Wednesday, July 15, 2009
News Fulton sheriff, county could face legal damages
Posted by Scott Henry @ScottTheHenry on Wed, Jul 15, 2009 at 10:53 PM
Oh, Myron. Even in your much-desired absence, you continue to afflict us. On Monday, a federal district judge gave the go-ahead for a jury trial for a lawsuit by a magazine accusing former Fulton County Sheriff Myron Freeman of unconstitutional censorship.
It seems there had been a longstanding ban on newspapers and magazines to inmates at the Fulton jail, which is run by the sheriff's office. But, in response to an inmate's lawsuit, a federal judge in late 2002 — just before Freeman took office — struck down the ban as unconstitutional.
Still, Freeman never lifted the ban, despite subsequent legal complaints and lawsuits by inmates, and somehow managed to sport the balls to ask judge to dismiss a federal lawsuit brought by Prison Legal News "contending that the jail was enforcing an unconstitutional policy that prohibited prisoners from receiving any books, magazines or newspapers other than religious publications," according to a PLN press release.
As you have guessed by now, Freeman's motion failed and the judge has cleared the way for the magazine to seek punitive damages against the former sheriff personally.
Gerry Weber, the former ACLU legal director, who's the local counsel for PLN, says the jury "will have a wide degree of latitude in assessing punitive damages."
In 2003, the Atlanta-Fulton Public Library System lost a $17 million judgment in a reverse-discrimination case when it was proven that library officials had conspired to force several white librarians out of management jobs.
While Weber doesn't expect potential damages in this case to be anywhere near that high, he maintains that Freeman's actions represent a rather flagrant flouting of a federal court order, in addition to a prolonged violation of inmates' First Amendment rights.
Whatever the final penalty might be, it's a given that Freeman won't have to pay it. Governments typically indemnify their elected officials, picking up the legal tab — even when they screw up real bad.
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