“What a huge debt this nation owes to its ‘troublemakers.’ From Thomas Paine to Martin Luther King, Jr., they have forced us to focus on problems we would prefer to downplay or ignore. Yet it is often only with hindsight that we can distinguish those troublemakers who brought us to our senses from those who were simply … troublemakers. Prudence, and respect for the constitutional rights to free speech and free association, therefore dictate that the legal system cut all non-violent protesters a fair amount of slack.”
— New York United States District Court Judge Jed A. Rakoff’s June 7, 2012, decision in Garcia v. Bloomberg, refusing to dismiss about 700 Occupy Wall Street protestors’ unlawful arrest claims against the police officers who arrested them while they crossed the Brooklyn Bridge. The Court did dismiss the claims against the City of New York, its Mayor and its Police Commissioner — because a different legal standard applies to the City and its top officials than applies to the actual arresting officers.
Thanks to Ken Isserlis for sharing this with us.