American Civil Liberties Union

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 >>

Proposition 34 Election Results: Death Penalty Repeal Goes Down in Defeat

California voters chose not to repeal the death penalty, Proposition 34. Los Angeles County voters actually voted to end the death penalty, backing Proposition 34 by a wide margin of 1,191,545. or 54.04 percent Yes, to 1,013,477, or 45.96 percent No. But the local vote was not nearly enough to ov ... More >>

Proposition 34: Campaign to Repeal the Death Penalty is Gaining Traction According to Poll

Good news today for supporters of Proposition 34, the initiative that would end executions in California and see the sentences of the state's 725 death row inmates automatically commuted to life in prison without the possibility of parole. According to a Field Poll released this morning, for first ... More >>

Teflon Sheriff Lee Baca, Undersheriff Paul Tanaka Slammed For Jail Violence

We call him the Teflon Sheriff because, despite more than a decade's worth of serious problems inside the L.A. jail system, woes that include gang-like cliques of tatted-up deputies, you keep electing Lee Baca as the county's top cop. Nothing seems to stick. Well, that might have changed today:

Skid Row Homeless Say LAPD Is Trying to Bully Them off Their Freshly Cleaned Turf

On the fourth day of "Operation Healthy Streets" -- the city's attempt to power-wash Skid Row of its feces, syringes and lord-knows-what-else -- the regulars near 4th and Towne got into a tense standoff with the LAPD, according to Pete White with the L.A. Community Action Network. White, a homeles ... More >>

Finally: Gay Bullying Gets Recognized as a Civil Rights Issue

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 >>

Antonio Montejano, U.S. Citizen and L.A. Dad, Detained for Days on 'Immigration Hold'

Jailed for being brown?​It's one thing to deport undocumented immigrants for non-crimes like selling ice cream or driving with a headlight out, even though they've lived here since they were kids. Awful, and inhumane, but technically allowed, under the Obama Administration's harsh federal immi ... More >>

Teflon Sheriff Lee Baca's Inmates Should go Home Instead of Building $1 Billion Replacement For Men's Central Jail, ACLU Says

David MarklandThe Teflon Sheriff.​Lee Baca's L.A. County Jail system, the largest in the nation, has been a large shop of horrors according to those inmates and even visitors who accuse deputies of beating them unnecessarily. Now Baca is proposing to tear down Men's Central Jail and start ove ... More >>

Shawne Fletcher, L.A. County Jail Inmate, Sues Sheriff Lee Baca for Another Brutal Beating

Courtesy of Dawn FletcherShawn, after the beating.​Allegations of abuse have been raining down on the L.A. County Sheriff's Department since springtime. LA Weekly writer Chris Vogel's "Men's County Jail Visitor Viciously Beaten by Guards" opened the floodgates for more testimonies, and lawsuit ... More >>

Deputies Made up Good Excuses, Got Away With Beatings in Lee Baca's Jails -- Report

"County."​If Sheriff Lee Baca thought the controversy over L.A. County Jail inmate beatings at the hands of his deputies was going to go away quietly, he better think again. Yesterday we told you how Baca, for the first time, it seems, struck a conciliatory tone by saying he would meet with t ... More >>

Buy Spray Paint in L.A., Give Your Address And ID For a Possible Police File Under Councilman Dennis Zine's Anti-Graffiti Proposal

Krylon​Updated at the bottom with reaction from the ACLU, which says this might not survive a constitutional challenge (what with freedom of speech and all). First posted at 2:35 p.m. Dennis Zine is the L.A. City Councilman who successfully got Aaron Brothers to back off its graffiti-themed b ... More >>

Fullerton Police Brutality: Beating Victim Kelly Thomas' Dad Finds YouTube Video of Familiar Scenario

OC WeeklyRon Thomas, left, schools protesters.​The sickening death of homeless and mentally ill man Kelly Thomas, 37, at the hands of six Fullerton policemen has gone national, as meticulously detailed by our sister paper, the OC Weekly. And no one has been more active in letting the world, al ... More >>

Porn Actress Contracted HIV in 2009: Judge Blocks State Workplace Regulators From Peeking at her Medical Records

​Update: The AIDS Healthcare Foundation says it will appeal the ruling to the California Supreme Court. Details at the bottom. A previously unknown HIV case in porn was revealed this week after an adult performer sued California workplace regulators who wanted access to her medical records. ... More >>

FBI Agents Encouraged to Search Your Trash, Public Databases Just to Sniff Around For Crime

Malingering​What the hell happened to America after 9/11? Have we lost sight of our founding principles? The FBI plans to issue new rules for its agents saying, essentially, that they can and should dig through our trash and search databases (Facebook, Twitter?) if people who aren't suspects ... More >>

Prisoners Testify to Vicious Beatings at Hands of County Jailers

Marijuana Possession Can Still be a Felony: Pro-Cannabis Group Mad at Gov. Brown For Not Changing That

'I pledge to uphold the polyester.'​The pro-marijuana brigade is unhappy with Gov. Jerry Brown's latest budget proposal, noting that he's refused to do as they say and reduce minor drug possession cases from felonies to misdemeanors, a move that could save California hundreds of millions. It' ... More >>

Cristian Gheorghiu, or L.A. Tagger 'Smear', in Court for Keeping Art Supplies at His House

Los Angeles TimesSmear in his garage studio​We have L.A. City Attorney Carmen Trutanich to thank for keeping dangerous criminals like Cristian Gheorghiu -- the graffiti artist better known as Smear, who has turned a life of crime into a legitimate career over the last few years, as detailed in ... More >>

'Seth's Law' to Prevent Anti-Gay Bullying at California Schools Introduced

FoxNelson Muntz.​Every little boy has been called anti-gay slurs by a kid who's bigger and badder. But in a world in which we now realize people are born with homosexual traits from day one, this has become seriously harmful discrimination for kids who really are gay. California Sen. Tom Amm ... More >>

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.

Villaraigosa's LAX Body Scan Fails To Expose The L.A. Mayor's Gravitas

ABC7Villaraigosa shows off -- a little.​L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa got his body scanned Monday to prove that it's safe, secure and not-too-invasive. Except if you saw media coverage of the mayor's walk-through at LAX, you didn't really see much. Come on, Mayor V., you ACLU supporter you, ... More >>

In Wake Of Grim Sleeper Arrest, Jerry Brown Says He'll Defend Practice Of Collecting DNA From California Felons

​Citing the DNA-triggered arrest of a suspect in the Grim Sleeper serial murder case, state Attorney General Jerry Brown says he'll defend the state against an ACLU lawsuit that challenge's California's collection of DNA from every convicted felon. The A.G.'s lawyers on Tuesday, in fact, will ... More >>

It Doesn't Take Much For Feds To Access Your Facebook Page (But That Could Change)

​Authorities can get all up in your Facebook account with relative ease, so a consortium of companies that includes Google, Santa Monica-based AOL and the ACLU is lobbying congress to enact legislation that will protect the privacy of everyday information stored in "the cloud." The Digital Du ... More >>

Mr. Orwell, Meet B-18: ACLU Sues Government Over Basement Holding Pens

The U.S. Federal Building at 300 N. Los Angeles Street is one of downtown's uglier edifices -- a gray, Brezhnevian block of barricaded concrete that houses a host of government bureaucracies, including the U.S. immigration courts. Visitors entering the lobby little suspect, however, that just below ... More >>

Mike Antonovich's Ironic Cross

Supervisor Mike Antonovich has rolled up his gray-flannelled trousers to wade deep into the culture wars. Specifically, according to the L.A. Daily News, he wants the crucifix put back in the County Seal, now that the steel cross has been restored to the roof of the San Gabriel Mission, following it ... More >>

Waiting for a Decision: Will State Court Overturn Prop 8?

California's State Supreme Court begins hearing arguments for and against overturning Proposition 8, the same-sex marriage ban approved by voters last November. The state's high court will issue its decision within 90 days. The San Francisco proceedings, based on three separate cases challenging the ... More >>

You'll Never Be Vice President: A Letter to My Daughter, the Community Organizer

Why didn't I nip all this in the bud and buy you a well-oiled Remington 12-gauge?

Lost in Tijuana

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

Earth to ELF: Come In, Please

Does the radical environmental group really exist?

The Sex Files

When you find yourself in one and can’t get out

Pulling the Plug

The long, sad road to King-Drew

Exposing L.A. Secrets

The right lawyer could make sure that L.A. County is run openly

The Chilling Fields

Homeland’s ICE cools Cambodian’s hopes

A Leg In the Crowd

LAPD baton-twirling acts at the Democratic Convention

Distractions of Class

The poor get worse schools and that may be legal

Punching-Out Gray

Any liberals left who haven’t gone off the cliff for Gray?

You Gotta Fight for Your Rights

Check This Out

Libraries quietly sound alarm against PATRIOT Act

Alarm Addictions

The state of America’s war on drugs

Party Busters

Rage and the LAPD

Ruling keeps alive protesters’ lawsuit in aftermath of Democratic Convention

Lesbian in the Locker Room

To be young, gay and outcast in Banning

No RAVE Review

Congress rushes bill targeting nightclub operators

The Gray Rat

Blame the governor for no books, no desks, no toilet paper

The Gloves Come Off

The $1 Billion Rumble

L.A. Unified loses court battle over control of its programs for the disabled

Tainted Thinking

Drug tests: A class ritual

Convention Casualties

Opposing views on police conduct

Death on the Menu

Inside Orgasmatron

A closer look at the motor of joy