Police in NY shrug off court order, deny religious free speech
We read:
"Alliance Defense Fund attorneys have filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Ithaca on behalf of a Christian man denied his free speech rights even after he showed police officers a court order prohibiting them from enforcing an unconstitutional "noise" ordinance. ADF attorneys also filed a motion asking the court to suspend the ordinance while the case moves forward. "Christians shouldn't be penalized for expressing their beliefs, especially when a court has expressly upheld their right to do so, as is the case here," said ADF Senior Counsel Nate Kellum. "Police officers cannot step beyond their authority and illegally suppress Christian speech in defiance of a court order."
In 2006, ADF attorneys secured a favorable ruling against the city of Ithaca on behalf of Kevin Deegan. The court's order prohibited officials from enforcing a municipal code that unreasonably restricts sounds on public streets, sidewalks, or paths that can be heard from 25 feet away.
Officers initially approached Deegan in 1999 for violating the code while he was sharing a gospel message in Ithaca Commons. In August 2008, officers prohibited his friend, Jim Deferio, from speaking in the same location. The following week, Deferio returned with Deegan, and officers again told them they were breaking the 25-foot "noise" ordinance. Deegan produced the court order, but the officers did not heed it, saying it didn't apply to them as new officers on the scene.
Source
7 comments:
WTF? You can't operate an automobile that isn't heard 25 ft. away. Is the first requirement for being a public official in Ithaca, NY idiocy?
even more idiotic is their interpretation of a court order against the police department to be a court order against specific individuals employed by that department.
Lets hope a judge writes a blistering ruling against Ithaca. This is about as blatant a violation of the first ammendment as there can be.
a popular bumper sticker in the area is ' ithaca..10 square miles surrounded by rationality'. i guess this is what happens when you let liberal college professors control a town.
The action of the local government, (ie: the Police) in this case is so blatantly unconstitutional as to make even discussing it ridiculous! What were they thinking? But the real "meat" of this story is, "where did the orders come from". What local official was responsible for ordering the police to take this action. You can bet they didn't do it on their own.
The police officers in this case should be brought up on charges of criminal contempt court. They knowingly disregarded a court order and in doing so they deprived someone of their first amendment rights... come to think of it, this might also be a criminal federal civil rights violation.
They knowingly disregarded a court order and in doing so they deprived someone of their first amendment rights.
That is overreaching. The original court order enjoined the town and specific officials from enforcing two specific ordinances. After the case, the town re-wrote one of the ordinances to make it comply, in their mind, to the court's direction.
It is overstepping slightly to say that they disregarded the court's order when in fact, the order didn't cover the new ordinance.
That being said, the steps and reasoning the court used were available to the town. This new incident is not different from the old one even though the officers read it as such. The reasoning the officers apparently used is contrary to the reasoning the court set out.
When showed the injunction, the cops did ask "how do we know you didn't print that on your computer?" (This according to the new complaint.) The cops should have checked with their superiors to see if the injunction would, in fact, apply now. They didn't.
I don't think that this is a case where the officers and town were deliberately trying to silence an individual or individuals. I think they were trying to use what they thought were legal means to stop what other people were complaining about in the commons area. They wanted to stop the complaints and appease as many people in the commons as they could. Its a good idea, but there is no Constitutional ban on "being annoyed."
After reading the papers and decisions, one of the things that I found both funny and terrifying is that the lower state court hired and certified as an "expert" an acoustic engineer who, after taking readings and making calculations, presented to the court that the 25 foot radius for sound was impractical and uninforceable. Things like heels walking on the side walk, a midly heated conversation, and kids playing would exceed the ordinance.
The court, apparently not liking what the expert said, discounted their opinion and ruled for the city.
You can tell that the District Court wasn't thrilled with that. You can almost read the "are they freakin' nuts?" in the decision.
The town should lose this and rightfully so. Yet to me, there is a hint of something even more scary and that is the judicial activism of the lower court when it dismissed all scientific evidence that appeared to go against what they wanted - and later did - decide.
Post a Comment