SCOTUS Rejects BLM Organizer’s Bid to Avoid Liability for Cop’s Injury

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the appeal of a Black Lives Matter (BLM) organizer whom a lower court held liable for a police officer’s injury during a protest he organized.  Brianna Herlihy of Fox News reports that during a 2016 BLM protest in Baton Rouge, initiated by organizer Deray Mckesson, a police officer was hit in the head by a rock thrown by a protester, knocking out his teeth and leaving him with a brain injury.  The officer sued Mckesson who organized the event that resulted in his injury.

Specifically, the officer’s attorneys noted:   “The pattern was set: out-of-state protesters representing BLM fly into a town, gather, block a highway, engage and entice police, loot, damage property, injure bystanders, injure police. By July 9, 2016, when Mckesson organized the Baton Rouge protest/riot—he had no reason to expect a different outcome—police will be injured.”

Last June, the Fifth Circuit decided that the case could proceed because Doe (the unnamed Officer) had successfully alleged that Mckesson had “directed his own tortious activity” of creating unreasonably dangerous conditions. The appeals court also said he had “incited” violence by “organiz[ing] and direct[ing] a protest . . . such that it was likely that a violent confrontation with the police would result.”

The ACLU, representing Mckesson, argued that the lawsuit violated the First Amendment, and would “chill classic First Amendment-protected activity nationwide.”

In a separate dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor suggested that last year’s high court ruling in Counterman v. Colorado, an internet stalking case, could influence the lower court’s holding on the police officer’s lawsuit.