University Police, alleging that their conduct in the investigation — leaving a note under the door of one student’s home and stopping the second student at their classroom door in bulletproof vests — caused the two students “undue emotional distress.”
“The Students Publishing Company, independent publisher of The Daily Northwestern, pursued a criminal complaint related to the publication of the ‘fake Daily’ this fall,” University spokesperson Jon Yates told The Daily. “As required by law, University Police pursued a criminal investigation, which led to a citation for violating state law that was issued to multiple students. Those criminal proceedings are pending.”
Yates did not respond to allegations against University Police made in the letter.
The letter also called on staffers of The Daily to urge SPC to drop the charges. It also asked all members of the NU community to sign a petition pressuring administration to “do more to protect Palestinian and pro-Palestinian voices” and to urge SPC to drop the charges against the two students.
As of Friday afternoon, the petition has received over 2,000 signatures.
“Staffers at The Daily Northwestern did not initially report this incident,” said Medill junior Avani Kalra, The Daily’s editor-in-chief. “Our staff is committed to reporting fairly and accurately on our campus and is not involved in any current legal proceedings.”
The imitated front pages, distributed in October, featured a photo of doctors surrounded by deceased civilians at the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza and a headline that read “Northwestern complicit in genocide of Palestinians.” The pages also imitated The Daily’s formatting and included a nameplate that read “The Northwestern Daily” in a font resembling The Daily’s masthead.
The papers were wrapped around copies of The Daily’s print paper in on-campus newsstands in more than a dozen buildings, pinned to the community posting board in Norris University Center and placed on desks in academic buildings like the Technological Institute.
Since October, Israel’s continued ground and air offensive in the Gaza Strip has killed over 27,000 Palestinians, according to Palestinian officials. The militant group Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel killed about 1,200 Israelis, according to Israeli officials.
SPC Chair John Byrne declined to comment on the letter, referring to the Board of Directors’ initial statement in response to the tampering of The Daily’s papers.
In an editorial published the same day, The Daily’s editorial board emphasized its independence from SPC, noting that the publishing company’s board — composed of students, faculty and alumni — has no involvement in The Daily’s editorial processes.
“The Daily’s staff did not have any prior knowledge of or involvement in these tampered print newspapers, nor their distribution to newsstands and classrooms across Northwestern’s campus,” the editorial reads.
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Email: [email protected]
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