ACLU of Maryland (ACLU-MD): Press Room

ACLU asks court to block Boardwalk ordinance silencing musicians

Mon, 10 Jun 2013 00:00:00 +0000

CONTACT: Meredith Curtis, ACLU of Maryland, 410-889-8555; media@aclu-md.org

BALTIMORE - On Monday, June 10, a federal court will hear evidence and oral argument in Hassay v. Mayor and City Council of Ocean City, Maryland, an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Maryland lawsuit challenging an unconstitutional noise ordinance that has been silencing musicians on the Ocean City Boardwalk. The ACLU is seeking a preliminary injunction to suspend enforcement of the ordinance while the case is under review. The lawsuit was brought on behalf of William F. Hassay, Jr., an accomplished violinist who has played for families on the Boardwalk for nearly two decades.

Initially, Ocean City filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, but has since withdrawn that motion and acknowledged that it lacked merit.

Maryland's federal court has previously ruled that the Boardwalk is a public forum, meaning that Ocean City may not place an undue burden on constitutionally protected speech. But in the summer of 2012, Hassay was threatened with arrest, up to three months imprisonment, and a $500 fine for playing his violin on the Boardwalk. Police were purportedly enforcing a noise ordinance that deems all music played on the Boardwalk from an instrument or device to be "unreasonably loud," and thus criminally prohibited, if it is "audible" from a distance of 30 feet.

The 30-foot audibility restriction on music violates the First Amendment. It also just makes no sense. The ACLU worked with an independent acoustical engineer who analyzed ambient sound at the Boardwalk and - to put the restriction in perspective - the jingling of a dog collar is audible more than 30 feet away on the Boardwalk. Thus, performers are effectively prohibited from playing any music that anyone could hear.

WHAT: Hearing on a motion for preliminary injunction in Hassay v. Mayor and City Council of Ocean City, Maryland, before United Stated District Judge Ellen W. Hollander.

WHO: William F. Hassay Jr., ACLU client; Gary Ehrlich, independent acoustical engineer; attorneys James Burke, Matthew Jeweler and Kathleen Orr, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP; and Deborah Jeon, ACLU of Maryland Legal Director.

WHEN: 10 AM, June 10, 2013

WHERE: United States District Court, Courtroom 5B, 101 W. Lombard Street, Baltimore, MD.

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ACLU Report on Racial Disparities in Marijuana Arrests

Tue, 04 Jun 2013 00:00:00 +0000

CONTACT: Meredith Curtis, media@aclu-md.org, 410-889-8555

BALTIMORE - According to a new report by the ACLU, African Americans were nearly three times as likely as whites to be arrested for simple marijuana possession in 2010, even though research consistently shows comparable rates of use across race. The report, Marijuana in Black and White: Billions of Dollars Wasted on Racially Biased Arrests, released today, is the first ever to examine state and county marijuana arrest rates nationally by race. The findings show that while there were pronounced racial disparities in marijuana arrests ten years ago, they have grown significantly worse. In addition, the report finds that the number of people arrested for marijuana possession increased substantially between 2001 and 2010 - and that African-Americans disproportionately bore the brunt of this increase in policing of marijuana.

A detailed county-by-county analysis of arrest data in Maryland will be released in the coming weeks by the ACLU of Maryland.

"The war on marijuana has disproportionately been a war on people of color," said Ezekiel Edwards, Director of the Criminal Law Reform Project at the ACLU and one of the primary authors of the report. "State and local governments have aggressively enforced marijuana laws selectively against Black people and communities, needlessly ensnaring hundreds of thousands of people in the criminal justice system at tremendous human and financial cost."

According to the report, Maryland has one of the highest arrest rates for marijuana possession in the country - it is fourth in the nation. In Maryland, police arrest one out of every 250 people for marijuana possession. Alarmingly, arrests for marijuana possession increased by 34% to a whopping 23,663 arrests in 2010. Maryland is now seventh highest in the country in terms of the raw number of marijuana possession arrests - outranking far more populous states like Pennsylvania and Ohio, which have more than twice the population of Maryland. In Maryland, marijuana possession arrests now make up 90% of all marijuana-related arrests and 50% of all drug arrests.

But even more alarming is that in Maryland, African-Americans comprise only 30% of the state's population - but 58% of arrests for marijuana possession. As is true nationally, the data shows that the race disparities in arrests have worsened - between 2001 and 2010. In 2001, blacks were twice as likely as whites to be arrested for marijuana possession. By 2010, African-Americans were three times as likely as their white counterparts to be arrested for marijuana possession in Maryland; whites were arrested at a rate of less than three per 1,000, while blacks were arrested at a rate of roughly eight per 1,000.

Put another way - between 2001 and 2010, Maryland's black population increased by 13%, but black arrests for marijuana possession increased by 69%. During that same period, Maryland's white population experienced a 4% increase in marijuana possession arrests.

Despite the fact that a majority of Americans now support marijuana legalization, nationally, states spent an estimated $3.61 billion enforcing marijuana possession laws in 2010 alone. Here in Maryland, we spent $106 million enforcing marijuana laws in 2010 - placing us 9^th in the nation. That is why the ACLU supported and advocated for legislation, SB 297, which would have decriminalized possession of small amounts of marijuana. While the bill made historic progress by passing the State Senate, the bill stalled in the House Judiciary Committee.

"Marijuana decriminalization efforts in the Maryland General Assembly advanced further than ever before this past session," said Sara Love, Public Policy Director of the ACLU of Maryland. "With this momentum and the new report, the ACLU of Maryland will continue advocating for reform of Maryland's racially biased and aggressive penalization of marijuana possession, which has torn communities apart, not improved public safety, not eradicated use, and has been a colossal waste of money."

Arrests for possession of even the smallest amounts of marijuana have often resulted in losing student financial aid, deportations, losing custody of children, greater difficulty finding a job, or ineligibility for public housing. Just as importantly, for every person who is found with marijuana, many more who have done nothing wrong are subjected to humiliating stops and searches by police - disproportionately people of color. The selective enforcement of marijuana possession laws has caused entire communities of people to be subjected to additional scrutiny by police not because they have done anything wrong - again, marijuana use rates are comparable -- but rather because of the color of their skin under the guise of the war on drugs and marijuana in particular.

Love added: "Now is the time to end this racially disparate approach of arresting and jailing people in Maryland for possession of marijuana because it not only wastes limited resources, but it hurts communities, and erodes trust with law enforcement."

Key national findings from the report include:

Arrests Rates

Nationwide, between 2001 and 2010, there were 8.2 million marijuana arrests. Over 7 million, or 88%, of these arrests were for possession (versus for sale or distribution). In 2010, there were over 889,000 marijuana arrests - 300,000 more than arrests for all violent crimes combined that year. This means one marijuana arrest every 37 seconds. Over 780,000 of those arrests were for possession.

Race Disparities

Nationwide, a Black person was over 3.7 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than a white person, despite comparable usage rates.
In the states with the worst disparities, Blacks were on average more than 6 times as likely to be arrested for marijuana possession as whites. And, in counties with the worst disparities, Blacks were over 10, 15 and even 30 times more likely to be arrested.
The racial disparities exist in all regions of the U.S., as well as in both large and small counties, cities and rural areas, and in both high- and low-income communities. Disparities are also consistently high whether Blacks make up a small or a large percentage of a county's overall population.

Nationally, the ACLU is calling for the states to legalize marijuana by licensing and regulating marijuana production, distribution, and possession for persons 21 or older, taxing marijuana sales, and removing state law criminal and civil penalties for such activities, which it says would eliminate the unfair racially- and community-targeted selective enforcement of marijuana laws. In addition, at a time when states are facing budget shortfalls, taxing and regulating would allow them to save millions of dollars currently spent on enforcement while raising millions more in revenue, money that can be invested in public schools and community and public health programs, including drug treatment.

In the report, the organization also urges lawmakers and law enforcement to reform policing practices, including ending racial profiling as well as unconstitutional stops, frisks, and searches, and also to reform state and federal funding streams that incentivize police to make low-level drug arrests.

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ACLU statement on Supreme Court decision on warrantless collection of DNA

Mon, 03 Jun 2013 00:00:00 +0000

CONTACT: Meredith Curtis, media@aclu-md.org or 410-889-8555

ACLU statement regarding the 6/3/13 Supreme Court decision in Maryland v. King, regarding warrantless collection of DNA from arrestees. The following can be attributed to Steven Shapiro, Legal Director for the national ACLU:

"Today's decision creates a gaping new exception to the Fourth Amendment. As Justice Scalia's dissent convincingly demonstrates, DNA testing of arrestees has little to do with identification and everything to do with solving unresolved crimes. While no one disputes the importance of that interest, the Fourth Amendment has long been understood to mean that the police cannot search for evidence of a crime - and all nine Justices agreed that DNA testing is a search - without individualized suspicion. Today's decision eliminates that crucial safeguard. At the same time, it is important to recognize that other states have DNA laws that are even broader than Maryland's and may present issues that were not resolved by today's ruling."

ACLU Slams Montgomery County Schools For Refusing to Discuss How to Stop Pledge of Allegiance Harassment

Tue, 21 May 2013 00:00:00 +0000

See full details at the legal case page

CONTACT: Meredith Curtis, Communications Director, 410-889-8555; media@aclu-md.org

DAMASCUS, MD - Troubled by a dismissive response from the lawyer for Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) to the ACLU's April 9, 2013 letter concerning a pattern of harassment experienced by MCPS students who decline to participate in the Pledge of Allegiance (Pledge), the ACLU renewed its call for a meaningful dialogue with the school system to discuss how to ensure that students' First Amendment rights are honored by teachers and administrators. The letter sent today to the Superintendent follows up on the call for a meeting prompted by the latest such incident, brought to MCPS's attention last month, which involved intimidation and harassment directed at a Damascus High 10^th grader who declined to participate in the Pledge as a way of expressing her opposition to U.S. government policies concerning Puerto Rico, where her family is from.

"The Montgomery County School System has a strong policy on student free speech, but what are school officials doing to ensure that that policy is fully understood and followed by teachers and administrators on the ground?" said David Rocah, staff attorney for the ACLU of Maryland. "Because the ACLU has received more complaints of school officials seeking to compel recitation of the Pledge from Montgomery County than any other school district, it is troubling that officials are unwilling to sit down to discuss how the situation can be improved."

Despite free speech guarantees in the Bill of Rights, state law, and in the Montgomery County School System's Regulations, the ACLU had to take action on behalf of Enidris Suirano-Rodriguez, who was repeatedly harassed and intimidated by teachers and an assistant principal for sitting quietly while the Pledge was recited. On behalf of the school system, attorney Judith Bresler asserts that school officials did nothing wrong in confronting Ms. Siurano-Rodriguez, denies that there is any systemic problem, and has refused to respond to our request for a meeting with MCPS staff to discuss our larger concerns, or to detail what steps have been or will be taken to meaningfully address the repeated complaints.

The Damascus High School incident was the fourth time the ACLU has contacted Montgomery County Public Schools concerning students' rights to decline to participate in the Pledge of Allegiance since 2005, and the sixth such occurrence reported to us from Montgomery County in the same time period. The latest incident also involved improper conduct by an assistant principal, like a similar incident in 2010 in which a middle school student was removed from a classroom by school police officers for refusing to stand for the Pledge, and in which an assistant principal said that the student should apologize for "her defiance." The MCPS spokesperson was quoted in April as saying that he was unaware of any training for staff on students' rights on this issue, despite the 2010 incident.

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ACLU Urges DOJ to Reopen Wicomico Voting Rights Challenge

Thu, 09 May 2013 00:00:00 +0000

ACLU letter to the Department of Justice

CONTACT: Meredith Curtis, ACLU of Maryland, 410-889-8555; media@aclu-md.org

WICOMICO COUNTY, MD - Concerned that Wicomico County is not taking the steps necessary to address underrepresentation of African Americans in local government despite the County's substantial minority population growth over the past two decades, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Maryland today asked the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to reopen its challenge to the County's racially discriminatory election system. Specifically, the group asks that DOJ revisit the Voting Rights Act challenge the federal government pursued from 1987 to 1991, during which the County adopted its current "hybrid" structure combining five single member districts with two at-large Council seats.

"By using a system that prevents even the most qualified African American candidates from winning more than a single seat on the Council, Wicomico County ensures that its long history of racial discrimination persists today," said C. Christopher Brown, General Counsel for the ACLU of Maryland, whose path-breaking voting rights litigation in the 1980s and 1990s, led to history-making advances for African-Americans across the Eastern Shore. "The Justice Department's worst fears about the hybrid system's racially discriminatory impact have been realized over time. Perhaps now, the Courts will see that and act boldly to ensure that minority voters in Wicomico County are finally afforded the fair representation that has been denied to them for decades.'"

Since adoption of the hybrid structure in 1990, no African-American or other minority candidate has ever won election to either of the at-large seats nor to any district seat except the single district with a majority-minority population, despite several attempts and the increased presence of minorities in the County. The ACLU argues that this pattern of exclusion demonstrates precisely the problem the DOJ sought to address with its challenge in 1990, and urges the United States to renew its challenge to the system in light of these developments.

"Election after election, African Americans in Wicomico County have gone to the polls with hopes of fair representation, but to no avail," said Mary Ashanti, President of the Wicomico County Branch of the NAACP. "Under the current election system, we are limited to just one seat on a seven-member council. We believe that a renewed legal challenge could remedy this injustice once and for all."

In September 1987, the DOJ sued Wicomico County, alleging that its at-large method of electing members to the County Council violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. At the time, Wicomico County had a five-member County Council in which all the members were elected at-large. In response to the DOJ challenge, Wicomico County expanded the County Council size to seven, and altered its structure so that five members are elected from single member districts, and the remaining two positions are elected at-large. Only one of the five single member districts has a majority-minority population, while the other four districts and the at-large seats are majority white.

The DOJ considered this change insufficient to remedy past discrimination and make the system fair, and so continued its challenge to the altered system. The case went to trial in federal court in 1991. Despite compelling evidence, the court ruled that the DOJ had not proven that the original plan violated the Voting Rights Act, and that it was too soon to know how well the new hybrid system would work, or whether it would be unfair to minority voters. In its current request to the DOJ, the ACLU asserts that the evidence now shows plainly that the hybrid system violates the Voting Rights Act.

"This is a matter of what is fair, because the way it is now is too one sided," said Edward Taylor, who served three terms on the County Council, representing the minority district. "It is important to have County Council members that reflect the voices of the African American members of community. No group can function as part of the community if they are excluded from representation."

The ACLU believes the current 5-2 plan operates to dilute the voting strength of African American voters and thus produces a discriminatory effect in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. As a replacement, the ACLU is recommending to the DOJ a system of seven single-member districts, which would allow African American majorities in two of the seven districts, and establish a more equitable system of representation.

"The change in the county's governance structure, now with a County Executive elected at-large, makes the old argument that there need to be two at-large council members superfluous," said Eddie Boyd, Jr. "Furthermore, the seven single member district plan would allow for a fair representation of African Americans on the County Council, consistent with their portion of the county's population."

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