That’s what the St. Paul Pioneer Press reports: Andrew Henderson watched as Ramsey County sheriff’s deputies frisked a bloody-faced man outside his Little Canada apartment building. Paramedics then loaded the man, a stranger to Henderson, into an ambulance. Henderson, 28, took out his small handheld video camera and began recording…. [A] deputy, Jacqueline Muellner, approached […]
Archive | Freedom of Speech
Injunction Barring Defendant from Mentioning Her Ex-Boyfriend’s Name in a Book
From Vrasic v. Liebel (Fla. Ct. App. Jan. 9, 2013): The parties to the instant appeal were once romantically involved. Some years after the end of their romantic relationship, Leibel sued Vrasic, alleging that, in the intervening years, she [Vrasic] had engaged in a pattern of harassment, i.e., she hacked into his email — sending […]
Court Refuses to Issue Preliminary Injunction Against Publication of Trade Secrets on Matters of “Public Concern”
The case is VI 4D LLP v. Crucians in Focus, Inc. (V.I. Super. Ct. Dec. 28, 2012); an earlier Virgin Islands Supreme Court decision in the case is likewise generally quite speech-protective. The facts, from the trial court decision: VI 4D filed an Application for Economic Development Commission Benefits with the United States Virgin Islands […]
Virginia Supreme Court Reverses Preliminary Injunction Against Alleged Libel
Public Citizen has details on the case, including the court documents. Here’s Public Citizen’s summary (paragraph break added): A contractor sued a woman who posted an unfavorable review of his services on Yelp and Angie’s List, alleging defamation in a number of respects, and sought a preliminary injunction. The trial judge held a preliminary injunction […]
Crime in England to Post on Facebook That “All Soldiers Should DIE & Go To HELL!”
I missed this story when it came up a few months ago; from The Independent (UK): Sergeant Nigel Coupe, 33, of 1st Battalion The Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment, was killed alongside Corporal Jake Hartley, 20, Private Anthony Frampton, 20, Private Christopher Kershaw, 19, Private Daniel Wade, 20, and Private Daniel Wilford, 21, all of 3rd […]
Petitions to Watch
I’m pleased to see that the Butt v. Utah petition, which I filed with the Supreme Court in September — and which will be considered by the Justices on January 4 — has made it to SCOTUSblog’s Petitions to Watch list. Now if only it can make it from there to SCOTUS’s Petitions to Grant […]
The First Amendment, the Second Amendment, and Article V
I’m not sure how much attention to pay to petitions on the White House site. Once upon a time, getting 25,000 written signatures on something through word of mouth or newspaper articles would have been a big deal; but today, getting that number of electronic signatures using e-mail and social media strikes me as not […]
Virginia Revocation of Plaintiff’s “ICUHAJI” License Plate Is Unconstitutionally Viewpoint-Discriminatory
So holds Bujno v. Commonwealth (Va. Cir. Nov. 2, 2012), which was just posted on Westlaw. The court concluded that the license plate program was a “nonpublic forum” in which the government could restrict speech based on subject matter but not based on viewpoint (a view adopted by other courts as well), and held that […]
The Christmas Finger
A Louisiana trial court has just “granted Sarah Childs’ request for a temporary restraining order prohibiting the City of Denham Springs from interfering with her display of lights on the roof of her house” — specifically, the display shown above. From the Complaint filed in support of the order: On or about Tuesday, November 27, […]
Mann v. Steyn — CEI SLAPPs Back
By Jonathan H. Adler on December 20, 2012 11:44 am in Climate Change, Defamation, Freedom of Speech, Politicizing Science
Earlier this week, Rand Simberg and the Competitive Enterprise Institute replied to Michael Mann’s libel suit. Specifically, they filed a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim and, more interestingly, a special motion to dismiss under the District of Columbia’s Anti-SLAPP Act. As I noted here, Mann exposed himself to this motion by […]
In re: Erik Loomis
By Jonathan H. Adler on December 20, 2012 12:34 am in Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Speech at Colleges and Universities, Freedom of Speech Restricted by Thugs
What Ken at Popehat said. UPDATE: David Henderson too.
Can the Westboro Baptist Church (the Funeral Picketers) Be Stripped of Their Tax-Exempt Status Because of Their Views?
There’s a petition so urging (with 30,000 signatures); there’s another petition asking that the church be “[l]egally recognize[d] … as a hate group” and subject to “some form of imposed regulation.” Is such stripping of a tax exemption based on the group’s “hate” viewpoint, or other similar “regulation,” constitutional? No. The government may indeed impose […]
Crime to Distribute Publications “Belittling the Traditional American Institutions or Folkways”
From Ormond Beach, Florida Code of Ordinances § 14-13(b): It shall be unlawful for any person to import, print, exhibit, publish, sell, lease, distribute or circulate any obscene publication, or any publication describing or portraying acts of sadism, propaganda against or belittling the traditional American institutions or folkways, sympathy with crime and the criminal as […]
Now There’s a Speech Restriction for You
A new Vernon County, Wisconsin ordinance provides a $50 to $500 fine — or, if the fine isn’t paid, up to 30 days in jail — for send[ing] information to another person by electronic means with the intent to annoy, offend, demean, ridicule, degrade, belittle, disparage, or humiliate any person if the information “serves no […]
Disparaging Those Who Deserve To Be Disparaged
Ken at Popehat takes on the Supervisors of Vernon County, Wisconsin (and my bet’s on Ken).