Members of the local outpost of Occupy Wall Street, the growing cross-country protest movement against corporate greed, could face arrest Friday night.

City Attorney Rick Doyle said it’s illegal to camp out at City Hall overnight, typically past 11:30 p.m.

“Bottom line is, we prohibit camping, we prohibit staying overnight,” Doyle said. “You’re entitled to come during the day and protest and assemble and picket or whatever you want to do. I don’t think it’s uncommon for cities to ban camping at public facilities.”

As soon as Friday night, Doyle said, San Jose police officers may officially order the protesters to leave. If they refuse, police could cite the gatherers or even arrest them.

But members of the loosely based group who met with Doyle’s office Thursday deny they are camping out and say they have a right to free speech.

“Occupying is a symbol of the movement across the nation,” said Elaine Brown, a San Jose resident and attorney who is helping to represent the Occupy San Jose members. “We’ve been trying to work with the city so that we can exercise our First Amendment rights here in a congenial manner.”

Brown and others also pointed out that the site where the five nylon tents have been erected near the corner of East Santa Clara and Fourth streets is being kept clean and litter-free, and that none of the protesters is using drugs or alcohol.

Moreover, she said, others have been allowed to stay on-site for weeks.

Attorney Dan Mayfield said he asked the City Hall facilities manager why the city in 2008 allowed an elderly Vietnamese activist named Ly Tong to camp outside the City Hall tower for about a month. Tong was protesting the city’s refusal of the Vietnamese community’s request to designate a Story Road section “Little Saigon.”

Mayfield said he asked the facilities manager: “Are you saying that because of the content of his (Tong’s) speech he got the right to stay, but because of the content of our speech we have to leave?” Mayfield said the facilities manager replied: “No comment.”

Henry Nguyen, who said he is Tong’s younger brother and was alongside him every day of his hunger strike outside City Hall, said Tong agreed to obtain a permit on the fourth day of his protest. But he said Tong never paid a fee and was never forced to leave.

Tom Manheim, spokesman for the city manager’s office, said Thursday that in retrospect, the city “probably should have cited” Tong. “We are concerned about allowing a precedent to be set that says anybody can come and do whatever they want on our plaza,” Manheim said. “We have a municipal code about that for exactly that reason, because we believe it’s important to control things on this plaza. We are now faced with a situation about what we should do in this event.”

Contact Tracy Seipel at 408 275-0140.