So get this: the City of Sheboygan, in Wisconsin, sent a nasty-gram to a chick telling her it was a big time no-no to link to the city’s police dept. website without their explicit permission. The letter came from the city’s attorney, Stephen McLean, and the mayor was cc’d. Here’s a copy of the official cease and desist. So of course chick is a little freaked, and she removes the link. Then she gets a call from the Sheboygan police saying “an official police investigation relative to the linking of her Web site to the City of Sheboygan Police Department.” So she does what any sane person would do and hotfoots it to the nearest lawyer. Said lawyer, a Mr. Paul Bucher, does what lawyers do and after telling her to put that link back up, he sends some nasty-grams of his own. Check out the fabulous writings he sent to city attorney (McLean), the chief of police(David Kirk), and the mayor (Juan Perez). The mayor immediately issues an ‘oops, our bad’ through an editorial in the local paper (sorry, it’s not online anymore or I’d *gasp* link to it). Here’s a snippit from an article in from the Sheboygan Press about the city backing down:
The City of Sheboygan is backing down from its demand that a Sheboygan resident remove a link from her business Web site to the Sheboygan Police Department, the city attorney said this morning.
Jeni Reisinger, who runs a Web site often critical of Mayor Juan Perez, was sent a cease-and-desist letter last month at the mayor’s request. But City Attorney Steve McLean said this morning the city informed Reisinger’s attorney in a letter sent Tuesday afternoon that it will no longer pursue the issue.
“There was never any intent to take any action further against her than write that letter,” McLean said. “We’re going to retract the cease-and-desist letter.”
But it seems it was too little, too late because girlfriend has now filed a lawsuit of her very own claiming that the city, the mayor, the police chief, the city attorney, and the city clerk, all violated her first amendment rights.
Now, where this lawsuit winds up will be very interesting to watch. I am an avid blogger, and I own/manage several websites that link to other websites. Telling someone that they can’t legally link to any of my sites is like me telling someone I’ll sue them if they give directions to your house when asked. It’s ridiculous. Are they suing Google, Yahoo and MSN? They all link to the police department’s site, so I hope they’re not in trouble, too. I think Mr. Bucher is right and this was a malicious attempt by the mayor to scare someone not on his favorite people list. And what’s with saying they never intended to pursue it? Last time I checked you weren’t supposed to threaten anyone with a cease and desist unless you meant it and you were prepared to follow through. This is like using the police to arrest someone you have no plans to prosecute. As far as I’m concerned the mayor, the city attorney and the police committed a humungous faux pas (read ABUSE OF POWER) with this, and I hope that the city taxpayers don’t wind up paying for it. Regardless, this one will be worth watching, as this kind of suit has never been court tested in this country before.
Somehow I was able to convince my bosses (fabulous men, all) that I need an iPhone. It’s true, I do need it. I need to be able to view real web pages where my ads or flash, etc might appear, one the fly. The mobile version doesn’t cut it. So there is a true need there. But I for sure didn’t think they’d go for it.
Warning: there are a few spoilers lurking in this post, so if you don’t want me ruining any of the Hulk for you, don’t read any further.
