The California Supreme Court has ruled a California law that criminalizes the act of knowingly filing a false misconduct complaint against a police officer is unconstitutional, as the court said the law violates people’s constitutional right to free speech.
On Nov. 10, the court ruled 6-1 to strike down the law.
Justice Goodwin Liu was the lone dissenter to the majority’s decision.
The case landed in court amid a dispute between Los Angeles Police officers and the city of L.A. over the city’s move to no longer require people filing a police misconduct complaint to sign a statement affirming that they understood that filing such a report falsely could result in criminal charges.
The dispute over the state law has continued for years.
The law has been on the books for decades, enacted by lawmakers who at the time said they feared law enforcement in the state could be hampered by people filing false complaints against police officers, either out of retribution or a desire to otherwise harm their careers or the administration of the law, bogging police oversight agencies with the need to slog through knowingly false misconduct complaints, while still properly investigating genuine misconduct accusations.
In 2002, the California Supreme Court – with a different set of justices – upheld the law as constitutional. At that time, the court determined the state was allowed to “discriminate” against speech that could be classified under the umbrella of defamation, as it involved...
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