Although a municipality or other local government may place reasonable time, place, and manner regulations on speech occurring on public property, it must be careful not to tread on the First Amendment. A recent case from the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals illustrates how far municipal governments may go. Citilink is a public entity providing…
Read MoreA recent case from the Third District Appellate Court in Willie Pearl Burrell Trust v. City of Kankakee, 2016 IL App (3d) 150655, defended by attorneys Michael Condon and Yordana Wysocki, upheld a city’s refusal to issue a rental license to an applicant who owed the county money for past ordinance violations. The City of…
Read MoreThe 7th Circuit decides Tolliver v. City of Chicago, 2016 U.S. App. LEXIS 6632 (7th Cir. 2016): Under Heck v. Humphrey, a Section 1983 plaintiff cannot obtain damages in circumstances where the actual relief sought necessarily implies the invalidity of his/her criminal conviction. See Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994). Heck holds that “in…
Read MoreHeffernan v. City of Paterson, et al., 578 U.S. ______ (April 26, 2016). Retaliation, Motive, and the First Amendment Rights of Public Employees Generally, a government employee cannot be fired, disciplined, or demoted for exercising their right to free speech in his or her civilian capacity on an “issue of public concern.” But what happens…
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