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Thursday, March 28, 2024 | Back issues
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Georgia sex offenders take fight over ‘no-trick-or-treat’ warning signs to 11th Circuit

A group of registered sex offenders have asked the appeals court to overturn a federal judge’s ruling in favor of a sheriff’s office that posted signs telling trick-or-treaters to keep away from the offenders’ homes on Halloween.

ATLANTA (CN) — A class of registered sex offenders asked an 11th Circuit panel Friday to overturn a federal judge’s ruling allowing Georgia sheriff’s deputies to put warning signs on their lawns before Halloween.

The Butts County Sheriff’s Office has argued in legal briefs that it was merely trying to protect “unwary trick-or-treating children from coming face-to-face with sex offenders” when it began a policy in 2018 of putting signs in front of the homes of every registered sex offender in the county.

The signs read: “Warning! No Trick-or-Treat At This Address!! A Community Safety Message From Butts County Sheriff Gary Long.”

A leaflet was also given to residents of the homes, warning them that tampering with the signs is a criminal offense.

A class of sex offenders led by Christopher Reed, Reginald Holden, and Corey McClendon alleged in a lawsuit against the sheriff’s office that the signs violated their First Amendment rights. The men claimed they were unfairly required to appear to endorse the message.

“The signs deprived [plaintiffs] of their autonomy to determine what they would and would not say on their own property,” the plaintiffs argued in a brief submitted to the 11th Circuit.

Though the men won a court order in 2019 blocking the deputies from putting out the signs that year, the victory was short-lived.

U.S. District Judge Marc Treadwell issued a ruling the next year finding that the signs did not violate the plaintiffs’ rights. The Barack Obama-appointed judge ruled that the signs were not a form of compelled government speech since they clearly identify the source of the messages as Sheriff Long. No observer could conclude that the residents agreed with the sign’s message, Treadwell found.

An attorney for the plaintiffs told a three-judge panel of the Atlanta-based appeals court Friday that the sheriff’s office “turned one of their most important rights on its head” by forcing them "to bear [the sheriff's] opinion on their lawns.”

But attorneys for the sheriff’s office say the signs convey government speech, which is not subject to regulation under the First Amendment.

In a brief filed in the case, the sheriff’s office argues it has a right to post the sheriff’s message in areas that qualify as public rights-of-way. The plaintiffs “have no veto” over that right just because they live near the signs and object to the message, the brief states.

However, the sheriff’s office has said it will not stand in the way if residents want to post competing messages.

A major stumbling block for the class of sex offenders on Friday appeared to be the issue that only one of the three named class members own their properties. Two of the men live with their families.

“How is it his speech if it’s not his property?” U.S. Circuit Judge William Pryor, a George W. Bush appointee, asked, referring to the two plaintiffs who live with their parents.

Arguing on behalf of the plaintiffs, attorney Mark Yurachek of Mark Allen Yurachek & Associates said that since the sign declares the home unsafe in general, anyone who lives in the house could have a claim.

Yurachek also argued that the plaintiffs’ rights are violated because the signs force them to respond to a government statement.

“The sex offender statute doesn’t say they can single out registrant’s homes… and compel them to respond if they don’t want to be branded [unsafe],” Yurachek told the panel.

The sheriff’s office has argued that the signs were supposed to be placed on public rights-of-way, where citizens cannot place signs without government permission.

In their brief, the plaintiffs claim the officers did not research property lines to ensure that the signs were placed on rights-of-way instead of on private property. Instead, they argue the signs were posted either next to a driveway or within two feet of a mailbox.

Treadwell was unable to decide, based on the evidence offered by the parties, whether the signs were placed within the rights-of-way or not.

Senior U.S. Circuit Judge Frank Hull, a Bill Clinton appointee, pointed out that the record in the case is unclear about what kind of due diligence the sheriff’s office did to make sure the signs were posted in the right-of-way.

“The most you had was [deputy sheriff Jeanette Riley] saying we only intended to put it in the right-of-way,” Hull said. “There’s no evidence it was actually in the right-of-way.”

Attorney Jason Waymire of Williams Morris & Waymire, who represents the sheriff’s office, told the panel that many homeowners are “confused” about their own property lines. Waymire argued that the grass some homeowners think is on their property sometimes isn’t actually theirs.

Waymire told the panel that the sheriff merely wants to “post government speech on government property.”

Hull and Pryor were joined on the panel by U.S. Circuit Judge Britt Grant, a Donald Trump appointee. The panel did not indicate when it will issue a ruling in the case.

Follow @KaylaGoggin_CNS
Categories / Appeals, Civil Rights, Government, Law

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