Petitioner at Mall Says Arrest Unfair in Case Over Speech, Property Rights

In a case that pits freedom of speech against private property rights, a mall manager and a Libertarian activist are headed for a showdown that could affect the way California retailers restrict petition carriers on their property.

On one side is Ron Tisbert, a former Libertarian candidate for state Assembly, who says he was unjustly arrested Jan. 17 for trespassing and disturbing the peace at the Antelope Valley Mall. He says he was merely seeking signatures on a petition to legalize marijuana when security guards handcuffed him, called him “a dope head” and summoned a sheriff’s deputy.

On the other side is Brian Pearson, the mall’s manager, who insists that the security guards had every right to detain Tisbert because he caused a ruckus in the management office and refused to obey shopping center rules. Pearson says rules that limit how, when and where petitioners can talk to mall visitors are needed to preserve a pleasant shopping environment.

The bitter dispute is expected to land them both in a courtroom.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California has agreed to defend Tisbert in his criminal case and plans to file a lawsuit alleging that the mall staff violated Tisbert’s constitutional rights, an ACLU attorney said.

“There’s absolutely no reason we see for the outrageous conduct of the mall, outside of their offense to the message these people want to express,” said ACLU attorney Alan Friel.

Tisbert, 46, of Palmdale, and a fellow petition carrier, Donovan James Taylor, 23, of Lancaster, pleaded not guilty Tuesday to the misdemeanor charges and asked for a trial next month.

Tisbert, who ran unsuccessfully for an Assembly seat in 1990 and 1992 on the Libertarian ticket, believes he and Taylor were singled out for harsh treatment when a mall staff member learned they were advocates of the California Hemp Initiative.

“As soon as the guy found out that hemp is marijuana, he insulted us, called us dope heads and said we weren’t going to (collect signatures) there,” Tisbert said.

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Mall administrators deny the men were mistreated or received unusual handling because of the content of their petition.

If it qualifies for the ballot and is approved by voters, the initiative would legalize marijuana for industrial, medicinal, nutritional and personal use by people who are 21 or older. Supporters say that hemp, another name for the marijuana plant, could become a valuable resource for the production of paper, fuel and fiber.

Tisbert is not the only California Hemp Initiative supporter to run into trouble in recent days.

Last Monday, a woman was denied permission to seek signatures for the measure in the free-speech zone at Pierce College in Woodland Hills. The incident led Friel, the ACLU attorney, to contact college administrators who, after consulting their own attorney, acknowledged that they had erred.

“It was a little misunderstanding,” said Richard Moyer, associate dean of planning and research.

He said the petition carrier, a 19-year-old student, was sent away by a college vice president. “He unknowingly reacted to the nature of the petition and said we can’t have that on campus, or that it was inappropriate,” Moyer said.

After the woman complained to the ACLU, the college “reminded” its staff that such actions violate school policies, Moyer said. “It was a mistake, and I would think it wouldn’t happen again.”

Another Hemp Initiative volunteer, Andrew Kolb, 21, of Reseda, said a San Fernando Valley supermarket manager recently told him to leave when he sought signatures in front of that store. Shortly afterward, two police officers pulled up and questioned Kolb but did not arrest him or order him to leave, Kolb said.

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Store owners and managers frequently treat people carrying drug legalization petitions harshly, the ACLU’s Friel believes.

“They have a particular problem because drugs are to the ‘90s what communism was to the ‘50s,” the attorney said. “It’s our scapegoat. All of society’s problems are because people use drugs.”

Even though some retailers oppose the content of the Hemp Initiative, the California Supreme Court ruled in 1979 that privately owned shopping centers are public forums that cannot restrict free speech without a compelling reason, Friel said.

Pearson, the Antelope Valley Mall manager, said his center complies with this court decision by providing tables at three interior sites where shoppers can sign petitions if they choose.

“What the court ruling said is that we’re required to allow people to present initiatives,” the manager said. “We would have granted (Tisbert) a table for the following day. We’re baffled as to what we did wrong.”

Pearson said the mall rules have not triggered any other disputes or led to the arrest of any other petition carriers since the center opened more than three years ago.

Tisbert was arrested, in part, because the rules prohibit people with petitions from approaching shoppers at the mall doorways or as they walk through the halls. “I have an obligation to the customers to make sure they enjoy their time here without being approached at random by people,” Pearson said.

The manager acknowledged that employees of a market research firm with an office at the mall sometimes stop shoppers as they walk through the halls, but he said the rules for petition carriers do not apply to mall tenants.

Several days before Tisbert’s arrest, the mall allowed two Hemp Initiative volunteers to staff an inside table. When the volunteers attached a hand-written sign to the table, Pearson said he asked them to remove it.

Pearson said it violated a mall rule that requires table signs to be “of professional quality and neat in appearance.”

“They got angry and left,” the mall manager said. “I didn’t harass them. I simply asked them to remove the sign.”

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Tisbert heard about the incident and decided to circulate petitions at the mall. But before he began gathering signatures, he says he went to the mall administration office and calmly asked employees there to read a court ruling concerning free-speech rights.

But Pearson said, “The gentleman was in my office, screaming at the staff.”

When Tisbert and Taylor refused to leave the mall and began asking shoppers to sign their petition, they were arrested, according to a mall security guard’s report.

If convicted of trespassing and disturbing the peace, each man could face up to six months in jail and a fine of up to $1,000 for each charge.

John K. Spillane, head deputy at the Los Angeles County district attorney’s Antelope Valley office, acknowledged that the case involves complex issues.

“We are in areas of First Amendment rights, balancing against the rights of the mall and of individuals at the mall to be free of disturbances,” the prosecutor said.