Defend Life, a small, Baltimore-based pro-life group, is celebrating a major legal victory nearly four years after its members were illegally arrested, strip-searched and jailed by the Maryland State Police for peacefully protesting abortion at an intersection in Harford County.
In August 2008, 18 members of Defend Life displayed graphic posters of aborted fetuses along Route 24 as part of its annual “Face the Truth Tour.” In response to irate calls from passing motorists, state troopers soon arrived and demanded to see the group’s permit.
In a videotaped confrontation available on YouTube, founder Jack Ames politely asks a state trooper why they needed a permit when one had never been required in the past. “I’m a state police officer,” was the retort. “I know the law.”
Turns out he didn’t. Neither did his duty officer. Even after the protesters regrouped within the town limits of Bel Air, Sgt. Dona Bohlen ordered them arrested on charges of disorderly conduct, failure to obey a lawful order and willfully obstructing traffic. After two juveniles were released, the other 16 were handcuffed, fingerprinted and transferred to the state police lockup.
“I was shackled and strip-searched twice,” Angela Swagler, now a Christendom College senior, told The Washington Examiner. “They confiscated our cell phones. My parents were very worried because I called them every night. They thought I had been kidnapped.”
The protesters were released from jail the next day, and the phony charges were soon dropped. But nine Defend Life members were not willing to let the matter rest there. They filed a federal lawsuit alleging violation of their constitutional rights.
U.S. District Judge Richard Bennett agreed with them. Last July, he granted the protestors summary judgment, ruling that their freedom of speech had been “unquestionably restricted.” The constitutional violations were so egregious, the judge noted, that if the case ever went to trial, the only thing left for the court to decide would be the amount of damages awarded to the plaintiffs.
Those potential dollar signs got the attention of Maryland’s three-member Board of Public Works, which quietly agreed to settle the lawsuit last month without comment. Under the terms of the $385,000 settlement, state troopers will have to undergo sensitivity training to learn how to enforce the law without violating the First and Fourth Amendments.
“The police can’t enforce ordinances against disturbing the peace or disorderly conduct to restrict peaceful protests or picketing on public sidewalks, parks or streets unless there is an immediate threat to public safety,” says attorney Tom Brejcha, chief counsel of the Chicago-based Thomas More Society, who represented several of the plaintiffs. The American Catholic Lawyers Association and the Alliance Defense Fund represented the other litigants.
“The police also can’t restrict speech based solely on the reaction of bystanders,” Brejcha added. “There’s no ‘heckler’s veto.’ And if the police believe the protest is illegal, they must provide protesters with the opportunity to relocate before they threaten or arrest anybody.”
The settlement also contains a provision that allows Defend Life to go back to federal court if the Maryland State Police attempt to interfere with any peaceful protest on public property within the next five years or attempt to restrict the content of any speech otherwise allowed, no matter how offensive it may be to passersby.
“A free society cannot exist if those whose sworn duty is to protect the public misuse their power to arrest and jail innocent people to curtail or stifle their message,” Brejcha said during Monday’s press conference announcing the settlement. Fortunately, the courts saw it the same way, and so free speech still exists in the Free State.
Barbara F. Hollingsworth is The Examiner’s local opinion editor.
