Issue isn't free speech.Byline: The Register-Guard Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And sometimes a person who makes a fool of herself refusing to obey a police officer is just a fool, and not a martyr martyr Person who voluntarily suffers death rather than deny his or her religion. Readiness for martyrdom was a collective ideal in ancient Judaism, notably in the era of the Maccabees, and its importance has continued into modern times. to the cause of free speech. A unanimous Oregon Supreme Court The Oregon Supreme Court (OSC) is the highest state court in the U.S. state of Oregon. The only court that may reverse or modify a decision of the Oregon Supreme Court is the Supreme Court of the United States. ruled last Thursday that Rose Mary Illig-Renn did not have a free speech right to refuse to climb down from the bed of a pickup truck that police officers wanted to have towed. The high court upheld a state law that makes it a crime to disobey dis·o·bey v. dis·o·beyed, dis·o·bey·ing, dis·o·beys v.intr. To refuse or fail to follow an order or rule. v.tr. To refuse or fail to obey (an order or rule). a lawful order from a police officer. Newspapers never back away from legitimate free speech battles, even when it requires supporting positions that people may find objectionable. But no common-sense assessment of the Illig-Renn case reveals a genuine free speech issue. Here's what happened when the case first unfolded in 2000. Illig-Renn was a passenger in a truck that a Clackamas County sheriff's deputy stopped at about 2 a.m. because the rear license plate light wasn't working. After running checks on the driver and Illig-Wren, Deputy John Zbinden learned that they both had suspended licenses and neither could produce any proof of insurance for the vehicle. Zbinden, confronted with no legally licensed drivers and a potentially uninsured vehicle, did what any sensible police officer would do in a similar case: He called a tow truck. At this point, Illig-Renn began to freely exercise her extensive command of profanity Irreverence towards sacred things; particularly, an irreverent or blasphemous use of the name of God. Vulgar, irreverent, or coarse language. The use of certain profane or obscene language on the radio or television is a federal offense, but in other situations, profanity as she climbed into the bed of the pickup and planted herself by the back window. Deputy Zbinden told Illig-Wren to come down from the truck. Illig-Wren responded with more profanity and verbal abuse verbal abuse Psychology A form of emotional abuse consisting of the use of abusive and demeaning language with a spouse, child, or elder, often by a caregiver or other person in a position of power. See Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Spousal abuse. . She screamed First single released by Ultra Vivid Scene
The 12" version included You Know it All - 3:06 that she wasn't coming down and that Zbinden was just going to have to arrest her. After giving her three more opportunities to get out of the back of the truck, Zbinden granted Illig-Wren's wish and snapped the handcuffs hand·cuff n. A restraining device consisting of a pair of strong, connected hoops that can be tightened and locked about the wrists and used on one or both arms of a prisoner in custody; a manacle. Often used in the plural. tr.v. on her. At trial, public defender public defender, governmental official who represents indigent persons accused of crime. U.S. Supreme Court decisions expanding the right to counsel to pretrial proceedings and holding that a person cannot be sentenced to even one day in jail unless a lawyer was Tammy Sun, who represented Illig-Wren, attacked the state law that made it a crime to disobey the lawful order of a police officer. Sun argued that the wording of the statute was unconstitutionally broad and could infringe on the free speech rights of lawful protesters. If the language of the statute was unconstitutional, it could not be used as the basis for a lawful police order. The Oregon Court of Appeals The Oregon Court of Appeals is the state intermediate appellate court in the U.S. state of Oregon. Except for death penalty cases, which are reserved to the Oregon Supreme Court, and tax court cases, it has jurisdiction to hear all civil and criminal appeals from circuit courts, agreed with Sun and in 2004 struck down the state law. Attorney General Hardy Myers Hardy Myers (born October 25 1939 in Electric Mills, Mississippi) is a lawyer and Democratic politician currently serving his third term as attorney general of the state of Oregon, United States. appealed to the state Supreme Court, which overturned the Court of Appeals and allowed the original charges to be reinstated. The Supreme Court made the right call in this case and in the process didn't diminish Oregonians' free speech rights one iota. Illig-Wren's obscenity-laced refusal on four separate occasions to obey Deputy Zbinden's legitimate order to climb down from the pickup truck had nothing whatsoever to do with free speech. Moreover, nothing in the language of the statute impinges on constitutionally protected political expression. The Supreme Court noted that if police were to use the law to arrest lawful protesters, the protesters could challenge the constitutionality of their arrests based on the facts of their case. Protection of free speech rights entails acceptance even of expression that is clearly offensive. But Illig-Wren crossed the line when she combined her own offensive speech with an unreasonable refusal to obey a lawful police order. |
|
||||||||||||||||||

Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion