People have a clear constitutional right and a civic duty to report crimes they witness to the police. But what happens when the police are the ones committing the crime?

Such was the case for Harold Strickland, who witnessed two undercover police officers chase, then beat and kick another man after he was handcuffed and on the ground.

Strickland, 45, was walking in South Beach one evening in March 2009, talking to his sister on his cell phone, when he noticed two men, who were undercover Miami Beach officers, chase a young gay Hispanic man through the parking lot next to Flamingo Park on Michigan Avenue, drag him to the ground, and beat him. Strickland hung up with his sister and called 911, reporting to the emergency dispatch officer at the Miami Beach Police Department (MBPD) that someone was being beaten by the police officers in the parking lot, next to a parked car. The dispatcher asked for Strickland’s location and asked him to walk closer to the scene to read the license plate on the car.

But there was no license plate. And Strickland had caught the attention of the two men who were beating Doe. The men approached Strickland, took his cell phone and verbally assaulted him with anti-gay epithets. The officers spewed insults: “We’re sick of all the f---ing fags in this neighborhood,” pushed Strickland to the ground and tied his hands behind his back.

Strickland told them why he was walking up to them and calling 911, but the officers ignored his explanation . After one officer continued taunting Strickland with anti-gay remarks, Strickland said he would report them. In response, the police officers threatened Strickland by telling him that “guys like him disappear every day.”

Strickland and Doe were transported to MBPD headquarters where the verbal abuse continued. After first questioning what charges they could charge Strickland with, the two officers charged Strickland with loitering and prowling.

On February 3, the ACLU of Florida announced its intent to sue the City of Miami Beach and the two officers on behalf of Harold Strickland.

"Gay men have been reportedly targeted by Miami Beach police near Flamingo Park for decades. Often, police target gay men walking near Flamingo Park for nothing more than looking 'too gay,'" said the ACLU's Robert Rosenwald. Furthermore, “The issue here is not just the violation of Mr. Strickland's rights as a gay man." said Ray Taseff, cooperating attorney and co-counsel. "All people have a clear constitutional right and a civic duty to report police misconduct. When police arrest individuals for reporting police misconduct, the public's faith in law enforcement suffers."

Thanks to additional efforts by SAVE Dade, a local organization whose mission is to protect LGBT individuals from discrimination, the City Manager called a meeting with leadership that resulted in an order by City of Miami Beach Police Chief for an internal affairs investigation and a review of the reports filed by the two officers. According to a statement released by the Miami Beach Police Department “a decision was made to reassign both officers involved in the reported incident to administrative duties effective immediately and pending the conclusion of the investigation.” The officers are off the streets and behind desks now. On February 9, the Miami Beach LGBT Business Enhancement Committee will be meeting with the Chief of Police, Carlos Noriega, in an open forum to ensure that the proper measures are taken to prevent a recurrence of this behavior by Miami Beach police.

The incident has shed light on anti-gay sentiment within the Miami Beach Police Department, and the ACLU of Florida is equally concerned with the retaliation against those who report police misconduct. It's our hope that our lawsuit will bring justice to those who have been victimized by this kind of abuse.

Yesterday, The Washington Post reported that Google — the world’s largest Internet search company — is negotiating an information-sharing agreement with the National Security Agency (NSA) — the world’s largest network for routine, mass communications surveillance.

The partnership is supposed to help protect Google’s networks, but the ramifications of companies like Google working with the NSA are frightening.

The NSA — a component of the Department of Defense — is an intelligence collection agency with few effective checks against abuse, and no public oversight of its activities. The NSA sucks up the equivalent of the contents of the Library of Congress every six to eight hours, every single day. In the last decade, the NSA’s dragnet, suspicionless surveillance has targeted everyday Americans, in violation of the law and the Constitution. (To lean more about NSA spying, download our fact sheet on “America’s Surveillance Society”).

If companies like Google think they need the government’s help to secure their networks, then a civilian agency needs to step up to the task. Cybersecurity for the American people should not be handed over to a military spy agency, one that is insulated from public oversight and has a history of secretly exploiting vulnerabilities, rather than fixing them.

Concerned? You can take action today by sending a letter to Google, letting them know that you object to such a deal and value your privacy online.

Yesterday, the Department of Defense (DOD) quietly made public its decision to require that emergency contraception (EC or Plan B) be available at all overseas military facilities. (Until it was picked up by the press, only the most avid readers of the minutes of the quarterly meetings of the DOD Pharmaceutics and Therapeutics Committee could have known about the decision).

This is a welcome change: Today, women make up 15 percent of the military. More than 356,000 women currently serve in the Armed Forces and more than 222,000 women have been deployed thus far to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan. It should go without saying that these women should have access to basic contraceptive care — EC can prevent pregnancy if taken less than 72 hours after unprotected sex or a contraceptive accident (the earlier the better).

The DOD deserves more credit than it sought for reversing a nearly decade-long policy that undermined servicewomen's reproductive health. But given what happened the last time DOD tried to make EC available to its servicewomen, it's easy to see why they might have been a bit gun-shy about publicity.

After EC became available in 1999, the press reported that nearly two-thirds of military treatment facilities (MTF) carried it. In February 2002, the DOD Pharmaceutics and Therapeutics Executive Council considered whether to officially add EC to the basic core formulary — the list of drugs that must be stocked at all military treatment facilities. Ethics consultants from all three military branches — hardly a group of rabid reproductive rights activists — had already concluded "that there are no apparent reasons to preclude the use of Plan B at MTFs, since it is an FDA-approved contraceptive and not, as some argue, an abortifacient." The council thus saw no reason that EC should not be "uniformly and immediately available" to servicewomen and voted to add it to the formulary.

However, when news of the decision became public, the then-Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs immediately rescinded the decision to place EC on the military formulary so that he could have a chance to "review" it. (I confess that I do read the minutes from the quarterly committee meetings, and I've never seen any drug submitted for a similar "review"). And so this FDA-approved contraceptive remained under "review" at the highest levels of DOD for more than seven years — until yesterday.

Hopefully, the decision to guarantee that EC is available to women serving overseas is the beginning, not the end, of needed changes. To reflect the reality of women's participation in the military, we must fully meet servicewomen's reproductive health needs — from access to birth control and regular gynecological exams to abortion care. Servicewomen dedicated to serving our country deserve no less.

Don’t fret, we’re here!

The right to free speech is undeniably one of the most fundamental rights we have as Americans. It is the breath that sustains our democracy.

When that right is threatened by government players, we at the ACLU — as the premier defender of free speech in America — take it personally. And so did Wayne E. Weatherbee, owner of Bee’s Auto in downtown Clermont, Fla.

In October 2009, Weatherbee erected 12 signs on his business property in political protest against the City of Clermont, which he claims selectively enforced its laws against him and his business, and has falsely arrested him. One of the signs pleads:

“ACLU WHERE ARE YOU”

Well, here we are. On Tuesday, February 2, the City began imposing a $75/day fine on Bee’s Auto until the signs are removed or Weatherbee obtains a permit. This series of actions crossed the line and unacceptably infringed on Weatherbee’s right to free expression, so yesterday, the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida filed a federal lawsuit (PDF) against the City of Clermont on behalf of the local businessman, charging that city officials have unconstitutionally targeted Weatherbee, attempting to suppress his free speech. The lawsuit also charges that the city’s signage code is unconstitutional and should be overturned.

So what’s really at stake here? Aren’t these signs just a bunch of eyesores in historic downtown Clermont? 

Political speech doesn’t have to be pretty to be protected.  And when a city regulates political speech based on its content, it is a violation of the First Amendment.  Clermont’s code, for instance, would allow, without a permit, a sign that urges viewers to ‘Vote for Crist for Senate,’ but would require a permit for one that reads ‘Impeach Gov. Crist.’ That’s viewpoint discrimination, and it’s unconstitutional.

(Notably, holiday decorations are exempt from Clermont’s permitting process and restrictions on size or number. That means that in Clermont, there would be greater protection of a warren of giant inflatable Easter Bunnies than of Weatherbee’s political speech. Not that there’s anything wrong with giant inflatable Easter bunnies, but...)

This isn’t the first time the city has violated the First Amendment. In 2007, the ACLU sent a letter to the city on behalf of a resident who was cited under the code for posting a “Vote for Ron Paul” sign in his yard.  The city wanted to charge residents a permit fee for posting political signs; although they backed down in 2007, they have failed to embrace the principle that political speech is protected speech.

Derek B. Brett, ACLU cooperating attorney in Orlando and Professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Central Florida, is leading the ACLU’s efforts in the lawsuit. Brett says: “The city’s actions are abusive.  Since at least 2007, the City of Clermont has been on notice that the code violates the First Amendment’s protection of political speech.”

So here we are again. This time, we are aiming not only to prevent the city from further levying fines or collecting past fines placed on Weatherbee and Bee’s Auto, but also to strike down the Clermont’s unconstitutional signage ordinance.

Media cameras and reporters descended upon this small central Florida town this week to see the Clermont Sign War play out, and residents poured out to support the ACLU’s efforts, saying “Thank God for the ACLU” and even taking up a collection of donations for the ACLU’s work.

So, we march on with their support and your help, battling bad government policies one small town at a time.