He sued city officials after police impounded his campaign truck in the weeks before the mayoral primary election. (Photo courtesy of Institute for Justice)

 The little-enforced, or never-enforced, ordinances that were used to silence Fambrough (and thereby deter other inconvenient speakers) mostly concerned his van. According to the complaint, the police, in a series of visits, insisted that it was parked illegally at his home — although he had been parking it there for more than 15 years. And although police ignored similar vehicles similarly parked in the neighborhood. The city could produce no evidence of the particular parking ordinance being enforced in the previous six years — other than against Fambrough, who says he was told by a police officer “this is coming from my boss” and “this is coming from the brass.”

He outfitted his step van, which is akin to a FedEx delivery truck, as a sound truck, adorned it with a poster of a candidate challenging the incumbent mayor and drove around his community making his political preference clear. The mayor apparently was not amused.

 

Now Fambrough, 74, is suing him and a slew of other city officials — police officers, lawyers — charging them with violating his rights guaranteed by the Constitution’s First, Fourth and 14th amendments: the right of free speech, the right to be secure in one’s possessions, and the rights to due process and equal protection of the laws.

 

 https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/11/18/democracy-needs-east-cleveland-gadfly/