DENVER - Federal District Court Judge Christine Arguello issued a 39-page decision yesterday striking down Grand Junction’s panhandling ordinance, ruling that it violates the First Amendment rights of persons who wish to solicit charity in public places.

Wednesday’s ruling expands on an earlier order in the case, issued in June, which held that the ordinance regulated speech on the basis of its content. That ruling required Grand Junction to meet the strictest standard of judicial scrutiny. In Wednesday’s decision, the Court explained that Grand Junction had failed to justify its regulation of expression.

“The ruling striking down Grand Junction’s panhandling ordinance will have ramifications throughout Colorado,” said Mark Silverstein, ACLU of Colorado Legal Director. “The reasoning of this decision, along with Supreme Court rulings earlier in the summer, signify that almost every panhandling ordinance in Colorado must be repealed or seriously amended.”

The ACLU of Colorado has initiated discussions with city attorneys in Denver and Colorado Springs about the need for repeal or for major revisions of their panhandling regulations. Police in Colorado Springs were recently ordered to stop enforcing most provisions of the city’s two panhandling ordinances.

Grand Junction adopted its ordinance in the spring of 2014, and the ACLU of Colorado filed its legal challenge before the ordinance went into effect. The challenged provisions made it a crime to ask for charity after sunset or within 20 feet of an ATM or a bus stop. Other challenged provisions prohibited asking for donations from people standing in line or seated at an outdoor café. The Court ruled that Grand Junction had failed to support its contention that the regulations were necessary to protect public safety.

Dozens of Colorado cities enforce similar regulations that prohibit asking for charity in certain public locations, at certain times, or in specified situations. The ACLU of Colorado encourages all Colorado city attorneys to immediately review the Grand Junction ruling and consider whether their panhandling ordinances must be repealed or amended.

“The ACLU does not object to carefully tailored regulations that target coercive, threatening, or menacing solicitations that actually invade the rights of others,” Silverstein said. “But we oppose, and the First Amendment prohibits, broad regulations that outlaw peaceful, polite, and nonthreatening requests for assistance.”

Along with Silverstein, clients in the case were represented by ACLU of Colorado staff attorneys Rebecca T. Wallace and Sara Neel.

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In a remarkable turn of events, the City of Colorado Springs has ordered the Colorado Springs Police Department to immediately stop issuing citations for alleged violations of ordinance 10.18.112, titled “Soliciting on or Near Street or Highway”. It has also forbidden citations for most sections of ordinance of 9.2.111 “Solicitation Prohibited.”

The CSPD issued a sweeping department bulletin instructing its officers to “discontinue issuing summonses for Solicitation on or Near Street or Highway.” The bulletin also makes clear that “passive solicitation is lawful everywhere in the City.”

This action is in response to ACLU concerns outlined in a September 14^th letter accusing the City of a widespread pattern of illegal enforcement of the panhandling ordinances against poor and homeless persons who were not in violation of the law.

Since 2013, the CSPD has issued over 900 citations for panhandling. The ACLU charges that at least 90% were issued for conduct that did not violate the ordinances, such as merely holding a sign that invites charity from passersby.

Colorado Springs City Attorney Wynetta Massey responded to the ACLU in a letter outlining the new policy and provided a copy of the revised CSPD bulletin.

“The Police Department and the City Attorney have now acknowledged that they have been citing, prosecuting and convicting innocent persons,” said Mark Silverstein, ACLU Legal Director. “We appreciate the City’s prompt decision to order police to stop enforcing the panhandling ordinances against persons who are not violating those ordinances.”

“As the police bulletin emphasizes, persons who solicit charity by passively displaying a sign inviting donations are not violating the City’s panhandling ordinances,” Silverstein continued. “Nevertheless, police have been issuing hundreds of citations. Instead of dismissing the tickets, the City Attorney’s office has prosecuted, and the Municipal Court judges have entered convictions and imposed sentences.”

The ACLU’s letter asserted that all three branches of the City’s justice system “played a culpable role in citing prosecuting, convicting and sentencing poor and homeless people, sometimes to jail, for a crime they did not commit.”

Silverstein said the police bulletin is a welcome first step, but more remains to be done. “The City Attorney’s Office must also dismiss all pending prosecutions against persons who were merely displaying a sign. In addition, it must also take steps to undo erroneously-entered convictions and sentences, including pending jail, fines or probation, that were imposed on persons who were merely holding a sign inviting charity.”
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DENVER –The ACLU of Colorado renewed its request today for records related to the Colorado Springs Police Department’s internal affairs investigation into the traffic stop of Ryan and Benjamin Brown, two ACLU clients who were pulled over, handcuffed, searched, and detained at gun point and taser point over a cracked windshield.

The ACLU’s request follows a decision yesterday by the 4^th Judicial District Attorney’s office to dismiss an obstruction charge against Ryan Brown, whose video recording of the traffic stop has been viewed more than 155,000 times on YouTube.

Brown filed a complaint with the department following the incident in March.  He received a brief boilerplate letter in June informing him that police had conducted a “complete and thorough” investigation into the incident and concluded that the officers’ conduct was “justified, legal, and proper.”  A subsequent ACLU records request for the internal affairs file was denied due to the pending criminal charge against Brown.

“Now that the criminal charge has been rightly dismissed, there are no more excuses for denying the internal affairs records,” said ACLU of Colorado Legal Director Mark Silverstein. "The public has a right to know how the Colorado Springs Police Department determined that it was 'justified, legal, and proper’ to remove two African-American men from a car at gunpoint and taser point, handcuff them, search them and detain them, over a cracked windshield."

Ryan and Benjamin Brown were driving just a block away from their home when they were pulled over by Colorado Springs police.  After a taser-wielding officer ordered Benjamin Brown, the driver, out of the car, he was handcuffed, searched without cause, and detained in the back of a police vehicle, even though he had been cooperative, no weapons or contraband were found, and there was no evidence to suggest that he had been involved in a crime.

Ryan Brown then began recording the scene on his phone. His repeated requests for the officers to identify the reason for the stop were ignored.  Officers worked together to force him out of the car, push him to the ground, face down in the snow, search him, and cuff him, all the while at gunpoint.

While dragging Ryan Brown out of the car, officers on the video are heard saying that he is not under arrest and that they were just checking him for weapons.  No weapons were found.  Officers took his phone, turned off the video, and threw it in the snow.

Benjamin Brown was cited for a cracked windshield, and Ryan Brown was charged with “interfering with official police duties.”  The ACLU defended the Browns in criminal court and yesterday won a complete dismissal of Ryan Brown’s charge."

The ACLU has maintained from the beginning that Ryan did not commit any crime,” said ACLU cooperating attorney Megan Downing of Recht Kornfeld PC. "We are very pleased that the District Attorney's Office did a thorough review of the facts and in the end, full dismissal was the right result.”

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