MDDC Joins Brief in Support of St. Mary's Appeal

Also supporting the appeal are the Association of Alternative Newspapers, the American Society of Newspaper Editors, Reporters’ Committee for Freedom of the Press and Maryland Media, publisher of The Diamondback at the University of MD.

The lawsuit was dismissed in federal court earlier this year and has been appealed to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which is being asked to reinstate the case to send it back to trial. No date had been set for a hearing in the Court of Appeals by press time.

Kenneth C. Rossignol, publisher of St. Mary’s Today, filed the lawsuit against St. Mary’s County State’s Attorney Richard Fritz, the Board of County Commissioners, the county sheriff and seven of his deputies. It alleges that on Nov. 3, 1998, seven deputies violated Rossignol’s First Amendment rights by purchasing more than 1,300 copies of his newspaper that contained articles critical of Sheriff Richard J. Voorhaar and Fritz on election day in order to keep voters from reading those articles.

In dismissing the suit, U.S. District Judge Earnest H. Nickerson said it was not proved that the deputies acted in their official capacity as police officers when they bought the newspapers.

The amicus brief, filed by the firm of Jenner & Block, is based on a law that was passed immediately after the Civil War and cites civil rights history as far back as 17th and 18th century English law. It contends that whether in uniform or not, the deputies were acting on behalf of government officials and the rights of citizens were violated by a deliberate effort of the officials.

The brief states that: "The actions of the Sheriff’s Department in St. Mary’s County are particularly troubling because they attack core political speech on election day – at a point where the public’s right to know should be at its zenith."

"Like the British government four hundred years earlier, the defendants recognized that they could not stop the St. Mary’s Today at the printing press, so they focused on its point of distribution," said the brief. "They prevented the plaintiff from circulating his protected speech, and deprived the readers – occasionally in face-to-face confrontations – from receiving the speech."

According to the brief, Section 1983 of the federal civil rights law was created to provide a remedy for a broad range of conduct that violates civil rights. The amicii contend this purpose of the law was ignored in the trial court, which only focused on whether the deputy sheriffs were off duty or not.