As we wrote just yesterday, the defamation trial brought by seven Adams County, Ohio deputies against rapper Afroman was going about as well for the officers as their original botched raid on his home. Today we can report the inevitable conclusion: the jury sided entirely with Afroman, clearing him of all liability after just hours of deliberation.
To recap briefly: deputies raided Afroman’s home in 2022 with guns drawn, found essentially nothing, filed no charges, broke his door (and his gate!), and got caught on his security cameras doing embarrassing things — including one deputy who appeared to cautiously eye a delicious-looking lemon pound cake. Afroman turned the footage into multiple viral music videos. The deputies, upset about being mocked, sued him for $3.9 million claiming defamation and emotional distress. The jury took just a few hours to say: nah.
The best part might be the closing argument from the officers’ attorney, who told the jury:
“Mr. Foreman doesn’t get to wrap himself in the American flag and say you can’t touch me, I can say what I want, no matter how untrue it is, no matter how much pain it causes people, because I have freedom of speech. He can’t do that.”
Afroman’s lawyer quickly responded that he can, in fact, do exactly that. That’s how the First Amendment works. Especially when talking about public officials. And then the jury agreed. This is especially delicious given that Afroman literally wrapped himself in the American flag for the entire trial, showing up each day in that wonderful suit.
Afroman’s own testimony summed up the whole case more concisely than any lawyer could:
“All of this is their fault, and they have the audacity to sue me.”
And through all of this, Afroman never stopped making music mocking these officers — right up to the trial. Here he is calling out Deputy Randy Walters:
And here he is set to the tune of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, reminding everyone that the proof of everything he’s saying is right there on the internet for anyone to see:
So the deputies sued because they were embarrassed by viral music videos, and, in doing so, created a three-day trial that generated a whole new wave of viral content about them, drew national media attention, and ended with a jury telling them they had no case. The Streisand Effect remains undefeated.
As Afroman’s lawyer told the jury in closing, citing NWA’s “Fuck Tha Police” and Richard Pryor’s comedy:
“I’m sorry they feel the way they do, but there’s a certain amount that you have to take as a public official, it’s part of the duties of the job. What chilling effect does that have on the world we live in? You don’t like what a public official does and you make a joke, and you’re dragged into court?”
There’s a serious point underneath all the absurdity. Public officials who raid your home for no good reason, find nothing, and break your stuff don’t get to then use the courts to punish you for talking about it. That’s the whole ballgame on the First Amendment, and the jury understood it perfectly.
We’ve been following the saga of Afroman (real name Joseph Foreman) and the Adams County Sheriff’s Office for a few years now, and I’m delighted to report that the defamation trial is currently underway and it is delivering everything you could possibly hope for, starting with this absolutely astounding suit that he’s wearing in court and on the stand (as well as in recent videos):
For those who need a refresher: back in 2022, the Adams County Sheriff’s Office in Ohio conducted a raid on Afroman’s home with a warrant for drug trafficking and — hilariously — kidnapping. (Kidnapping. Afroman.) The search turned up a couple of joints, some legal hemp, and a vape pen. No arrests were made. No charges were filed. The warrant itself appeared to have been sloppily assembled from boilerplate, with the kidnapping allegation looking a whole lot like someone forgot to delete an irrelevant paragraph before submitting it to a judge.
What the deputies did manage to accomplish was breaking Afroman’s door and gate, apparently pocketing $400 in cash (later explained away as a “miscount”), and getting captured on Afroman’s home security cameras doing a series of things that made them look absolutely ridiculous — including, famously, cautiously approaching a lemon cake sitting in a glass container on the kitchen counter.
The deputies, naturally, tried to cut power and unplug the security cameras during the raid — because surely that’s what the good guys do. But they didn’t get to them fast enough. Afroman took that footage and did exactly what you’d hope a musician would do: he turned it into a pair of songs — “Lemon Pound Cake” and “Will You Help Me Repair My Door” — complete with music videos featuring the actual raid footage. The videos went massively viral. In fact, here, watch them again:
And then the deputies did what we’ve come to expect from law enforcement officers who love power but hate the accountability that very occasionally accompanies it: They sued Afroman, claiming his use of their images in his music videos caused them “emotional distress, embarrassment, ridicule, loss of reputation, and humiliation.”
At the time, we noted that this lawsuit was profoundly stupid and predicted it would only make things worse for the deputies. Three years later, the trial has begun, and I am pleased to report: it is making things so much worse for the deputies.
Let’s start with the visuals. As mentioned above, Afroman showed up to court in a full American flag suit. This is a man who understands exactly what kind of stage he’s been handed, and he’s performing brilliantly. If you want to see the entirety of his testimony, that’s on YouTube too, and it’s glorious (click through as they’ve disabled embeds on that one).
Legal reporter Meghann Cuniff has also been posting astounding video clips from the courtroom to Instagram, and they are a gift, so we’ll include a few of the best cuts here.
First, here’s Afroman on the stand making the single most devastating argument in the entire case, which is also the most obvious one: none of this would have happened if they hadn’t raided his house in the first place.
That’s it. That’s the whole case. The deputies created the raid. The raid created the footage. The footage created the songs. The songs created the “emotional distress.” The lawsuit created this trial, which is now creating a whole new wave of viral content about these deputies. Every single thing these officers are complaining about is something they set in motion themselves.
When the plaintiffs’ lawyers kept pushing him about how unfair he was being to these poor deputies, Afroman’s response was wonderful:
Don’t miss the “you’re welcome” at the end of that one.
Then there’s Afroman explaining what should be pretty obvious to anyone who has even a passing familiarity with the First Amendment: this is his freedom of speech, he makes humorous songs for entertainment, and — oh yeah — he needed to pay for the door and gate these deputies broke.
But the real fun starts when the deputies themselves take the stand. Sgt. Randolph Lee “Randy” Walters Jr. managed to admit, on the witness stand, that many of the things people have been saying about him are statements of opinion rather than fact.
For those keeping score at home: opinion is a complete defense to a defamation claim. When one of the plaintiffs in a defamation case casually concedes on the stand that the allegedly defamatory statements are opinion, that’s… not great for the plaintiffs.
And then there’s Deputy Shawn Cooley, who is apparently quite upset that people have been calling him “Lemon Pound Cake.” Yes, a law enforcement officer is in court, under oath, complaining about a nickname derived from the fact that he was filmed treating a dessert as a potential threat during a drug raid that turned up essentially nothing.
But wait, it gets better. Afroman’s defense team called Cooley’s ex-wife to the stand, where she testified that Cooley knew the song was a joke and even made fun of it himself.
So we’ve got a deputy claiming severe emotional distress over a nickname, while his own ex-wife is testifying that he was laughing about it. Outstanding.
As Defector noted in its recap of the trial’s early days:
This suit is certain to just make things worse for the department. Afroman’s videos may have gone viral but they were mostly contained, their reach, outside of the initial wave of virality, more than likely limited to Cincinnati, its surrounding areas, and whatever colleges at which Afroman goes around performing. But the trial has brought all new visibility to these videos, putting Afroman on the brink of going platinum again. There is no winning here for the cops, no matter how many distressed tears you try to pull out of these officers.
We called this three years ago when the lawsuit was filed. The deputies were upset that Afroman’s videos made them look foolish, so they filed a lawsuit that would guarantee far more people would see those videos and learn their names. The Streisand Effect remains undefeated.
There’s a serious point underneath all the absurdity. These are public servants who conducted a search of a private citizen’s home under a warrant, found essentially nothing, broke his property, possibly took his money, tried to disable his cameras, and then — when he had the audacity to use his own security footage to make fun of them — decided to use the legal system to try to shut him up and get paid for their hurt feelings.
The message they were trying to send is the same one law enforcement sends in so many of these cases: we can do whatever we want to you, and if you embarrass us for it, we’ll make your life even harder. It’s the same impulse that leads cops to arrest people for filming them, or to seize phones during protests, or to charge people with “resisting arrest” when there’s no underlying crime. The whole point is to make the cost of accountability so high that people stop trying.
But Afroman showed up in an American flag suit and explained, calmly and clearly, that he makes funny songs, that these officers raided his house for no good reason, that they broke his stuff, and that he has every right to talk about it. And the deputies’ own testimony is undermining their case in real time.
As Defector’s recap put it:
As for Afroman himself, this may not be Uncle Luke on trial or anything, but it is another case in which people must decide how much they actually like freedom of speech, as well as whether or not the police are justified to behave however they like under the auspices of “doing their job.” Actually, he explains it a lot better than I could. It’s a trial about a principle and fighting unfairness, with some funny videos making it all that much more entertaining. Justice the Afroman way is a lot more satisfying than what the system usually gives.
It sure is. The deputies wanted to punish Afroman for making them look bad. Instead, they gave him a bigger platform, a better story, and a courtroom full of cameras capturing every moment of their continued self-own. If you wanted a textbook example of why you shouldn’t use a lawsuit to silence criticism of your own embarrassing behavior, this is it.
Though I suppose we should thank the Adams County Sheriff’s Office for one thing: If they hadn’t filed this lawsuit, we wouldn’t have gotten to watch Afroman testify in an American flag suit while a deputy complains about being called Lemon Pound Cake. Sometimes the legal system truly delivers amazing moments.
When the Adams County (OH) sheriff’s office raided rap artist Afroman’s home, he didn’t just sit back and assume everyone involved operated in good faith. The raid was captured on Afroman’s security cameras, which the artist soon converted into a viral video/rap song entitled “Will You Help Me Repair My Door.”
The footage — which the deputies tried to prevent from being recorded by cutting power to Afroman’s house and unplugging any cameras they could find — showed the deputies doing all sorts of ridiculous drug warrior stuff. Like cautiously approaching a lemon cake in a glass container on the counter top. And rifling through CD cases looking for evidence of drug trafficking and — according to the warrant — kidnapping. And taking any cash they could find, of which $400 went missing when Afroman was allowed to collect this so-called evidence.
What wasn’t found during the raid was anything pointing to the criminal acts that supposedly justified the intrusion. All deputies found were a couple of joints and some loose cash. An investigation into the missing $400 by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigations came to the conclusion this was a mistake by the deputies, who stated they had simply miscounted the take.
But that’s not the stupidest part of this debacle. The deputies who did all the dumb stuff caught on Afroman’s cameras — dumb stuff authorized by a piece of paper signed by a judge — are now claiming they’re the real victims here, not the person who house was raided and whose property was seized.
Seven members of the Adams County Sheriff’s Office who raided Joseph Foreman’s home last year are now suing him claiming, among other things, that he invaded their privacy.
Four deputies, two sergeants and a detective are claiming Foreman (a.k.a. “Afroman”) took footage of their faces obtained during the raid and used it in music videos and social media posts without their consent, a misdemeanor violation under Ohio Revised Code.
They’re also suing on civil grounds, saying Foreman’s use of their faces (i.e. personas) in the videos and social media posts resulted in their “emotional distress, embarrassment, ridicule, loss of reputation and humiliation.”
LOL. Fuck these guys. There’s no case here. The lawsuit [PDF] makes plenty of claims that might have sounded credible if these officers (1) were not public servants, (2) not performing their public duties, (3) not captured by someone else’s recording equipment, and (4) not doing a bunch of stuff that made them look ridiculous.
Fortunately, by filing this lawsuit we now have the names of some of the deputies who participated in the raid, which should only add to their emotional distress, embarrassment, ridicule, loss of reputation, and humiliation. They are Shawn Cooley, Justin Cooley, Michael Estep, Shawn Grooms, Brian Newland, and Lisa Phillips, and Randolph Walters, Jr.
These idiots, who love power but hate the accountability that very occasionally comes with it, are hoping a judge will force Afroman to take down his publication of his own security camera footage, prevent him from ever doing it again, and give them some of Afroman’s money because he had the audacity to wrest the narrative from their control. These aren’t public servants. These are children playing dress up — daft punks who seem to believe their actions should be eternally free of consequences.
They’re trying to bring a “right of publicity” claim against Afroman — an oft-abused offshoot of copyright law that supposedly allows people to control how their faces, bodies, images, etc. are used to prevent commercial exploitation without their consent.
It’s highly unlikely public servants recorded performing their public duties can prevent use of these recordings in any way that might conceivably result in monetary gain for the person doing the recording. That much seems obvious. This also seems to foreclose this action: it’s unlikely these seven officers (deputies Happy, Sleepy, Dopey, Grumpy, Bashful, Sneezy, and Doc) will be able to claim that their faces/bodies as captured by Afroman’s security cameras have any intrinsic value capable of being exploited in violation of this law. To wit:
(A) “Persona” means an individual’s name, voice, signature, photograph, image, likeness, or distinctive appearance, if any of these aspects have commercial value.
Perhaps if Afroman utilized their “personas” to perform a faux endorsement of his candidacy for sheriff, they might have a point. But copyright law is on Afroman’s side: the footage used in the viral videos was captured by his cameras. And no officer was “exploited” individually for commercial gain. The entire raid, which happened to include these particularly childish law enforcement officers, became the basis for a music video.
Back to the lawsuit. Enjoy this paragraph, in which the seven deputies manage to misspell “plaintiffs'” in the opening sentence:
As a result of Defendants’ actions, Plaintiffs have been subjected to ridicule, even in the further performance of their official duties, by members of the public who have seen some of Defendants’ above-described postings. In some instances, it has made it more difficult and even more dangerous for Plaintiffs to carry out their official duties because of comments made and attitudes expressed toward them by members of the public.
Yeah, that’s a real shame. Too bad about those “official duties.” And Afroman’s video and Instagram posts utilizing his own security camera footage are nothing more than criticism of government employees — the kind of thing given the utmost in First Amendment protections. That he’s making money doing it is beside the point. As the saying goes, if you can’t stand the heat, get out of someone else’s kitchen.
And, as for the worries about further reputational damage, the best way to stop this form of bleeding would be to take your lumps on social media, rather than call attention to your own deep insecurities with a vindictive lawsuit that ensures your names will be seen by far more than Afroman’s social media followers.
The deputies also claim they’ve been subjected to death threats. While that’s unfortunate, it’s neither here nor there. Receiving death threats is not a component of the state’s right of publicity law. And the deputies offer no evidence Afroman is encouraging his fans to engage in this sort of behavior. Indeed, if they had any evidence this was happening, they likely would have arrested Afroman for terroristic threats (or whatever applicable, abusable law is on hand).
This is a stupid, vindictive lawsuit that has zero chance of surviving a motion to dismiss. Maybe the deputies know this. They apparently had to shop around quite a bit to find an attorney to represent them, settling for someone who doesn’t seem to have much experience in IP law or personal injury litigation cases that don’t involve either car accidents or elderly abuse.
This case is going to get into unexplored areas of law that require expert guidance — not because the law needs to be better settled, but because it will take particularly deft maneuvering to keep the judge from spending most of their time expressing their displeasure and incredulity that a member of the bar would even bring this shit into their courtroom. Hopefully the deputies’ attorney has advised them the humiliation and ridicule is going to get a whole lot worse before it gets any better.
Rap artist Afroman’s biggest hit is “Because I Got High,” a track that details how his best intentions were undone by his weed intake. So, one might reasonably suspect marijuana might be found at his residence. But there’s very little that’s reasonable about what happened to Afroman four months ago.
Earlier this year, he became yet another statistic: a black person whose house was raided by heavily armed officers, all over the supposed existence of drugs and paraphernalia. But it’s not just about the raid. It’s about the damage done, which goes beyond the door officers destroyed en route to finding almost nothing but some loose cash they decided to keep.
After the Adams County Sheriff’s Office conducted a raid on his Ohio property in 2022 with a warrant for drug trafficking and kidnapping, Afroman, real name Joseph Foreman, told VICE he lost out on gigs and felt angry and powerless. He channeled that energy into a pair of songs, “Lemon Pound Cake” and “Will You Help Me Repair My Door,” with music videos that feature actual footage of deputies smashing their way onto his property, rifling through his belongings, and checking out the baked goods sitting on his counter before they cut power to his personal security cameras altogether. Clips from Afroman’s music videos have since gone viral on TikTok. He was never charged with a crime, and maintains that the sheriff’s department stole $400 of his money that they seized during the raid.
Fortunately for Afroman, his cameras were rolling. From that unjustified invasion of privacy, he managed to salvage a viral video, which racked up more than a million views in nine days.
There are few things more satisfying then watching a bunch of dudes dressed for war blunder around a house with increasing frustration as they fail to discover any evidence of the alleged criminal acts they swore were happening in order to secure the search warrant.
Speaking of the search warrant, it’s wild. It not only accuses Afroman of drug trafficking, it claims he’s suspected of kidnapping.
I don’t think the Adams County Sheriff’s Office actually believes Afroman kidnapped anyone. This looks like someone got careless cutting and pasting boilerplate and forgot to delete the part that’s unrelated to the drug allegations the swearing officer pretended he had probable cause to pursue.
This raid is like countless others that occur daily across the nation. And it contains the same casual abuses officers engage in just as regularly. Like the decision to pocket the cash found in the pocket of one of Afroman’s coats… just because. Worse, the Sheriff’s Office pretended $400 of this money never existed, despite being caught on camera taking it. Here’s what Afroman had to say about that in his interview with Vice:
So, that precinct could not investigate itself, so they had a neighboring precinct do it. Now the neighboring precinct is saying it’s just a miscount, but it’s funny how somebody stole or they “miscounted” exactly $400.
Then there’s another common action taken by law enforcement officers during raids of private property: the controlling of the narrative by eliminating any recordings of their actions they can’t directly control. The officers eventually located Afroman’s home security cameras and disconnected them, leaving part of this search unrecorded. Here’s Afroman again, pointing out the obvious: unplugging cameras just makes cops look guilty as fuck.
According to America, police officers are the good guys. I figured a good guy would want to leave the camera going so he can verify the fact that he is a good guy. I know burglars and crooks and criminals and murderers, they spray paint the cameras. They want to take them down because they don’t want you to see who they are and what they’re doing. So I’m wondering, why is the good guy disconnecting the camera, taking away the verification that he is good?
The footage shows officers rifling through books of CDs, peering into the back of closets, struggling to maintain control of the entrance gate, drawing down on a cake already safely contained in a glass container, and otherwise doing a bunch of cop stuff. What it doesn’t show is the contraband found by officers looking for evidence of drug trafficking and kidnapping: a couple of joints, some (legal) hemp, and a vape pen. Not exactly the haul they thought they’d find. And not enough to sustain criminal charges since medical marijuana is legal in the state and recreational use decriminalized in Cincinnati, where Afroman resides.
Fortunately, there’s a permanent records of these cops and their actions. And it’s set to music, which makes it that much more enjoyable. What’s captured here isn’t an aberration: it’s standard operating procedure for cops all over the nation. It’s the casual abuse of power that’s rarely, if ever, punished by the agencies employing these sad excuses for public servants.
A good way to get yourself sued if you’re a law enforcement officer is to treat a heated Facebook post like it’s an actual crime. Law enforcement officers remain the most delicate of snowflakes, unable to let a citizens blow off verbal steam without effecting arrests for contempt of cop. This case involves digital contempt, but it was treated as though the plaintiff was up right in the deputy’s face and screaming.
Plaintiff Jon Goldsmith was attending an outdoor festival in Corning, Iowa when he saw deputies pull over Ed Avila for a supposedly faulty brake light. This turned out to be pretextual stop, as stops for minor traffic violations often are. This is from Goldsmith’s lawsuit [PDF], filed with the assistance of the ACLU of Iowa. (I will preserve the misspelling of brake light which, unfortunately, is found throughout the lawsuit.)
After informing Avila of the reason for the stop and asking for everyone’s identification, Dorsey informed Avila he would be having his partner, Deputy Evan Ruse, write a warning ticket to fix the break light.
Dorsey then told Avila that he would be running his K9 or “drug dog” around Avila’s vehicle.
Goldsmith watched as Dorsey tapped the bed of Avila’s pick-up right before his K9 jumped into the bed.
Dorsey informed Avila that the K9 hit on the truck.
At this point, Dorsey ordered everyone out of the vehicle and proceeded to pat everyone down and search the individuals.
Goldsmith then observed Dorsey make Avila and his passengers stand on the side of the road while Dorsey searched the vehicle.
Dorsey discovered no contraband or anything else of note in Avila’s vehicle but during the search, Dorsey kept uttering that he was getting a whiff of something.
At that point, Dorsey and Ruse gave Avila a ticket for the break light and told him that he was free to go.
As they began to walk towards the street festival, Goldsmith observed Dorsey and Ruse walk across the street and for reasons unknown and questionable to Goldsmith, Dorsey then body slammed a gentleman named Mike Arthur to the ground.
The fishing expedition that occurred at the Avila traffic stop — along with the perceived abuse of another witness of the stop — angered Goldsmith. As most of do, he turned to social media to express his feelings. He commented on the Adams County Sheriff’s Office’s post of Mike Arthur’s mugshot with this:
Ya when they run the drug dog round said car/truck and they make a fake claim the dog hit yes he hit after you tap where you want him to jump on then call it a hit and NOTHING shows up and they look like total fucking lying POS they/he gets pissed walks across main street and body slams THIS bystander that was giving them a hard time guess they dont have any balls to take shit talk they get BUTTHURT YES YOU DORSEY you fucking pile of shit hope this guy hires George and sues the county and you will be the 1st to go Dumbass Dorsey WHY you run the dog getting pulled over for so called fake claim you call a cargo light a brake light you STUPID sum bitch so why run the dog for a traffic stop of light out? THAT IS FUCKING BULLSHIT what reason? when you get shit canned i ll hire ya to walk my dog and PICK up his shit
It may lack eloquence but it does drive Goldsmith’s point home effectively: the traffic stop, the drug dog, the attack on Mike Arthur… all bullshit. And every word of this Deputy Dorsey-aimed rant is protected speech. And it’s the best kind of protected speech: criticism of the government as personified by the Adams County officer.
Neither Deputy Dorsey nor Sergeant Paul Hogan saw it that way. Unaware of the contours of the First Amendment — or perhaps just not caring — they filed a criminal complaint against Goldsmith for third-degree harassment.
Sergeant Hogan’s sworn statement in defense of this bullshit charge is inadvertently hilarious, as all-caps, verbatim recountings of personal slights often are:
ON 7-29-18 AT APPROXIMATELY 0330 JON GOLDSMITH MADE A THREATENING POST ON FACEBOOK IN WHICH HE SINGLED OUT CORY DORSEY MULTIPLE TIMES. IN THE FACEBOOK POST GOLDSMITH REFERRED TO DORSEY AS A “FUCKING PILE OF SHIT.” GOLDSMITH ALSO REFERED TO DORSEY AS A “STUPID SUM BITCH.” GOLDSMITH ENDED THE FACEBOOK POST WITH “WHEN YOU GET SHIT CANNED I’LL HIRE YOU TO WALK MY DOG AND PICK UP HIS SHIT.”
Unfortunately for these officers, the court and the plaintiff know the law better than they do. As Goldsmith’s lawsuit points out, there’s a case directly on point in that state’s top court saying this sort of criticism is protected by the First Amendment.
On September 21, 2018, Attorney Mailander filed a Motion to Dismiss the charges against Goldsmith as violative of the First Amendment.
Among other things, Mailander’s Motion cited to the case State v. Fratzke, 446 N.W.2d 781 (Iowa 1989), directly on point, in which the Iowa Supreme Court held that the state could not justify the same harassment charge Goldsmith was charged with against a motorist who wrote a letter to a highway patrolman who had stopped him for speeding, based on the letter’s statement that the officer was a “liar,” a “thief disguised as a protector,” that the arrest was “legalized highway robbery,” that the officer “just enjoys stealing people’s money so he can show everyone what a red-necked mother-fucker he is,” and expressing the letter-writer’s hope that the officer would “have an early and particularly painful death hopefully at the side of the road somewhere he’s robbing someone else.” As the Court explained, “[o]ur Constitution does not permit government officials to put their critics, no matter how annoying, in jail.”
The court agreed with Goldsmith’s motion and dismissed the charge. But some damage had already been done. After the charge was filed against him, Goldsmith emailed a screenshot of the post to his wife, deleted his post, and deactivated his Facebook account. He has steered clear of Corning, Iowa where the traffic stop he criticized took place, and saw a physician who noted Goldsmith’s anxiety and increased blood pressure.
The lawsuit also points out the Adams County Sheriff’s Office seems particularly susceptible to “mistaking” criticism for criminal acts. Deputies have arrested people for cursing at them and giving them the finger.
The lawsuit alleges false arrest and First Amendment retaliation. It seems pretty clear the deputies wanted to punish Goldsmith for lighting them up on Facebook and dug around until they found an abusable law to use against him. Unfortunately, Iowa’s harassment statute is pretty damn abusable:
Communicates with another by telephone, telegraph, writing, or via electronic communication without legitimate purpose and in a manner likely to cause the other person annoyance or harm.
So, there’s a couple of bars Goldsmith will have to clear. The first is not specific to Iowa. Courts have held for years that law enforcement officers aren’t expected to be experts in the laws they’re enforcing. Yeah, it makes very little sense, but I guess we don’t want our officers ruminating over appellate level splits on edge cases during “tense, uncertain, and rapidly-evolving” situations.
Then we have the law itself, which lends itself to the reading that people can be arrested simply for “annoying” law enforcement officers and Goldsmith’s Facebook post certainly fits the common definition of annoying.
The wild card is the court and whether it will recognize this for the retaliation it is. Deputies were briefly publicly shamed for turning a traffic stop into a roadside fishing expedition and — instead of doing nothing — they did this.
