Award Against ACLU Lawyer Will Stand

The state Supreme Court on Thursday let stand a precedent-setting, $46,000 damage award against a former American Civil Liberties Union lawyer for violating the rights of a policeman he ejected from a public meeting on police surveillance practices.

The justices, in a brief order, refused to hear a challenge by the attorney to a state Court of Appeal decision last December that concluded the Newport Beach officer’s removal from an ACLU-sponsored conference in the Orange County city was discriminatory under the Unruh Civil Rights Act.

Lawyers for attorney Rees Lloyd had vigorously defended the ejection of Officer Richard T. Long, saying the right of free association allowed conference organizers to turn away someone they believed was an undercover “government agent.”

The case marked the first time the ACLU--the longtime champion of individual rights--or one of its lawyers has been held liable for infringing on the rights of others. The ACLU itself earlier paid Long $35,000 in settlement of its portion of his claim.

Thursday’s action allows the appellate decision to become binding on trial courts throughout the state.

Hugh R. Manes of Los Angeles, an attorney for Lloyd, called the action “incredible” and pledged to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. “I am absolutely stunned,” said Manes. “This case has many free-speech implications--not the least of which is the right to throw out a police officer who is spying on you at a meeting.”

Jeffrey M. Epstein, a Los Angeles lawyer representing the officer, welcomed the high-court action, saying it established an important judicial precedent protecting the right of government employees to sue for discrimination.

“I find this case extremely ironic,” Epstein said. “I don’t have any great dislike for the ACLU, but if they do something wrong they should be made to pay for their mistakes just like anyone else.”

Long, a sergeant and head of the department’s robbery-homicide detail, said the decision vindicated him from accusations that he was spying at the meeting.

“I’m very pleased that the courts saw fit not to forget my civil rights as an individual and as a police officer,” he said.

The case arose in 1980 when the ACLU organized a conference on police practices, advertising the meeting as open to the public and inviting the local police chief, who did not attend. Long, then a community relations officer, went to the meeting dressed in civilian clothes, paid an admission fee, put on a name tag and took a seat at a seminar on police surveillance.

The officer made written notes and, apparently surreptitiously, tape-recorded the proceedings. Conference organizers spotted him and one of the speakers, Linda Valentino of the Friends Service Committee, announced his presence.

According to the officer, Lloyd, then an ACLU staff attorney, demanded that Long identify himself--which Long did. Lloyd then said: “I want you outside. I’d like to discuss some of the principles of the ACLU with you.” Lloyd allegedly pointed a finger in the officer’s face, again ordered him out of the meeting and then threatened to slap him. Long rose to tell the audience he was not there to spy but to improve community relations and then left the room.

The officer brought suit against the ACLU, Lloyd and Valentino, seeking damages for unlawful discrimination and infliction of emotional distress. An Orange County Superior Court jury in 1987 awarded Long $4,600 from Valentino, $46,000 from Lloyd and $20,000 from the ACLU--with a judge later holding the ACLU liable for $72,000 in legal fees for Long.

Later, after the ACLU reached a settlement with the officer, a state Court of Appeal in Santa Ana upheld the award against Lloyd but by a vote of 2 to 1 overturned the award against Valentino.

The appeals court rejected Lloyd’s contention that the words he used in the confrontation with Long represented constitutionally protected free speech. The Unruh Act can be violated by words alone, the court noted. “If the speech is meant to, and does, offend the law, utterance of the words themselves may be protected; but the speaker is subject to the consequences,” Appellate Justice Thomas F. Crosby wrote for the court.

The panel also turned down the lawyer’s claim that officers are not protected by the Unruh Act when they attend public meetings to gather information about groups or individuals. The jury could properly conclude that Long was the victim of discrimination because of his occupation, the court said.

“Police officers as individuals have rights, too, and can bring actions for violations of those rights even though their injury has arisen in some way related to performance of their duties,” Crosby said.

In their subsequent appeal to the state Supreme Court, Lloyd’s lawyers argued that political groups were entitled to exclude what they reasonably perceived as an “illegal governmental presence.” The ACLU’s policy, they said, was that police monitoring of lawful public meetings violated the First Amendment. Permitting suits for ejecting police, they said, would have a “chilling effect” on free speech and association.