Suer of Little Rock says revised city ban infringes rights

Access to officials still limited

Nearly three weeks after a federal judge declared that the city of Little Rock was violating the First Amendment by extending a ban blocking a neighborhood activist from city buildings, the ban has been revised.

But the activist, Luke Skrable, still isn't happy.

He contends that an Aug. 6 revision of the ban -- giving him access to more city buildings, but still not to City Hall, the Department of Public Works and other city buildings downtown -- constitutes a continued violation of his rights under U.S. Magistrate Judge Beth Deere's July 25 order.

The revision, filed in court Aug. 7 by City Attorney Tom Carpenter, says Skrable will be granted permission to enter all city-owned buildings and property in 90 days, on Nov. 4, as long as he hasn't been arrested for a violent crime, made any reported threats to any city employee or official, caused any damage to public facilities or harmed anyone by violating a city ordinance or policy.

If the ban isn't lifted Nov. 4, a new review based on the same conditions will occur in another 90 days, and reviews will be repeated every 90 days until the ban is lifted altogether.

Skrable, an outspoken member of the Merrivale neighborhood off Baseline Road in southwest Little Rock, said the current restrictions, even if relaxed from a total ban, still prohibit him for at least the next three months from attending city Board of Directors meetings, which occur at City Hall, and expressing his concerns about city issues to the board.

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He said he also suspects the city will find a way to extend the ban another 90 days come November.

"If I spit on the sidewalk, they can ban me for another three months," Skrable said.

He said Friday that he is weighing his next move. He indicated that simply waiting quietly until Nov. 4 is not an option, but he first wants to see if a 41-page stack of documents he filed Aug. 7, after the case was closed, will prompt any action from the judge.

A series of emails contained in the filing shows that Little Rock attorney Ed Adcock, who represented Skrable in a July 17 nonjury trial before Deere, became exasperated with Skrable on July 28 and quit.

According to the documents, Adcock told Skrable that his refusal to "lay low and give me time to work out an agreement with the city" was the last straw in their contentious relationship -- "So, I quit."

Previous emails indicated that Adcock agreed with Skrable that the revised ban wasn't sufficient to protect Skrable's First Amendment rights and that he had been working with Carpenter to resolve the situation, but then Skrable emailed a "rant" to Carpenter directly, interfering with the process.

Adcock told Skrable, "All things considered, you've rendered your case [unwinnable] and I'm not going to continue to sink money and time into it."

The half-day trial in July stemmed from a lawsuit Skrable filed after City Manager Bruce Moore imposed a ban preventing Skrable from entering any city buildings for a year.

That ban was put in place after Skrable sent an angry email to Moore on the night of Jan. 20, 2015. Earlier that evening, Mayor Mark Stodola had refused to let Skrable address the city board on a topic that Stodola said he believed had already been discussed by the board two weeks earlier.

Skrable argued that Stodola simply didn't want other board members to hear him criticize Stodola, but Deere disagreed.

The initial yearlong ban grew to two years after Skrable was convicted in July 2015 of misdemeanor counts of terroristic threatening for the email he sent to Moore and a voice message he had left in September 2014 for a Public Works employee, and he then lost an appeal of the convictions. The appeal resulted in an order that the ban remain in place throughout Skrable's probation.

In March of this year, Moore extended the ban for another year, which Deere said was a violation of Skrable's First Amendment rights. But she also said Moore wasn't liable for the constitutional violation because he was protected by qualified immunity, which "gives government officials breathing room to make reasonable but mistaken judgments."

In her July 25 order declaring that Skrable's rights had been violated, but clearing Moore of any liability, Deere said the continuing ban "is not narrowly tailored" to a governmental interest "and does not provide adequate alternatives for Mr. Skrable to exercise his First Amendment rights."

The judge's order also directed the city to "craft a narrowly tailored ban going forward with meaningful reassessment of the danger Mr. Skrable poses to the safety of City personnel."

In the 2015 email to Moore, Skrable had written, among other things, that "your days are numbered," which Skrable later said was simply a reference to Moore's days in public office. Skrable testified that he has never intended to cause physical harm to Moore, with whom he'd had several disputes dating back years.

Moore testified that he couldn't be sure of Skrable's motivation and that he imposed the ban in an effort to protect himself, his family and city government workers.

Carpenter confirmed Friday that the revised ban, which became effective Aug. 6, remains in place. Carpenter said the revised ban is designed to keep Skrable out of City Hall and the Public Works Department, because that's where the people Skrable threatened in 2015 have offices.

Skrable, however, noted that the ban doesn't single out just those two buildings.

It says, "Effective Aug. 6, 2017, Mr. Skrable will be allowed to enter buildings owned by the City of Little Rock and to come onto City properties, with the exception of any such buildings or properties that are located downtown. This includes, but is not limited to, Little Rock City Hall."

The emails contained in Skrable's Aug. 7 filing, including those between Carpenter and Adcock, between Adcock and Skrable, and between Skrable and Carpenter, indicated that because the court has closed the case, the judge may not take any further action on it, such as responding to Skrable's filing.

"I can always file another complaint, but I don't think that's going to have to happen," Skrable said Friday. "This case is not over. I can tell you that. They have violated my constitutional rights, and they're still doing it."

Metro on 08/14/2017

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