News & Commentary

ST. LOUIS, December 28, 2009 - The American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri today filed suit on behalf of Michael Bauer, alleging Bauer was held in the Jefferson County and Madison County jails for more than a month earlier this year on a body attachment that had been withdrawn in 2007. A body attachment is similar to a warrant but issued in a civil proceeding rather than a criminal proceeding. The suit alleges that unlike persons picked up on a misdemeanor or felony warrant, Bauer was never given an opportunity to appear before a judge to say that he was being held mistakenly.

On December 24, 2009, the ACLU of Eastern Missouri and the ACLU of Kansas and Western Missouri filed a friend of the court (amicus curiae) brief with the Missouri Supreme Court in support of lawyer Carl Smith’s Petition challenging his conviction, on August 5, 2009, of and his sentence to 120 days in jail for criminal contempt based on his appellate advocacy on behalf of clients in a grand jury matter.

ST. LOUIS, December 17, 2009 - The American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri (ACLU-EM) has filed a lawsuit in federal District Court asserting the right to place political leaflets on vehicles parked on public streets. The lawsuit, filed against the City of St. Louis and the St. Louis Police Department, alleges that a city ordinance prohibiting such behavior is a violation of free speech.

ST. LOUIS, December 14, 2009 -- The American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri applauded a long-anticipated ruling issued December 11 by Judge Philip Heagney. The decision came in a case filed in 2007 by the ACLU of Eastern Missouri on behalf of John Chasnoff.

JEFFERSON CITY – The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Eastern Missouri will be in court Wednesday, November 30 to argue on behalf of Kelly Glossip, whose partner, Dennis Engelhard, was a state trooper killed in the line of duty while responding to an accident on Christmas Day, 2009. Missouri offers survivor benefits to spouses of state troopers who are killed in the line of duty, but excludes committed same-sex partners from receiving those benefits. Glossip is seeking the same survivor benefits provided to different-sex partners.

ST. LOUIS, November 3, 2009 - United States District Judge Richard Webber yesterday found that the 2008 election held by Robinwood West Community Improvement District, a small political subdivision located in unincorporated St. Louis County, was unconstitutional and that the Missouri Legislature’s imposition of greater restrictions on certain voters violates the Equal Protection Clause.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri announced today that its suit on behalf of an underage recruit has resulted in the Army voiding the enlistment and discharging the juvenile soldier. The ACLU-EM had filed the lawsuit against the United States Army on the grounds that both parents had not given their permission for her to enlist. Late yesterday a federal judge granted the ACLU's request to dismiss the case because the Army provided the relief sought.

JEFFERSON CITY, MO – The American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Eastern Missouri and the ACLU of Kansas and Western Missouri today filed a lawsuit challenging the latest attempt by a political operative to rewrite Missouri's state constitution to ban equal opportunity programs in the state.

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