Legal Director's Report
Legal Department Highlights of 2001 from Mark Silverstein

• scored another appellate court win in our challenge to state-mandated random urine testing of dog trainers in the Greyhound racing industry
• challenged the display of a Ten Commandments monument in a prominent spot at the entrance to the Grand Junction City Hall
• submitted an amicus brief supporting the Tattered Cover's resolve to resist a search warrant that seeks records revealing customers' reading choices
• successfully challenged an overly broad state liquor regulation that punished bar owners who permit "profanity ... that might reasonably lead to violence"
• began legal proceedings against contractors for the Department of Youth Corrections who treated two suspected victims of child abuse like criminals, confining them in locked facilities and shackling them during transport
• won a meaningful victory in a jury verdict on behalf of an air traffic controller who was unjustly fired when the government refused to accommodate his religious practice, which required Saturdays off to celebrate the Sabbath
• recruited defense attorneys for persons arrested during a Denver peace march whom the police apparently targeted for wearing black clothing and covering their faces
• submitted an amicus brief arguing that a divorce court violated a gay man's rights by ruling that he could not take his daughter to services of the Metropolitan Community Church, which the court disparagingly described as "having a gay orientation"
• filed suit on behalf of the family of a Colorado Springs man who died from lack of prompt medical attention after spending a day at the El Paso County Jail on a minor marijuana charge
• successfully defended an Estes Park business owner who, during the President's visit in August, was arrested for peacefully distributing samples of a product he sells: toilet paper bearing the President's likeness

In many cases, ACLU volunteer attorneys and legal department staff achieve success with letters or telephone calls instead of legal action. For example, in 2001, we:

• convinced Colorado county clerks and recorders to stop refusing to issue marriage licenses to individuals who have no social security numbers, a practice that discriminated against undocumented immigrants and unconstitutionally infringed on the right to marry
• persuaded the City of Colorado Springs to repeal a recently passed ordinance that barred individuals with past felony convictions from running for city council
• prevailed on Denver's Public Safety Review Commission to recommend that the Denver Police Department should require officers to record the facts they rely on to justify warrantless pat-down frisks and should require supervisory review of those records
• successfully intervened on behalf of members of the Colorado Coalition for Peace in the Middle East, whom Denver police had threatened to arrest for loitering if they held a banner on the 16th Street Mall
• secured the City of Palisade's agreement that it will never again force our client to choose between standing for the Pledge of Allegiance at city council meetings or being removed from the room by police
• persuaded the principal of Broomfield High School to respect a student's right to engage in silent symbolic expression by wearing a cap with an upside-down American flag
• helped a low-budget advocacy group obtain an assembly permit after convincing Denver officials that they had unjustifiably conditioned the permit on payment of a substantial fee, purchase of $1 million in insurance; and hiring of off-duty police officers
• wrote to the principal of a Highlands Ranch high school on behalf of a student who believed that the administration was unfairly hampering her efforts to organize a gay-straight alliance
• intervened with the City of Fort Collins to assure that peace marchers were permitted to conduct peaceful demonstrations against the war in Afghanistan

The staff of the ACLU Legal Department also:

• urged the El Paso Board of County Commissioners to investigate the alarming pattern of inmate deaths in the county jail (4 in 2001 and 9 since 1998), which the ACLU said raised serious questions about the training and staffing levels of deputies as well as whether the jail's medical and mental health units are adequately staffed with competent personnel
• sent a detailed letter to the Chief Medical Officer of the Department of Corrections (DOC) explaining the ACLU's view that the DOC's protocol for treating inmates with Hepatitis C unjustifiably delays and denies necessary medical treatment
• recommended that the Denver Police Department adopt measures to regulate police officers during traffic stops, such as banning pretext stops; requiring reasonable suspicion before seeking consent to search; informing individuals of their right to refuse such consent; requiring written permission for consent searches; and gathering statistical data on police requests for consent searches

  Although we cannot report success with regard to the foregoing three examples, our advocacy continues.

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