News & Commentary

Representatives of the Providence Human Relations Commission, the Urban League of R.I., the R.I. Civil Rights Roundtable and the ACLU of Rhode Island issued the following statement in response to yesterday’s State Police raid of the Narragansett Indian smoke shop:

At a news conference organized by the ACLU of Rhode Island, a dozen civil rights and community groups gathered at the State House today to call for concrete action by the Attorney General and local law enforcement authorities to address the now-thoroughly documented problem of racial profiling in the state.

The R.I. ACLU called “shortsighted” the state’s announcement today that it will no longer issue drivers’ licenses to individuals who present Individual Tax Identification Numbers (ITIN’s) rather than Social Security Numbers.

A settlement in the Barrington “blue cow” case was announced tonight. Under the settlement approved by the Barrington Town Council meets, the owners of Imagine gift store will be allowed to keep their cow statue, and the Town will review its sign ordinance for possible revisions. The town also agreed to pay ACLU volunteer attorney Carolyn Mannis $5,000 for her work on the case.

The R.I. ACLU announced today the formal settlement of its lawsuit challenging a Town of Bristol ordinance which banned persons between the ages of 18 and 21 from getting tattoos. Last November, the ACLU filed a federal lawsuit challenging the ordinance as a violation of the First Amendment and the privacy rights of young adults. The suit was brought on behalf of Alfred Figueiredo, owner of the Forbidden Art Studio, a Bristol tattoo parlor, and a potential customer, Nicholas Arruda.

The R.I. ACLU today hailed a decision issued by U.S. District Court Judge William Smith, holding unconstitutional the INS’ efforts to indefinitely detain without a hearing, pending deportation proceedings, an immigrant with a criminal record. The court held that inmate Errol Hall, who is from Jamaica but has lived in this country for 30 years, had to be provided an opportunity to show whether he is a flight risk or a danger to the community that justifies his continued detention after three years. ACLU executive director Steven Brown called the ruling a “welcome reminder of the important role the judiciary must play” in protecting our freedoms.

The ACLU of Rhode Island has called upon Providence Mayor David Cicilline and the City Council to reject a proposal, floated this past week to raise revenue for the city, of installing so-called “red light cameras” at various intersections in the city. In a two-page letter to City officials, R.I. ACLU executive director Steven Brown argued that installation of the cameras “raises troubling privacy and due process concerns,” and “erodes, in subtle ways, our basic rights and turns on its head the major rationale for traffic safety laws.” Excerpts from the ACLU’s letter appear below:

In the near-final chapter of a long-running ACLU “open records” lawsuit against the Providence Police Department, the R.I. Supreme Court has unanimously ruled that the City of Providence cannot charge the community group DARE (Direct Action for Rights and Equality) for the costs of providing copies of internal police misconduct reports. The Court has also ordered the City to pay the ACLU’s volunteer lawyers their attorneys’ fees dating back to the ACLU’s inception of the litigation in 1995.

In a major ACLU free speech case addressing the First Amendment and the Internet, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments tomorrow, Wednesday morning, March 5th in the Bush Administration’s appeal of a Congressional law that would force libraries to deny adults and minors access to constitutionally protected speech online. One of the plaintiffs in this lawsuit filed by the National ACLU and others is a Rhode Island-based website, AfraidToAsk.com, which discusses sensitive health care issues. The R.I. Library Association has also filed a “friend of the court” brief in support of the ACLU’s position.