Men who allegedly took over USC lectures to remove YouTube postings

Two men who were already barred from USC for allegedly barging into classrooms during live lectures and creating disturbances they posted on YouTube have agreed to take down the social media posts and stop disparaging the university, according to new court documents.

The accord between the university, Ernest Kanevsky and Yuguo Bai was outlined in court papers filed Wednesday with Los Angeles Superior Court Judge James C. Chalfant. The judge had issued a tentative ruling in favor of the university’s motion for a preliminary injunction against the pair and said he was unaware of the agreement until Wednesday’s hearing.

Chalfant had granted a temporary restraining order against the men on April 8, barring them from campus as well as any other university-owned properties in Los Angeles County. He said he was reluctant earlier to order that any postings be taken down because of the First Amendment, but he accepted the agreement by Kanevsky and Bai to do so on their own accord.

Kanevsky and Bai did not appear in court on April 8 or on Thursday. However, attorney Adam B. Maldonado, on behalf of USC, said he had been in contact with the men and that the two sides came to the agreement outlined in his court papers.

In his earlier court papers, Maldonado criticized the alleged actions of Kanevsky and Bai.

“Simply put, there is no public benefit to terrorizing students to the point where they are running out of lecture halls for fear of their lives through the perpetration of prank classroom takeovers in order to garner a handful of likes on YouTube,” Maldonado wrote.

USC will continue to experience a loss in goodwill and confidence within its community and among its students and faculty if the men are allowed to continue their “unauthorized assault on (USC’s) classrooms through the continued perpetration of classroom takeover videos,” according to Maldonado’s court papers.

The university’s lawsuit was filed April 6 and alleges both private and public nuisance. The current terms will remain in effect until the case is concluded.