CLEVELAND (AP) — An Ohio man had a constitutionally protected right to direct obscene language at law enforcement officers who were escorting him off a county fairground and then arrested him for disorderly conduct, a federal appeals court has ruled.
A three-judge panel at the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati ruled earlier this week that Michael Wood’s civil rights lawsuit against a group of Clark County sheriff’s deputies should proceed after U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Rose in Dayton dismissed it in 2020.
Wood, 38, caused friction when he entered the Clark County Fairgrounds in the summer of 2016 wearing a shirt with an obscenity directed at police. Deputies confronted Wood, who was no longer wearing the shirt, several hours later when the fairgrounds’ executive director asked him to leave.
Wood agreed to leave and repeatedly swore at deputies as they escorted him off the property, prompting the officers to arrest him for disorderly conduct. The misdemeanor charge was later dismissed. Wood filed a federal court lawsuit in 2018 alleging the deputies had infringed on his rights.
Judge Rose dismissed the lawsuit saying the deputies had qualified immunity, meaning they cannot be sued for doing their job, and Wood had not proved the deputies had retaliated against him for using foul language.
ACLU of Ohio attorney David Carey in a statement said the Sixth Circuit decision “confirms that the First Amendment protects people’s right to criticize their government, including law enforcement, regardless of whether they go about it politely.”
Andrew Yosowitz, an attorney for the Clark County deputies, said the ruling disregards 40 years of Ohio case law regarding the state’s disorderly conduct statute.
“Even if the deputies made a mistake, it was a reasonable mistake of law, and the deputies should be entitled to qualified immunity,” Yosowitz said.
