WOODLAND — On the day Yolo County prosecutors were expected to air their evidence against the suspected vandal of a local mosque, the Davis woman surprised the court by pleading guilty to all the charges against her.
Lauren Kirk-Coehlo, 30, did what’s known in legal circles as “pleading to the sheet” — admitting to the allegations in full. She was charged with felony vandalism with a hate-crime enhancement and vandalism to a church.
Such a move does not require the prosecution’s cooperation.
“She wanted to take responsibility for her actions and plead guilty at an early stage of the proceedings,” Steven Sabbadini, one of Kirk-Coehlo’s two defense attorneys, said following her brief appearance in Yolo Superior Court Judge David Rosenberg’s courtroom. “We’ll leave it up to the court’s discretion to determine an appropriate sentence.”
Kirk-Coehlo faces a maximum of six years in state prison at her sentencing hearing, scheduled for June 16.
Supervising Deputy District Attorney Ryan Couzens, the case’s prosecutor, declined to comment at length but confirmed that the guilty plea “was done with no promises, no deals from us.”
John E.B. Myers, a criminal law professor at McGeorge School of the Law in Sacramento, said Kirk-Coehlo’s plea comes as little surprise given the relatively few charges filed against her.
“In this case her violations of both counts and the enhancement were so clear. She was going to be convicted of both if the case had gone to trial,” Myers said. “There were all kinds of charges they could have packed on, such as criminal trespass and attempted burglary, and they didn’t do that.
“I think it will be viewed favorably by the sentencing judge,” Myers added.
A graduate of Davis High School and UC Berkeley, Kirk-Coehlo was caught on surveillance video vandalizing the Russell Boulevard mosque during the early hours of Jan. 22, smashing multiple windows, damaging bikes and wrapping raw bacon — a prohibited food in the Muslim religion — on the door handles.
She was arrested Feb. 14 following a joint investigation by the Davis Police Department and the FBI.
A judge set Kirk-Coehlo’s bail at $1 million — well above the county’s bail schedule for those charges — in light of social media activity that police and prosecutors said deemed her a threat to public safety.
According to court documents, Kirk-Coehlo wrote of having “dreams and aspirations” of killing people, glorified Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof and called herself a “hero” after carrying out the vandalism.
Police detectives who scoured Kirk-Coehlo’s Twitter account also found that she “made derogatory remarks using the terms ‘Jews, Mexicans and (N—–s)’ on a regular basis,” and conducted online searches regarding local mosques, bomb vests and Quebec mosque attack suspect Alexandre Bissonnette, says an affidavit in support of the bail enhancement.
Sabbadini and co-counsel David Dratman asserted in court documents that the bail amount excessive and unreasonable for what essentially was a property crime. The alleged Twitter postings, while offensive, are “constitutionally protected speech” that “amount to no more than anonymous internet hyperbole,” the defense attorneys said.
“While people might deplore what was said, it’s free speech under the First Amendment,” Dratman argued in court Feb. 24 during an unsuccessful bid to lower Kirk-Coehlo’s bail. “The fact that people rant on the internet does not always translate into action.”
Kirk-Coehlo remains in Yolo County Jail custody pending her sentencing hearing.
Hamza El-Nakhal, former president of the Davis Islamic Center, said while surveillance video from the crime presented strong evidence against Kirk-Coehlo, he is hopeful that her admission will help reduce her sentence.
“Even though we were very shocked by the vandalism on our house of worship, I announced in Central Park (during a community gathering in response to the crime) that we forgave her. We greatly appreciate living in a loving community,” El-Nakhal said.
“In the future, we hope she will not harm herself or others in the community based on her thoughts or urges. We pray for her. May peace be with her and her family and friends.”
Kirk-Coehlo’s plea also was welcomed by the Sacramento Valley office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
The case now goes to the Yolo County Probation Department for preparation of a report and sentencing recommendation. However Kirk-Coehlo’s fate ultimately will be decided by Judge Daniel Maguire, who will preside over the June sentencing hearing.
— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene