The following court ruling on August 26, 2011 concerning a Boston case can be used as legal precedent to protect us from the encroachment of the police state as outlined in a previous article. Although this ruling is an important victory for 1st amendment rights, the media does not seem to be too concerned with freedom of speech issues.
The final outcome of this case may be the difference for Michael Allison’s case in Illinois between freedom or a life sentence:
In the meantime, let’s keep those video cameras and microphones turned on.
David DeGerolamo
Court Affirms Legality Of Recording Police Officers
Last Friday, the U.S. First Circuit Court of Appeals issued a ruling that affirmed, stronger than ever, the rights of individuals to openly record the actions of police officers.
In 2007, a young lawyer named Simon Glik was walking through Boston Common when he saw three police officers arresting a teenager. Glik thought the officers were getting a little rough, so he flipped open his cellphone camera and started shooting video.
The officers arrested Glik for, in their minds, violating the state’s wire-tapping law, even though the whole incident happened out in public and Glik didn’t try to conceal the fact that he was recording.
The ACLU took up Glik’s cause and the courts threw out the charges against him. Since then, the Boston Police Department has been instructing personnel that the state’s wiretapping law does not apply to people making unconcealed audio or video recordings in public. But Glik and the ACLU have pressed on, suing the BPD and the individual officers for violating his First Amendment rights.
The officers moved to have the suit dismissed, saying they were just enforcing an interpretation of the law that was handed down to them by their superiors. But on Friday, the federal court disagreed.
Judge Kermit Lipez writing for the unanimous panel, wrote, “Gathering information about government officials in a form that can readily be disseminated to others serves a cardinal First Amendment interest in protecting and promoting ‘the free discussion of governmental affairs.’”
That means that Glik’s suit against the officers may now go forward; they could be found liable for Simon Glik’s legal costs, among other damages. And while, theoretically, this kind of thing doesn’t go on in Boston anymore, ACLU attorney Sarah Wunsch says the court’s ruling has broader significance.
