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  1. #1
    Cerberus
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    Man awarded $50,000 for flipping off police

    Citation for Gesture Costs Pittsburgh

    By SEAN D. HAMILL
    PITTSBURGH — The City of Pittsburgh has agreed to pay $50,000 to a man who sued after being issued a disorderly conduct citation for gesturing offensively at a police officer.

    The settlement, in which the city also agreed to retrain its officers in the limits of disorderly conduct law, was reached with Dave Hackbart, 35, after research undertaken by his lawyers found that police citations for swearing or offensive gestures were common here.

    From March 2005 to July 2009, the research found, Pittsburgh officers cited 198 people for disorderly conduct on the basis of that sort of behavior, even though the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has consistently found such citations unlawful on free speech grounds.

    “Hopefully we’ll send a message to other police officers across the state, where this is a consistent problem, that this is not legal,” said Sara J. Rose, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, which helped represent Mr. Hackbart in a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city.

    Pittsburgh’s deputy police chief, Paul J. Donaldson, said the city had retrained officers in the law twice since 2006 but would do so again, to emphasize that “the disorderly conduct statute can’t be used to protect the police from all verbal indignities.”

    Mr. Hackbart was charged on April 10, 2006, while trying to parallel-park. According to his lawsuit, another car pulled up and blocked him from parking, frustrating Mr. Hackbart, who gestured with his middle finger at the other driver.

    When a third driver objected to the gesture, Mr. Hackbart delivered it to him as well. That driver turned out to be an officer, Sgt. Brian Elledge, who wrote the citation. Mr. Hackbart was found guilty by a magistrate and fined court costs.

    “I felt really let down by the system,” Mr. Hackbart said. “I challenged it as a matter or principle.”

    Of the $50,000 settlement, he will get $10,000; the rest goes to his lawyers.

    Mr. Hackbart said that the case had raised his interest in law and that he had he quit a job as a waiter and gone back to school to become a paralegal. He is considering going on to law school.

    “A lot of good things have come out of this,” he said. “Hopefully it’s a big deterrent and it helps other people down the road who are in my shoes.”
    lol owned cops

  2. #2
    The Mizzle Fizzle of Nikkei's Haremizzle

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    wtf

  3. #3
    They call me Lord Null for a reason.
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    Man got owned by his lawyers as well.

  4. #4
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    Quote Originally Posted by Null View Post
    Man got owned by his lawyers as well.
    That is just how the system works. There's a reason he's thinking about going to law school now.

  5. #5
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    Yeah but he's using that 10k to become a lawyer and fuck over other people. Guy has the right idea. Welcome to America.

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cyn View Post
    Yeah but he's using that 10k to become a lawyer and fuck over other people. Guy has the right idea. Welcome to America.
    http://licenseplates4u.com/images/Am...ag%20Eagle.jpg

  7. #7
    The Fucking Voice of Actually
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    Quote Originally Posted by Null View Post
    Man got owned by his lawyers as well.
    This is what sods me off. I have enough respect for law, but very little for lawyers.

  8. #8
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cantih View Post
    This is what sods me off. I have enough respect for law, but very little for lawyers.
    I want to tell this to the lawyer that I just paid $1500 to. So that I could plead guilty.

  9. #9
    I'll change yer fuckin rate you derivative piece of shit
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    I told a cop to "fuck off" once, face to face. None of my friends believed me because they said he would've arrested me if I'd actually done that.

    Now I wish he would've.

  10. #10
    The Fucking Voice of Actually
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cyn View Post
    I want to tell this to the lawyer that I just paid $1500 to. So that I could plead guilty.
    My "Max™ style dream"™ to the situation would be to take the legal code, and distill and layman-ize it to the point where the average idiot could successfully represent themselves. Then as the legal profession collapsed, I'd rub it in their face, telling them I did it because of their disgusting behavior. That if they weren't so goddamn greedy, I never would have bothered.

  11. #11
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    I'm still debating on whether $1500 was worth getting out of an interlock device.

  12. #12
    The Fucking Voice of Actually
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    Can't help you there, I don't drink.

  13. #13
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    I do. But I promise I don't drink and drive anymore.

  14. #14

    Quote Originally Posted by Cyn View Post
    I'm still debating on whether $1500 was worth getting out of an interlock device.
    I personally would have paid the $1,500 instead of putting on that leash, if it makes you feel any better.

  15. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by Shuvo View Post
    I personally would have paid the $1,500 instead of putting on that leash, if it makes you feel any better.
    Yeah, it is still rather annoying that I ended up with 2 years of probation regardless. There are a few flat-out bullshit things about the legal system that bug me.

  16. #16
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    http://www.palefirer.com/images/sam_eagle.jpg
    Sam Eagle disapproves of this thread.

  17. #17
    okay guy I guess
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    WELL NO ONE ASKED YOU, SAM EAGLE!
    http://www.liberalrapture.com/upload...ger-704928.jpg

  18. #18

  19. #19

    Tyranny. Civil Disobedience is the tool of resistance, is the means of breaking the State. Fuck the police who enforce laws (or the lack thereof) that are untenable with Natural Law and NAP. If I was him I would have took it to a jury trial, educated the jury about jury nullification and tried to nullify disorderly conduct law, whatever bullshit that is.

  20. #20
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    Are you... really?

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