NPR: Cell Service Shutdown Raises Free Speech Questions

[Generic Other]

The shutdown of mobile phone service in San Fransisco Bay Area subway stations has constitutional experts hitting the law books.

Authorities for Bay Area Rapid Transit, or BART, blocked wireless signals in certain stations on Thursday in an attempt to prevent protests opposing the July 3 shooting death of Charles Blair Hill by BART police. Police say Hill came at them with a knife.

First Amendment scholars say they can't remember a time when a public agency in the U.S. moved to disrupt wireless traffic in quite that way. Now, they're trying to stretch old First Amendment principles to fit in the context of new technology.

One group that promotes electronic freedom compared the people who run BART to an authoritarian regime in Egypt, tweeting "BART pulls a Mubarak in San Francisco."

http://www.npr.org/2011/08/16/139656641/cell-service-shutdown-raises-free-speech-questions?ft=1&f=1002&sc=igg2

[MineralMan]

1. I think it clearly violates the 1st Amendment. No Question

in my mind.

[Generic Other]

2. They are using our cell phones agaiunst us in so many ways

GPS to spy, now this to silence. I disapprove as well.

[MineralMan]

5. My cell phone is always off, unless I'm making a call.

Nobody has the number. I consider it an emergency device. I know that others use theirs for many other things. My wife is a Blackberry person, and uses hers extensively for email, etc. If I'm at my desk, I'm available. When I'm not at my desk, I'm not. I have voicemail and email, and check both regularly. I've just never felt the need to be in communication wherever I am and whatever I'm doing.

I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

[truebrit71]

4. I'd have to agree with you...

..although shutting down the airwaves/cell networks is at the top of the list for the Feds if there is a "national emergency"....:eyes:

All I know is I don't like the idea of a company OTHER than my cell provider determining whether my phone works or not..

[global1]

3. What If.......

someone had an emergency and needed to use their cell phone during the time that the service was shut down? Couldn't that action endanger peoples lives? What about the telephone company providers of service. As their customer - I'm paying them. Could a third entity shut down the phone company's service? Wouldn't the phone company have a beef with the BART people? If BART could shut down cell service - what other companies have that ability?

The ramifications of this are scary.

[digitaln3rd]

6. Are we such spoiled children

That we can't go two minutes without a precious cell phones? Puh-lease... free speech questions? What a load of crap. Pretty sure it's BART's network, so they can do what they want to. I'm sure all those people will be just fine without their wireless for a couple of minutes.

[Occulus]

8. Pretty sure people are paying their cell providers and not BART

which makes it denial of service.

That's a crime, by the way.

Oh, and: I was just out of television, internet, AND phone service for two days because a strom knocked it all out and I didn't have a cell. I'll be getting a good one as soon as I can afford it. Had I had an emergency, I would have had NO way to call for help.

Never again.

[Generic Other]

10. The reason they shut it down makes it a free speech issue

They tried to squelch protests.

If they want to discontinue cell phone calls on BART altogether, it would not be a first amendment issue. There is a difference.

[EFerrari]

15. Um, no. The FCC is investigating what appears to be an illegal

interruption of service.

[MrDiaz]

7. although i do not agree

with what BART has done, nowhere in the 1st ammendment does it say everyone must have a phone in order to have free speech, if my little brother who is 14 isn't allowed to have a cell phone, are our parents directly violating his right to free speech, simple answer is NO.

[Occulus]

12. Sure sounds like you agree.

I don't agree, full stop. No mealy qualifications!

[MrDiaz]

13. I don't agree

Which i have previously stated, I'm just looking at facts, and my interpretation is that, No, it is not a violation of the first amendment. I may be wrong, so please can you tell me why it is a violation of the first amendment?

[Occulus]

18. Because BART is a public agency

and they did so explicitly to disallow speech with which they did not agree.

This could not possibly be more cut-and-dried as a 1A violation. The facts fit that interpretation.

Also, what BART did may have been actually illegal. As in, fines and jail time illegal: this was an unauthorized denial of service. People go to prison for that.

[elehhhhna]

22. and this is why you'd be a horrible attorney.

[Hosnon]

23. Well for starters, parents cannot violate the First Amendment.

It proscribes government action.

And this looks a lot like prior restraint (albeit not of a publication). I think BART is wading into dicey territory here.

[Ichingcarpenter]

9. China approves of America's and Britain's governmental answer to protests

Just do a search..... they really do

[MrDiaz]

11. so...

[Ichingcarpenter]

14. LOL....you welcome the new totalitarian order

to stifle free speech.

[EFerrari]

16. I have a pet theory about that shutdown.

BART has always been very conservative about their liability and when was the last time the FCC investigated any violation of civil liberties so promptly and loudly?

I tend to think that this was a federal deal, not a local one.

[Occulus]

19. You think BART may in fact have violated a more serious Federal law?

Denial of service is my guess. One does not want to run afoul of those laws, I know that much...

edit: more serious than a "maybe, maybe not" Constitutional violation, I mean.

[EFerrari]

20. No, I tend to think this was a joint operation between BART

and the Feds, specifically with the Secure Communities people. I could be wrong but BART has always been pretty conservative. An action like this shutdown leaves them open to all kinds of liability problems. Plus the way they mobilized to win pubic opinion is much better than they usually do -- they even produced videos that portray the prosters as rioters and all kinds of bs.

Plus, the FCC usually sits on its @ss over 1st Amendment issues. But I notice that their "investigation" is being widely promoted.

So that's my :tinfoilhat: for the day but I bet that's what we're going to find out down the road.

[WinkyDink]

17. It's a TSA World.

[pennylane100]

21. I said this on an earlier thread and inspite of criticism, I will say it again.

I think that having a protest with a plan to possible disrupt subway trains is a bad idea in a confined place like a BART station. I was a regular commuter for many years on the London underground, and rush hour traveling is no fun. I believe that there is a live electric line that runs along the tracks, or at least there used to be. I think that holding a demonstration there is dangerous.

I would not care if my phone were turned off to stop it. The demonstrators, so I heard, said that there may be some delays caused by their action. Many parents on tight schedules to pick up their children from after school care would be late, I did not hear any concerns for the rights. My daughter or her husband have to pick up the kids by a certain time and pay quite a nice fine if they are lat

I totally support the cause of the demonstration but I think it should be done responsibly. Picket BART offices if they are located in other areas picket police stations. I would have no problem joining such demonstrations, I just want the right not to be trapped in the middle of one, and being a little bit of a claustrophobic, not in enclosed spaces.