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KingCast tells Columbus, Ohio on Jerry Doyle's cases: "You can only hate a man so much, then you have to pay him."

By Christopher King

Let me go back to 1998 as I was "losing" one of Jerry's cases in Federal Court almost ten years to the day: Doyle v. City of Columbus 41 F.Supp.2d 765 S.D.Ohio,1998 December 18, 1998. Read the comments to this post for more of the case.

After a thorough discussion, Judge Smith concluded that the City Council is a limited public forum, and its restrictions on public speech (such as limiting the subject matter to items on the agenda, and prohibiting repetitive comments) are content-neutral, constitutionally permissible time, place and *767 manner regulation. These findings constitute the law of the case.

First, Jerry only sued to speak on the off-agenda items. Second, you can clearly see that "prohibiting repetitive comments" relates to CONTENT.

Note also that because the Court slammed Jerry on the Constitutional issues they dismissed his pendant claims that a police officer pushed him to the ground (assault) which he most certainly did. We got what we wanted in that Jerry was called to speak the next week, but we finished out of the money -- and in my book unlawfully denying someone the Right to speak for nine (9) months is worth a ton of money.
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I'll keep a civil tongue but note that former Council President Kennedy admitted the real reason for the unlawful, obviously content-based First Amendment restriction. Here he is in the Columbus Dispatch:

"In 1996, he tangled with the Columbus City Council when then-council President John P. Kennedy barred him from speaking. Kennedy complained that Doyle kept protesting two things: the city paying for police protection at a Ku Klux Klan rally, and his mistreatment by the school board.

Doyle filed a federal lawsuit over that. A judge dismissed that case in 1997, and a judge threw out a similar suit in 1999. "Jerry Doyle coming in with a white suit, accusing (Mayor) Mike Coleman of being a slave on the white man's plantation" was too much, Kennedy said."

That's content, Bubba. Not time, place or manner. Pure content. C-O-N-T-E-N-T. CONTENT. Oh, did you notice it was content?

So anyway, in Jerry's current lawsuit you can see Judge Pollitt giving police officers who commit assault (Stanley Byas) no jail time, while he makes sure that Jerry Doyle takes a good ol' fashioned lock-down and Doyle loses a leg, to boot. Either Pollitt or Karnes, or both will feel some heat from this one. And it's worth more than not being able to speak for nine (9) months, you bet.

And this time Jerry Doyle will assuredly finish in the money. It's been a long time coming.

Full post as published by Chris King's 1st Amendment Page on October 06, 2008 (boomark / email).