"THE MOST PROTECTED RIGHT"
State Rep Paul Donato after Art Deluca ripped him off and refused to play then-Councilor Stephanie Muccini-Burke chastising TV3.
THE MOST PROTECTED RIGHT
But now that Ms. Burke is in the seat of power, she's taking her sweet time with public access, isn't she?
This article on Commonwealth vs Bigelow should be in today's Boston Globe
State Rep Paul Donato after Art Deluca ripped him off and refused to play then-Councilor Stephanie Muccini-Burke chastising TV3.
THE MOST PROTECTED RIGHT
But now that Ms. Burke is in the seat of power, she's taking her sweet time with public access, isn't she?
This article on Commonwealth vs Bigelow should be in today's Boston Globe
http://law.justia.com/cases/massachusetts/supreme-court/2016/sjc-11974.html
Justia Opinion Summary
Commonwealth v. Bigelow
Annotate this Case
After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of two counts of
criminal harassment.
The convictions were based on five letters that Defendant wrote and sent to Michael and Susan Costello after a local election in which Michael had been elected as a town selectman.
The Supreme Court reversed and dismissed Defendant’s conviction of criminal harassment of Michael (since he's a public figure, an elected official- editor) and vacated Defendant’s conviction of criminal harassment of Susan and remanded for a new trial on that count, holding
(1) in light of First Amendment constitutional protections afforded to political speech and the lack of evidence of serious alarm of Michael’s part, the evidence was not sufficient to support Defendant’s conviction of criminal harassment of Michael; and (2) the speech on which the complaint of criminal harassment of Susan is premised might be found to qualify as fitting within a constitutionally unprotected category of speech that may be subject to prosecution as a form of criminal harassment.
The convictions were based on five letters that Defendant wrote and sent to Michael and Susan Costello after a local election in which Michael had been elected as a town selectman.
The Supreme Court reversed and dismissed Defendant’s conviction of criminal harassment of Michael (since he's a public figure, an elected official- editor) and vacated Defendant’s conviction of criminal harassment of Susan and remanded for a new trial on that count, holding
(1) in light of First Amendment constitutional protections afforded to political speech and the lack of evidence of serious alarm of Michael’s part, the evidence was not sufficient to support Defendant’s conviction of criminal harassment of Michael; and (2) the speech on which the complaint of criminal harassment of Susan is premised might be found to qualify as fitting within a constitutionally unprotected category of speech that may be subject to prosecution as a form of criminal harassment.
