After asking the protesters to leave several times, university police pepper sprayed a group of student demonstrators as they were seated on a paved path in the campus quad.

UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi apologized to the students, saying that the police had acted against her orders for there to be no arrests and no use of force.

A public debate about the militarization of police and the appropriate use of pepper spray on peaceful protesters took place in the media, with questions raised about the freedom of speech and the right to peaceably assemble guaranteed by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

On 18 November 2011, campus police officer Lt. John Pike pepper sprayed nonviolent demonstrators at UC Davis.

The Davis Division of the UC Academic Senate (the faculty of the University of California) conducted their own, separate investigation concurrently as well.

[17][18] In October 2013, it was reported that Joel Harter, an administrative law judge for the California Division of Workers' Compensation, had approved a settlement totaling $38,056 for Pike.

[23] The following years saw several large protests and actions across California in response to tuition hikes and other complaints against the UC administration, including 52 arrested on November 19, 2009[24] and an attempt to block the local interstate on March 4, 2010.

[26] Occupy Wall Street (OWS) began on September 17, 2011, in New York City's Zuccotti Park in the Wall Street financial district with protests focused on social and economic inequality, high unemployment, greed, as well as corruption, and the undue influence of corporations—particularly that of the financial services sector—on government.

81% tuition increases for students, mandatory furloughs (including for professors), firings of lower-ranking workers (especially those working directly with students), and well-publicized raises for the highest paid administrators have further fueled discontent both within the University of California system (of which UC Davis is a part) and within the California State University system, which has also seen large tuition raises and consequent protests.

[28] On November 9, 2011 students and professors at UC Berkeley began with a series of teach-ins around campus, a noon rally, and a march.

[35] University Professor Bob Ostertag echoed these sentiments in a public letter about the earlier events at UC Berkeley:[36] Chancellor Robert Birgeneau thus joins the likes of Bull Connor, the notorious segregationist and architect of the violent repression of the civil rights movement in Birmingham, Alabama, as some of the very few people who view the non-violent tactics of Martin Luther King as violent.The faculty of the UC Davis Department of English published a statement calling for "the disbanding of the UCPD and the institution of an ordinance against the presence of police forces on the UC Davis campus, unless their presence is specifically requested by a member of the campus community.

"[37] On Tuesday, November 15, 2011, several hundred demonstrators rallied on the quad to protest against proposals to increase tuition fees due to state budget cuts.

[39] At least one student who was pepper sprayed was also put on her stomach by police, hog-tied and placed in handcuffs, which was a clear violation of CSU's own policies.

[40] On Thursday, November 17, 2011, a group of Occupy UC Davis demonstrators once again set up tents, this time on the campus quad between Memorial Union and Shields Library.

On November 18, Katehi, citing safety concerns about people from outside the UC Davis community participating in demonstrations on the campus, informed the Occupy UC Davis group in writing that the tents must be removed by 3:00 pm "in the interest of safety, respect for our campus environment and in accordance with our Principles of Community.

Demonstrators held Thanksgiving in the quad with a local family donating 10 cooked turkeys and 100 pounds of mashed potatoes.

[61] Kamran Loghman, who helped develop pepper spray with the Federal Bureau of Investigation in the 1980s, stated that the incident at Davis "violated his original intent,"[62] adding he'd never seen "such an inappropriate and improper use of chemical agents."

We also call for a policy that will end the practice of forcibly removing non-violent student, faculty, staff, and community protestors by police on the UC Davis campus.

In addition, there are another 1,000 faculty members on campus made up of adjunct professors, lecturers, University Extension educators and other non-tenure-track academic appointments.

[76][77] At a town hall meeting, she told around 1,000 students, "I want to unequivocally apologize to the entire community for the appalling use of pepper spray.

Student, faculty and staff protesters have been pepper-sprayed directly in the eyes and mouth, beaten and shoved by batons, dragged by the arms while handcuffed, and submitted to other forms of excessive force.

[80]Bratton, chairman of the Kroll Security Group, was accused by critics and the Council of UC Faculty Associations as having a potential conflict of interest.

Kroll, which holds security contracts in the UC system, is a subsidiary of Altegrity Risk International and works closely with the financial sector on Wall Street.

[81] On December 6, 2011, Rep. Jerrold Nadler of New York's 8th congressional district and ranking member of the United States House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, sent a letter to Eric Holder, the United States Attorney General, requesting that the United States Department of Justice "launch a thorough investigation into law enforcement activities surrounding Occupy Wall Street — and its national offshoots — to determine whether the police have indeed violated the civil liberties of demonstrators or members of the media."

[86] On September 26, 2012, The University of California announced its decision to offer $30,000 to each of 21 plaintiffs who were pepper sprayed by Pike, according to a proposed settlement of a class-action lawsuit.

[89] Journalist Laura Flanders described the events as a "Bull Connor Moment," an allusion to the Birmingham, Alabama sheriff who infamously deployed fire hoses and attack dogs against peaceful protestors during the American Civil Rights Movement.

[90] Viewing footage of the incident, political strategist Ron Christie described it on Hardball with Chris Matthews as "excessive force", saying, "I wouldn't call that pepper spray, I'd say that was a pepper-hose.

Images have been manipulated to depict him pepper spraying various famous people, works of art and other objects and have received widespread coverage in media.

[95] The San Francisco Chronicle reported that Pike subsequently received some seventeen thousand angry or threatening emails, ten thousand text messages, and hundreds of letters, causing him to state that he suffered from depression and anxiety, which helped him achieve a worker's-compensation claim settlement of $38,056.

Katehi stated that she would use her time to write "a memoir about her experiences as a woman in the electrical engineering field and as an administrative figure".