In August 2015, Sarah Molina and Christina Vogel attended a large protest in St. Louis, Missouri, as legal observers in order to protect the right to protest. Molina and Vogel wore bright green hats indicating that they were legal observers. During the protest, St. Louis police officers ordered the crowd to disperse. Some protesters responded by throwing rocks and bottles. Police then shot inert smoke canisters into the crowd. Vogel was recording these events. Police then started using tear gas, at which time Molina and Vogel left and reassembled with some others about 500 feet away off the thoroughfare and on a side street in Molina’s yard. Minutes later, an armored police vehicle known as the BEAR (short for “Ballistic Engineered Armored Response Counter Attack Truck”) drove by and fired tear gas canisters toward them while they sought shelter in a passageway between neighboring houses. Police later denied shooting chemicals from the BEAR, but an after-action report contradicted their statements. The primary liaison between a police helicopter and the BEAR later acknowledged that he recognized the individuals wearing bright green hats were legal observers.
Molina and Vogel sued the police for retaliating against the exercise of their First Amendment rights to observe and record police conduct. However, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed their claims, finding that the police officers were covered by qualified immunity because the right to observe police-citizen interactions had not been clearly established at the time, even though, as dissenting judges pointed out, two earlier decisions by the Eighth Circuit indicated otherwise. In asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case, The Rutherford Institute is urging the Court to affirm that the First Amendment protects the right to peacefully observe and record police activity in public.
The amicus brief in Molina v. Book and The Rutherford Institute’s “Constitutional Q&A: Rules of Engagement for Interacting with Police” are available at www.rutherford.org.
The Rutherford Institute, a nonprofit civil liberties organization, provides legal assistance at no charge to individuals whose constitutional rights have been threatened or violated and educates the public on a wide spectrum of issues affecting their freedoms.
Source: https://tinyurl.com/24mcpemx
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