Legal Geek No. 22: Race Riots and Constitutional Rights

Welcome back to Legal Geek. This week, we take a look at the ongoing protests in Ferguson, Missouri and whether constitutional rights are being infringed by acts of the local police and government in that area.

https://archive.org/details/LegalGeekEp22

Following the fatal shooting of black teenager Michael Brown by a police officer on August 9 in this suburb of St. Louis, a series of memorials and protests began the next day. The largely white police department was believed to have acted too harshly in trying to apprehend Brown, and the conflicts have escalated multiple times over the past two weeks.

The highly militaristic gear and responses to protests used by the local police departments in Ferguson have been largely shunned in the media and across the nation. This period of race riots has become the most notable in the U.S. since the 2001 race riots in Cincinnati and the 1992 race riots in Los Angeles following the Rodney King incident. With social media now a factor, the world is watching closely and some organizations like the Islamic Republic News Agency and the Russian Foreign Ministry have called the U.S. and Nobel Peace Prize winner Barack Obama hypocrites for ordering other nations to provide human rights while not taking care of the same problems within their own borders.

However, have these police departments infringed on constitutional rights of the people in Ferguson by the actions taken to date?

The first amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects the right of the public to peaceably assemble together and also protects the freedom of the press to cover events. Missouri governor Jay Nixon has imposed nightly curfews in Ferguson to try and curtail the violence and riots, which is a strategy that worked to end the week-long 2001 Cincinnati riots. But this curfew has led local police to arrest numerous journalists trying to cover the story as well as organizers of peaceful protests.

The 14th Amendment to the Constitution and Supreme Court decisions in the 1930's (Near vs. Minnesota and DeJonge vs. Oregon) have incorporated these two constitutional rights so as to apply to state and local governmental agencies, such as those acting in Ferguson. By imposing a curfew across the board and enforcing it without acknowledging the exceptions used for workers in the Cincinnati curfew of 2001, the Ferguson police are almost certainly infringing the freedom of the press right under the 1st Amendment.

Even Barack Obama has publicly come out against some of the actions that have occurred against the press. The curfew likely also is infringing the right to peacefully assemble, but that is more of a gray area with the protesters frequently turning to violence which can and must be curtailed by the police for public safety reasons.

Bottom Line: If the actions of governor Nixon and the local authorities is ever challenged in court, it is hard to see how their actions will be deemed anything but unconstitutional. Until police forces are more representative of the communities in which they operate and operate with the utmost caution at all times, these sad incidents and the subsequent protests will continue to happen over time. Hopefully future incidents can be handled better and in compliance with the U.S. Constitution, which is the most important mandate of our government.

Thanks for reading. Please provide feedback and legal-themed questions as segment suggestions to me on Twitter @BuckeyeFitzy or in the comments below.

Legal Geek No. 21: The Legal Effects of Suicide

Welcome back to Legal Geek. This week, we honor the recently-passed Robin Williams and take a look at whether there are any legal effects caused by the commission of suicide.

https://archive.org/details/LegalGeekEp21

On Monday, news broke that famous comedian and actor Robin Williams had died at the age of 63. He certainly made the world a better and happier place with his art, and he will be sorely missed. Sadly, it appears that his death was a suicide likely fueled by the depression he has battled with for many years. Even though the subject is hopelessly morbid, this begs the question: what, if anything, are the legal ramifications of suicide?

Certainly if you've ever looked over a life insurance policy, you are likely aware that most policies deny payout in the event of suicide, but only if that happens within a set time period in the contract such as the first two years the policy is in effect. While insurance payouts are hopefully not an issue for the family of Robin Williams, it is something to be aware of. This is just based on contract though, not the law itself.

Almost all current laws dealing with suicide are criminal laws regarding assisting someone else commit suicide. Many states had laws on record making suicide itself a felony up through about the 1960's, but no state still has any such law on the books (and they were rarely, if ever, enforced back when these laws existed, because the person is already dead). Regardless, some states still hold that suicide is a common law crime, under judge made law, and this can bar damages recovery for the deceased's family in an ongoing lawsuit, in some circumstances. Essentially, this long shot is the only significant effect of suicide that may be legally binding on the survivors.

There is no automatic loss of copyrights or other IP rights as a result of suicide. Indeed, the estate of someone artistic like Williams may very well hold some valuable copyrights for the next 70 years past his death, and this may be a continued revenue stream for his heirs for many years to come. So beware bloggers, you may want to be careful with using the copyrighted clips and pictures of Williams that will inevitably be shared like wildfire over the next few days and weeks.

Bottom Line: Suicide and depression simply stink, and we lost a great one this week. Although his family will have plenty to grieve about in the coming months, at least this act carries essentially no adverse legal consequences for them. Let's hope we as a society find better ways to help those who need it in the future, as none of us should have to experience the devastation that is suicide.

And Robin, we will miss you. "You ain't never had a friend like me." Indeed, we haven't.




(copyright Carter Johnson, check out her stuff @carterejohnson)

Thanks for reading. Please provide feedback and legal-themed questions as segment suggestions to me on Twitter @BuckeyeFitzy or in the comments below.

Legal Geek No. 20: Copyright Monkeys

Welcome back to Legal Geek. This week, we take a look at this week's hot copyright controversy, that being whether a photographer has rights to shots taken by a monkey with his camera.

https://archive.org/details/LegalGeekEp20

Back in 2011, British photographer David Slater spent a great deal of time and money taking a wildlife photography trip to Indonesia. During this trip, a pack of monkeys, specifically crested black macaques, grabbed one of Slater's camera and ended up taking hundreds of pictures. A couple of these pictures ended up being good looking selfies, which made for a great story and a good selling photo for Slater.

However, the Wikimedia Foundation has this week refused to delete the photos from wikipedia, arguing that there is no valid copyright in the images. Essentially, Wikimedia argues that the only authorship of those photographs was by the monkey itself, and copyright law does not protect or grant rights to non-human authors. Thus, the photo is allegedly in the public domain. But is this true?

I agree with most copyright experts that U.S. and European copyright laws provide rights to creators of works of authorship only when the author is human. The problem for Slater here is that he did not add anything to the monkey selfies, he did not frame or arrange the shots and did not alter them or improve them upon bringing the photos back home. The author of a photograph is the one who snaps the shutter, absent some of these other possible additions to the creative expression or work. Slater did not add anything here, and so if there could be a copyright, it would be owned by the monkey, which is impossible under current laws.

Granted, this is a bad situation for creative types like Slater who spend thousands of dollars trying to get one lucrative photo like this monkey selfie. But copyright case law is clear, co-ownership or transferred ownership only comes by written contract in work made for hire, or when actual authorial participation was added to the work. Merely transporting the camera to Indonesia and owning it is not enough to pass the sniff test. Wikimedia is correct, in this case.

Like other IP law doctrines, copyright law does change and reform with the times. Perhaps the era of everyone having a smartphone in the pocket will force another major revision to copyright law to account for complex situations such as this. Just like when the law had to begin adjusting to the Internet age in 1998 with the DMCA.

Bottom Line: Today's copyright law does not allow for a copyright when a monkey steals a camera and takes a selfie. Perhaps when the Planet of the Apes timeline begins, we will adjust our laws and give unto Caesar what is his.

Thanks for reading. Please provide feedback and legal-themed questions as segment suggestions to me on Twitter @BuckeyeFitzy or in the comments below.