LOS ANGELES - The ACLU of Southern California won a temporary restraining order today to stop the Los Angeles Police Department from continuing its pattern of harassment and intimidation of protesters. Judge Dean Pregerson enjoined the LAPD from:

"1. Seizing from the Convergence Center or destroying any puppets or printed material; 2. entering the Convergence Center on the basis of purported administrative violations, including building and safety, zoning, and fire code violations, in the absence of a prior order issued by this court."

"The Court's order sends a clear message," said ACLU of Southern California staff attorney Dan Tokaji, "that the Constitution will not be suspended because the Democratic National Convention is in town."

The ACLU of Southern California won a key victory this week in its challenge to the Constitutionality of California Penal Code ﾌ_148 6, which makes it a misdemeanor to knowingly file a false allegation of misconduct against a peace officer. The statute has frequently been used to discourage people from filing complaints, as it was in the case of La France Hamilton, an African American man who was attacked by police officers last year during a bicycle traffic stop and who later tried to file a complaint at the San Bernardino Police Department. The watch commander threatened Hamilton with criminal prosecution under Section 148 6, and Hamilton decided not to file.

"This law, which was held unconstitutional by the court today, treated complaints against police officers differently from other types of complaints," said ACLU of Southern California staff attorney Dan Tokaji. "The court's ruling sends a clear message. The people have a right to complain about police abuse without fear of criminal prosecution. Mr. Hamilton's case demonstrates that when states try to create exceptions to the U.S. Constitution, they expose their residents to grave dangers and serious abuses. The law blocks citizen complaints and frustrates the mechanisms by which police are held accountable to the communities they are supposed to serve."

Judge Robert Timlin denied the City of San Bernardino's motion to dismiss portions of the ACLU's complaint, observing that, "California courts have noted the dramatic impact peace officers tend to have on the public and the great potential for social harm if power by peace officers is abused...Debate on public issues and criticism of peace officers, just as with other public officials is speech 'at the very center of the constitutionally protected area of free discussion.'"

In a similar case, Gritchen v. Collier, the ACLU of Southern California succeeded in challenging the civil twin of this statute, which allowed peace officers to make defamation claims against those who file citizen complaints against them. That decision is on appeal.

Judge Timlin found that, "Section 148 6 impermissibly discriminates on the basis of the content of the speech which it criminalizes and, therefore, facially, violates the First Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause."

LOS ANGELES - The ACLU of Southern California entered into a landmark settlement yesterday with the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transit Authority in Beauchamp v. MTA, a case filed in 1998 to guarantee access to MTA's bus lines for passengers who use wheelchairs or other assistive devices. Mobility-impaired passengers were frequently left to wait by the side of the road because wheelchair lifts were not in working order, or because drivers simply did not stop to pick them up. Even when a bus stopped and the lift worked, restraints inside the buses were frequently not in working order, thus endangering passengers' safety.

The settlement agreement requires MTA to guarantee that a minimum percentage of buses with wheelchair lifts and restraints in full working order will be rolled out each morning and creates an oversight system to be carried out by an independent company using testers to ascertain how frequently mobility-impaired passengers are bypassed because of equipment or other problems.

"Concrete measures such as this one are the bricks and mortar of history," said Peter Eliasberg, staff attorney at the ACLU of Southern California. "The Americans with Disabilities Act was the blueprint for meaningful change, and this case and this agreement are an example of the realization of that vision of equal access for people with disabilities. Mobility-impaired people will no longer be left stranded on the streets of Los Angeles."

Plaintiffs in the case told of being passed by again and again as they sought to go about the business of their daily lives in Los Angeles.

"Disabled riders have not simply been sent to the back of the bus," said ACLU staff attorney Dan Tokaji, "They have been kept off the bus entirely. Time and time again, the bus door has been slammed in their face. This settlement will change that."

The ACLU sought and received a court injunction to stop MTA's discriminatory service patterns. The August 9, 2000, agreement, subject to the approval of the federal district court, will settle the portion of the lawsuit aimed at improving service to passengers in wheelchairs. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted yesterday to approve the agreement.

"Negotiations for this agreement were intense," said Eliasberg. "We're optimistic that the judge will see this solution as a just one and approve it."

Private attorneys David Warshaw, Danny Fisher, David Gross, and the late Stanley Fleishman joined the case as pro bono co-counsel.