Eastern District of California Blog

Anti-Abortion Activists Sue To Stop California's Reproductive Fact Act

Reproductive health clinics run by abortion opponents moved immediately to head off enforcement of a bill signed Friday by Gov. Jerry Brown that would require the clinics to inform patients that abortion services are available elsewhere.

On Saturday in Sacramento federal court, religiously affiliated clinics in Marysville and Redding that don’t offer abortions sued California Attorney General Kamala Harris, a sponsor of the new law, asking for an injunction preventing it from taking effect Jan. 1.

“At a minimum,” the lawsuit charges, AB 775 “unconstitutionally compels (the clinics) to speak messages that they have not chosen, with which they do not agree, and that distract, and detract from, the messages they have chosen to speak,” in violation of their free speech rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment.

In addition, the suit claims, “Disseminating the mandated state message, which is inconsistent with plaintiffs’ religious convictions, burdens these clinics’ free exercise of religion, secured under the First Amendment.”

The 18-page complaint, filed on behalf of the clinics by the Pacific Justice Institute, a conservative, nonprofit legal organization in Sacramento, asks the court to declare the Reproductive Fact Act unconstitutional and prohibit its enforcement.

Sacramento Bee, 10/11/15

California AG Defends Ban On Handgun Ads

Pundits on the left and right have sometimes complained about the “politicization of everything” — the way issues increasingly take on a partisan, grudge-match quality to them. There’s little room for compromise and common sense when just about every disagreement turns into a litmus test.

An ongoing case in a federal court in Sacramento illustrates this argument. Attorney General Kamala Harris is defending California’s enforcement of a 1923 gun-related law against some central and northern California firearms dealers. The dealers have challenged the law on constitutional grounds after the state fined them during routine store inspections.

UT SanDiego, 4/6/15

Sacramento County Settles Panhandling Suit

Sacramento County has settled a federal lawsuit over panhandling restrictions, clearing the way for enforcement of an ordinance banning solicitation in medians, near ATMs and other locations.

The settlement was formalized Wednesday when attorneys representing the county and the Sacramento Homeless Organizing Committee filed a motion in U.S. District Court asking for the case to be dismissed, said attorney Mark Merin, representing the committee.

The plaintiffs agreed to settle because the county amended its panhandling ordinance to allow for charity solicitation not long after the lawsuit was filed, Merin said.

SacBee, 1/8/15

Religious Group Files EDCA Free-Speech Suit Against Loomis School District

A conservative legal group that defends religious freedoms has sued the Loomis Union School District, complaining that campus officials violated a sixth-grader’s free-speech rights by scolding her for sharing religious fliers with two friends during the lunch hour without permission.

The Pacific Justice Institute lawsuit filed in federal court in Sacramento also names Superintendent Gordon Medd, Loomis Basin Charter School and two campus administrators. It alleges the 12-year-old girl was called to the principal’s office four times in one day and required to “write out an incident report to confess what she had done.”

The girl, identified only as K.C., was instructed by the principal to turn over her fliers and scolded for bringing them to school “because the content is religious and … had not been approved by the school district,” according to the November lawsuit filed by the Sacramento-based group. The lawsuit said the girl was also told “not to talk about religion at school.”

Sacramento Bee, 12/21/14

EDCA Suit Challenges California's Ban On Handgun Window Ads

In this EDCA Complaint filed Monday, four Northern California gun store owners are raising a First Amendment challenge to a California law that bans ads of handguns in windows or other places available to the public.  See CBS Local, KCRA TV, News10, and SF Gate.

Porterville Sign Rules May Have Violated First Amendment

  John Duran says the city of Porterville - a town of 55,000 about 70 miles southeast of Fresno - interfered with a "get out the vote" event he had planned in a local park ahead of city council elections in 2012.

     Duran claims he got permission for the event from someone named Michelle in the parks and leisure department. However, as he was setting up candidate signs on the day of the event the man says Porterville Police Department sergeant - and defendant - Richard Standridge ordered him to remove the signs because they violated an at-the-time unspecified city ordinance.

     But Duran placed the signs throughout the park anyway, about a yard away from the public sidewalk. Standridge returned later and ordered Duran to remove the signs completely, although he allowed the man and his volunteers to place them on car windshields and bumpers a few feet away on a public street.

     Duran sued, claiming the city's unconstitutional code on signing interfered with his First Amendment rights. The man also argued that Standridge acted at the behest of defendant city manager John Lollis to silence the event, since it touted Lollis' rivals and political adversaries.

     For its part, the city argued that Duran lacked standing to bring the suit at all since by his own admission the signs didn't belong to him and he didn't support any of the candidates. The city also said Duran's action was moot because Standridge had relied on an ordinance that had already been repealed to get Duran's signs out of the park.

     But U.S. District Judge Lawrence O'Neill said last week that while Duran's alleged constitutional injury seems minor, it is still a violation of his First Amendment rights that needs to be addressed.

     "The court finds that plaintiff's declaration provides sufficient facts - almost all of which defendants do not dispute - that show that plaintiff suffered a cognizable legal injury, however minor, traceable to Standridge's conduct, which likely can be redressed by a favorable decision from this court," O'Neill wrote. "Plaintiff therefore has standing to bring claim under Section 1983 on the ground that Standridge violated his First Amendment rights. The court further finds that plaintiff's declaration provides sufficient uncontested facts to demonstrate that he has standing to bring his First Amendment claim through his as-applied challenge to the city ordinance on the ground that Standridge's alleged enforcement of that ordinance impermissibly restricted plaintiff's First Amendment rights."

Courthouse News, 9/29/14

EDCA Court Rules Documents In Lodi Police Shooting Death Case Should Be Public

A trove of documents related to the shooting death by Lodi police officers of an Army veteran earlier this year should be released to the public and the media, a federal magistrate judge ruled Friday.

Judge Allison Claire denied a motion by the city for a blanket “protective order” that would have kept confidential autopsy reports, witness statements, photographs and other information pertaining to the fatal shooting of Parminder Singh Shergill by police as he walked toward his mother’s home on the morning of Jan. 25.

Claire said the city failed to prove that it had the legal standing for the proposed protective order, which was labeled a “gag order” by Sacramento civil rights attorney Mark Merin, who is representing the Shergill family.

Shergill, 43, a Gulf War veteran who suffered from schizophrenia and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, was shot dead by police as he walked toward his mother’s home in Lodi. His family had called police, as they had in the past, after he suffered a mental “episode” and left the house. They asked that officers pick him up and take him to a mental health facility.

Sacramento Bee, 8/8/14

ACLU First Amendment Lawsuit Challenges Sacramento County's Anti-Panhandling Law

This lawsuit filed by the ACLU of Northern California and attorney Mark Merin claims Sacramento County's anti-panhandling law violates the First Amendment.  Sacramento Bee

Fresno Jury Awards $17,500 In Free Speech Action Against Former Los Banos Mayor Tommy Jones

A federal court jury in Fresno last week ruled that a former Los Banos mayor owes $17,500 to a one-time resident whose microphone went dead mid-speech during a presentation at a city council meeting.

The jury found that Tommy Jones violated Eugene Forte's free-speech rights by cutting off his microphone while he addressed the Los Banos City Council.

Forte, who represented himself at the civil trial, was awarded $10,000 in general damages and $7,500 in punitive damages after a week-long trial.

Fresno Bee, 6/18/14

Liberty Counsel Asks Supreme Court To Review Gay Conversion Therapy Ban Decision

Liberty Counsel has filed this petition for writ of certiorari requesting that the Supreme Court review the Ninth Circuit's decision rejecting a First Amendment challenge to California SB1172, which bans "gay conversion" therapy for minors.  Bloomberg News, 2/6/14.

[Hat tip to how appealing blog].