The ACLU of Ohio has been at the forefront of correcting disproportionate sentencing of drug paraphernalia cases in the City of Cleveland. We are dedicated to improving fair enforcement, judicial equity, and community relations.

Remember that public service announcement that the Partnership for a Drug Free American launched back in 1987 that starred an egg and a frying pan? An announcer told viewers that the egg was their brain. He then cracked the egg and, as it sizzled in the pan, he intoned, “This is your brain on drugs.”

The ad — a hit at pot parties — was about as effective in combating drug use as Cleveland’s policy of automatically leveling felony charges against people caughe with traces of drugs in pipes and syringes.

To his credit, Mayor Frank Jackson realizes that. This month, he changed the city’s procedure for handling drug paraphernalia cases.

Now, drug abusers arrested with drug residues in crack pipes and heroin needles will face misdemeanor charges, which means they can seek treatment through the Greater Cleveland Drug Court.

Giving offenders a better chance to kick their habit is the kind of strategic response required to truly help them. We already know that scary ads and prison sentences don’t often work.

ACLU of Ohio Executive Director Christine Link states charging teens with felonies for bad judgment is a misuse of the law.

The recent furor over “sexting” and the resulting threats from many officials is more than troubling (”Sexting: Did you really want to send that out?” March 23). Sexual offender laws were created to protect children from predators, yet these same laws are being twisted to prosecute the very young people they were meant to shield.

Admittedly, teenagers do not always have sound judgment and make decisions impulsively without considering the consequences. No one will argue  young people should be sending nude or semi-nude images of themselves. However, should a young person’s entire life be ruined because they showed poor judgment?

Some law enforcement officials have promised to charge teenagers with felonies if caught in possession of nude or semi-nude photographs, even if the image is of themselves. These charges could include classification as a sexual offender, which would require the child to register with police every six months for up to 25 years. A felony record, especially with a sexual offender charge, will prevent them from obtaining employment in many fields, living in certain areas and pursuing education in some disciplines.

Punishing a child for the rest of their lives because of a careless indiscretion is unfair and a distortion of the sexual offender laws. These laws were meant to punish adults who prey on children, not young people with poor judgment who share inappropriate pictures of themselves.

Parents and schools have an important job in teaching young people to respect the dignity and privacy of themselves and others. Misusing sex predator laws to lock up children in prisons shows terrible judgment, a lack of balance and disregard for their welfare. Rather than locking the cell and throwing away the key, we must engage our young people and speak to them empathetically and intelligently about the pitfalls of sharing information electronically.

Christine Link
Executive Director
ACLU of Ohio

Lima continues on the path to establishing better police-community relations following the tragic shooting death of Tarkia Wilson in January 2008.

The police department residents have come to know through the years is changing and will continue to change to streamline the process and prioritize resources to better serve the public, said Harry Dolan, a community policing expert.

“It’s really an issue of how best to use the resources. That’s what it really comes down to,” Dolan said.

Dolan, who is the police chief in Raleigh, N.C., is in Lima this week teaching new officers and offering a refresher course for the veterans, on community-oriented policing.

Summit County Prosecutor Sherri Bevan Walsh defies logic in denying a convicted man on death row a DNA test to prove whether or not he is innocent.

Summit County prosecutors say they will not agree to DNA testing requested by condemned killer Brett Hartmann unless ordered by a judge.

In a letter sent Friday to Hartmann’s attorneys, Prosecutor Sherri Bevan Walsh wrote that the former Akron man ”is faced with clear and convincing evidence of his guilt.”

She rejected DNA testing of hairs, such as those found on the body of murder victim Winda Snipes, because they are ”easily transferrable.”

Luckily, officials have come to their senses in at least one case in the recent hysteria over students “sexting” one another.

A 14-year-old Kettering Middle School student will not be charged for having a picture of herself and another juvenile engaged in a sexual act on cell phone, according to Kettering Police Officer Michael Burke.

A Montgomery County Juvenile Division Prosecutor reviewed the girl’s case and a decision was made not to press charges against the girl, Burke said Tuesday, March 24.

The girl’s cell phone was confiscated on March 10 for having the cell phone on during school hours, according to Kettering City Schools Superintendent Robert Mengerink. The school official who confiscated the cell phone noticed the picture of the sexual act and called police.

Margo Pierce at the City Beat picked up an action alert the ACLU sent out regarding legislation that would ban corporal punishment in Ohio.

Violence begets violence; it certainly doesn’t have the effect of bringing about effective communication that ultimately leads people to understand and embrace positive actions. So why would Ohio schools – institutions of learning and thought – allow hitting kids as punishment?

The history of abuse and tyranny connected with physical violence ought to be enough of a motivator for lawmakers to take a stand against adult violence in the schools. But politicians are politicians so logic doesn’t always apply, that’s why the ACLU is encouraging people to call the members of the Ohio House Education Committee today, the group is voting on House Bill 26, “which would end the use of corporal punishment in all public schools.”

Recent censorship at the Firelands Branch of Bowling Green State University has many people in the community upset.

The removal of a sculpture from a Firelands campus art exhibit that administrators deemed “inappropriate” has raised questions surrounding First Amendment rights and academic freedom, prompting outrage in the University community and the attention of a national censorship watchdog organization.

What happened:

Last Wednesday when Art Professor David Sapp showed up to work at the Firelands campus, he was informed that a sculpture was removed from his gallery.

The removed sculpture, titled “The Middle School Science Teacher Makes a Decision He’ll Live to Regret,” depicts a girl wearing a backpack, on her knees, performing oral sex on a standing male middle school science teacher. It was one of 13 sculptures in the exhibit.

Check out this column about a recent court case the ACLU won establishing the federal government unfairly discriminated against a woman because she is transgender.

Baby boomers will remember that many years ago, Bob Dillon sang the times they are a-changin’. Although we joined in enthusiastically, I doubt if any of us could have anticipated how the workplace would be a-changin’ in the 21st century. In today’s work world, employers are continually challenged to keep pace with technology, a dipping economy, a global market place, and ever-evolving and sometimes conflicting employment laws, regulations and court decisions.

One such court decision went against the Library of Congress. Although the decision is controversial, it likely provides a sneak peek into our future employment practices. The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia found that the library discriminated against a perspective job applicant when it failed to hire her because she had undergone a sex change operation - from male to female. According to the judge, evidence demonstrated that the Library was originally enthusiastic about hiring David Schroer - until she disclosed her transexuality.

Findlay Schools appear to have decided to continue their unconstitutional and unfair practice of aiding the distribution of Gideon bibles at public schools. Check out the video as well as the text of the story.

The ACLU of Ohio claims the district violated the First Amendment when it allowed members of an evangelical group to distribute Bibles to students. A policy committee took a look at the district’s procedures.

No one will be handing out Bibles this year, but next year it could be back on. Late last March members of the evangelical group Gideons International passed out Bibles to fifth grade students while they were leaving school. It happened at all five intermediate schools. The district’s superintendent told us the distribution had been going on for at least 15 years. Last year the ACLU heard about it and sent a letter to the district’s superintendent. In part it reads:
“The distribution infringes on the First Amendment rights of every student to receive such information while on school time.”

The Plain-Dealer reports on a recent letter the ACLU sent the Cleveland Heights-University Heights School Distrcit regarding censorship in one of their middle school libraries.

The ACLU said the First Amendment was violated when Brian Sharosky, principal of Roxboro Middle School, confiscated the November issue of Nintendo Power magazine. The magazine covers the world of Nintendo video games, from previews and ratings to secret codes and short cuts.

“Literature should not be removed from a school library simply because one person may find it inappropriate,” said Christine Link, ACLU of Ohio executive director, in a statement last week. She called for the board to “immediately order that the magazine be reinstated.”

ACLU Volunteer Attorney Scott Greenwood is quoted in this article about unfair polcies preferring married over single people in adoption cases.

CINCINNATI — Child-welfare organizations and the American Civil Liberties Union are criticizing an Ohio county’s adoption and foster parent policy that gives preference to married couples.

[…]

Scott Greenwood, an Ohio attorney and a general counsel for the ACLU, said Butler County’s policy seems to go beyond hostility to gay people by also favoring married couples over unmarried heterosexuals.

“This agency certainly should recognize that married couples don’t automatically provide the stability or even safety for children in adopted or foster care,” said Greenwood, referring to the case of Marcus Fiesel.

Fiesel, a 3-year-old Butler County boy, died in 2006 after his foster parents, who were married, left him bound inside a closet for two days.

The Lima News editorializes again on the failures of the war on drugs.

They say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results. If that’s true, U.S. policy on drugs is insane.

For decades, federal, state and local governments have fought the war on drugs, dumping billions of dollars into a bottomless pit, ruining thousands of lives, and ending many others. What kind of working relationship Lima police and the Allen County Sheriff’s Office should have in combating drugs was a central point of the sheriff’s race last fall. Massive prisons have been built to house victims of the drug war, many of them guilty of doing nothing our last three presidents haven’t done. Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland has proposed alternative sentencing for some nonviolent criminals, and common sense says that would include many people convicted of drug offenses. But regardless of the punishment, taxpayers have footed the bill for all this, assured by the government that their money was being spent to keep them safe.

This article came out in response to a letter the ACLU sent to the Summit County Board of MRDD regarding a memo that stated employees could not talk about anything that did not have to do specifically with their jobs.

The Summit County Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities board plans to clarify a memo restricting conversations at work after it drew criticism this week from the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio.

…

In a letter to the agency, the ACLU said: ”Employees have a right to discuss with their fellow employees whatever they wish, including … the latest political and economic news or, indeed, how the Cavs, the Indians or the Browns did in their latest games.”

”Employers have a lot of leeway in limiting your behavior on the job, but that memo is just way over the top,” said Chris Link, executive director of the ACLU of Ohio. ”It would seem to indicate that there are some other issues that they need to deal with and talk about with their employees.”

The ACLU plans to review the second memo, she added.

The Dispatch gets it right in this powerful editorial on the need for expanded DNA testing.

Judges and prosecutors should not stand in the way of DNA testing for people convicted of crimes if, for any reason, the best testing available has not been used.

Technology continues to advance, “lost” evidence is found years after conviction and defense attorneys sometimes fail to request a test that could make a difference. These circumstances and more can justify new testing.

Just ask Joseph R. Fears Jr., who spent more than 25 years in prison on two rape convictions. He was cleared by a DNA test on evidence that had been declared lost and probably will be released this week.

A great AP article on a growing movement to save resources by halting the death penalty.

After decades of moral arguments reaching biblical proportions, after long, twisted journeys to the nation’s highest court and back, the death penalty may be abandoned by several states for a reason having nothing to do with right or wrong:

Money.

Turns out, it is cheaper to imprison killers for life than to execute them, according to a series of recent surveys. Tens of millions of dollars cheaper, politicians are learning, during a tumbling recession when nearly every state faces job cuts and massive deficits.

More data has come out about the dangerous over population of prisons.

One in every 25 adult Ohioans is in prison, jail or on parole or probation, a study by the Pew Center on the States shows.

While the national average is one in 31 U.S. adults, the numbers are more dramatic for Latinos (one in 27), men (one in 18), and blacks (one in 11), according to One in 31: The Long Reach of American Corrections, released yesterday.

Ohio’s one-in-25 rate was sixth among the states. Georgia had the highest at one in 13, and New Hampshire the lowest at one in 88.

After a series of great news articles on the death penalty, the DDN calls for a halt to executions and adopting smarter ways to punish criminals.

Ohio should just do what needs to be done and outlaw the death penalty.

How much more evidence do we need that the process of executing criminals is so fraught with error, and so unfair in its application, that it should be abolished?

On Feb. 22 and 23, Dayton Daily News reporters Tom Beyerlein and Laura Bischoff chronicled the problems with Ohio’s death penalty. The process of putting a convicted killer to death is long and arduous, and, even so, there’s no guarantee that only the most deserving face the ultimate penalty.

In fact, since 1981 a huge number of inmates who have left death row — 71 of 119 — were either granted clemency or had their death sentences thrown out by a court. A much smaller 23 percent were actually executed.

Check out this great editorial from the Youngstown Vindicator on the need to balance liberty and security.

The release of nine memos drafted by Bush administration lawyers in the aftermath of 9/11 provide a cautionary tale of how fear can motivate bureaucrats to advocate the deconstruction of a constitutional republic.

The snapshot provided by the memos is that of a band of Justice Department lawyers who were willing, if not eager, to create an imperial presidency that was not answerable to the Congress, the judiciary or the Constitution, at least not as most people understand the Constitution.