ACLU of Southern California

Feds Back Off Controversial Threat To Deport Barking Dog Owner Ruth Montano

There are some bad immigrants out there, from ecstasy dealers to robbers to murderers, and deporting them is probably the least we could do. But being booted out of the country for barking dogs? That's what faced Southern California resident Ruth Montano. At least until the ACLU stepped in:

Lee Baca Named America's 'Sheriff Of The Year' Despite Jail Violence

In a middle finger to all those journalists and civil libertarians in town who have accused the L.A. County Sheriff's Department of allowing unjust beatings of jail inmates to persist during the last decade or so, the National Sheriffs Association has named Lee Baca its Sheriff of the Year. Baca ha ... More >>

Readers Take on the Sheriff, Our Theater Critics -- and Our Treatment of Kristen Stewart

Immigrant Inmates Kept in L.A. County Jail For Days For No Legal Reason, Says ACLU

Updated at the bottom with strong allegations from an ACLU attorney. For some inmates L.A. County Jail is like the "Hotel California" -- You can check-out any time you like / But you can never leave. At least that's what the ACLU of Southern California claims in a lawsuit announced today. The grou ... More >>

Teflon Sheriff Lee Baca: Go to Jail, Get Your Face Broken? PHOTOS

No surprise here. L.A. County Jail deputies sometimes stomp on, bash in, and literally break inmates' heads: That according to an ACLU report issued today, 48 hours ahead of the much-anticipated final findings of a separate Citizens' Commission on Jail Violence. The ACLU says in a summary that the ... More >>

LAPD Spy Device Taps Your Cell Phone

StingRay is secretly used without warrants

License Plate Recognition Logs Our Lives Long Before We Sin

Kearian Giertz's Gay Marriage Comment Gets Him Booted From Fullerton High Event: ACLU To The Rescue

The lesson of the day for Kearian Giertz, a Fullerton High School senior who declared his support for same-sex marriage in front of an annual "Mr. Fullerton" campus pageant, is to keep your opinions to yourself, or you'll be publicly chastised. That's what happened after he was promptly swept away ... More >>

Duncan Roy: Director Trapped in Men's Central Jail

Film director Duncan Roy's three-month nightmare that wouldn't end

Venice Boardwalk Trinket Sales Ban

LAPD will decide what can be peddled as art

Is 'Teflon' L.A. County Sheriff Lee Baca the Next Sheriff Joe Arpaio?

A scowl worthy of Sheriff Joe?​Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio has become the posterboy of tough, rogue immigration policing in the age of Bush/Obama. (And don't think for a second that conditions have improved for America's huddled masses under the "HOPE" banner of the latter. In fact, the ... More >>

Occupy L.A. Eviction: Is LAPD Restricting Coverage With Last-Minute 'Pool Media'?

[Update, morning after: Awesomely, the "pool" reports turned into a sort of crowd-sourced feed; LA Weekly reporter Gene Maddaus says he received constant email updates throughout the night from news outlets with soldiers in the pool. So it seems the chosen ones didn't adhere to the LAPD's silly, une ... More >>

Teen Cellphone Photos, Texts, Contacts Being Searched at School: ACLU of SoCal Says It's Illegal

ACLU​Those pesky bleeding-heart liberals at the ACLU actually want teachers and school administrators to keep out of your kids' cellphones. A report issued by the ACLU of Southern California lists some anecdotal evidence that school authorities are searching the contents of students' phones w ... More >>

Stephen Yagman VS. Chemerinsky

A disbarred cop-brutality lawyer blames his friend, a top California legal eagle

Prisoners Testify to Vicious Beatings at Hands of County Jailers

Will Gov. Jerry Brown save money and relieve prison overcrowding by overcrowding county jails?

​Among the many ideas Gov. Jerry Brown apparently has to reduce California's colossal $25 billion-plus deficit, including reductions to state parks and libraries, is to pawn state prisoners off on county jails. That may work in some counties, but it's hardly clear if LA is one of them.

Kid Censorship Crackdown Spreads To L.A. County: Monrovia School Superintendent Bans Students From Performing 'Rent'

Don't let "Rent" happen to your kids: Here, Disney star Vanessa Hudgens falls prey to its deviant powers​There seems to be a recent spike in adults trying to keep Gen Y from all things sexy. First we saw Huckleberry Finn butchered a few days ago by NewSouth Books, who thinks replacing "nigger" ... More >>

The L.A. Lakers Have A Date With Obama Tonight (What Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Wouldn't Give...)

Associated PressDoesn't Biden get a No. 2? Racism, we tell ya​Barack Obama and the lagging Los Angeles Lakers meet again, for their annual shoot-the-shit play date! A presidential elbow-rub is apparently one of the perks of winning NBA titles -- and both parties are milking this photo op for ... More >>

Hector Villagra Appointed As First Latino To Head ACLU Of Southern California: Will He Take On The TSA?

ACLUHector Villagra will take over as the chief of the ACLU.​Updated after the jump with the ACLU stating the group has been against the x-ray scanners. The ACLU of Southern California announced Monday that it has appointed its first Latino executive director. The liberal group's legal dire ... More >>

West Hollywood's John Heilman and Abbe Land Beg Voters To Keep Gerrymandered Districts in 'Yes on 27' TV Ad

Ted SoquiWest Hollywood City Councilman John Heilman​West Hollywood City Council members John Heilman, Abbe Land, Lindsey Horvath, and Jeff Prang star in a "Yes on Prop. 27" TV ad, begging voters to maintain the supremely shady practice called "gerrymandering." Few, if any, major politicians ... More >>

Prop. 27 Gerrymander Supporters Duck and Cover

Howard Berman camp issues denial; consultant Michael Berman won't talk

ACLU Adds New Names In Their Lawsuit Against U.S. Government Challenging Their Policy Of Detaining Immigrants Indefinitely Without A Hearing

​The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California announced Tuesday that they're adding new plaintiffs to its lawsuit against the U.S. government, challenging the government's right to hold immigrants indefinitely while they wait for their cases to be heard in immigration hearings. T ... More >>

Robert Rizzo, Disgraced Former Bell City Manager, Pushed Police Hard To Impound Cars

Bell police faced an unsubtle message: Impound cars, or else​Sometime in early 2009, patrol officers for the Bell Police Department were given an ultimatum: If they didn't help fill city coffers by stepping up their towing and impounding of cars, Bell would have to lay off four fellow officers ... More >>

In case of Grim Sleeper Lonnie Franklin, Debate Over Familial DNA

​ The LAPD's unique method for finding and arresting Lonnie David Franklin, Jr, is called familial DNA tracing -- using DNA from a crime scene to find a brother, uncle or son of a perpetrator if you can't find the perpetrator himself. Although Franklin's DNA wasn't in a massive California felo ... More >>

ACLU Drops Suit Against Santa Monica Over Its Treatment Of Homeless

​The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California announced this week it was dropping its lawsuit against the city of Santa Monica over its treatment of homeless residents. An ACLU statement indicates Santa Monica officials have agreed that " ... merely sleeping and homeless status sh ... More >>

Proposition 14, the Open Primary

What happens to ossified Sacramento if California voters get to shop around?

On the Backs of Children

How UTLA's teacher-layoff rules are devastating inner-city L.A. schools

ACLU Calls For 'Broad' Investigation Of LAPD Shooting Of Unarmed Autistic Man

Google Maps​The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California urged the Los Angeles Police Department Tuesday to take a "broader look" at its use-of-force policy in the wake of a fatal Koreatown confrontation between gang cops and a 27-year-old autistic man. Two officers shot Steven E ... More >>

ACLU Defends Man Who Displayed Upside Down U.S. Flag

Demonstrator Rosebrock, left.​The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California announced Tuesday it has filed a lawsuit against the Veterans Administration on behalf of a veteran and perpetual demonstrator who it says had his free speech rights violated when he was cited after display ... More >>

County School For Juvenile Offenders Accused Of 'Abuse, Retaliation'

L.A. County Probation​The ACLU and an alliance of organizations are suing the county over its administration of the Challenger Memorial Youth Center for youths on probation, where education mandates are ignored and kids are neglected, the groups allege. The suit contends that the Lancaster sc ... More >>

Queer Town: "No on 8" Executive Committee Revealed

Late yesterday, gay rights activist and blogger Michael Petrelis accomplished the seemingly impossible--he found and published the 16 "principal officers" of the "No on 8" campaign's executive committee. If you think that kind of information would have been easily available, you are very, very wrong ... More >>

The Unconsumed Life

Silver Lake's bring-your-own-bag lady

Pedro Guzman's Return

Wrongly deported to Mexico, a developmentally disabled man is found safe

Lost in Tijuana

A mother’s search for a son, born in East L.A. but deported by County Sheriffs

Dog Food Caper

Journalists and City Council cave to iffy lawsuit

All Families Created Equal

The responsibilities of gay parents

Preying on the Seal

The ACLU takes on the county’s cross

Foul Justice

After 10 years, critics of Three Strikes may get another chance with voters

Votes of No-Confidence

Cost of election ending up in court

Dr. G’s Hard Medicine

Will L.A. County’s top public doctor be remembered as the man who resuscitated health care for the poor or left it gasping for air on the operating table?

A Divided Union

Endorsements

Our recommendations in the April 10 Los Angeles city election

Just the Truth

LAPD recruits are having trouble with new lie-detector tests

What Were They Thinking?

Juvenile Injustice

Proposition 21 aims to send thousands of California teenagers to adult prisons

Radio Radar

Shots in the Dark

Filmmakers, educators, politicians stand up to campus violence

The War at Home

Local Progressives Talk About Kosovo

To Expel an Inspector

How the LAPD cleansed itself

From Liberty Hill to the Living Wage

A brief history of Progressive Los Angeles