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U.S. Supreme Court Rules that ExPolice Officers Pornographic DVDs not Protected Free Speech
The U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous ruling on December 6th that found a former police officer who sold pornographic DVDs of himself on eBay deserved no First Amendment protection.
The police officer was fired because the DVDs depicted him stripping off a generic police uniform and engaging in solitary sexual conduct.
The Supreme Court's ruling reversed the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' decision that the DVDs dealt with a matter of "public concern" and thus comprised expression entitled to constitutional protection. According to the Supreme Court, the expression at issue did not meet the threshold test for "public concern" that would trigger the balancing of interests test articulated in the Supreme Court's precedent of Pickering v. Board of Education.
The ruling is significant because it qualifies the notion of "public concern" as entailing "something that is a subject of legitimate news interest", and "of general interest and of value and concern to the public." This standard could significantly lessen the categories of speech afforded First Amendment Protection in the future; it is questionable, for instance, whether a gossipy website would constitute protected free speech by this standard.
For a copy of the decision, visit: