On Oct. 7th, 2006, the PA State Police illegally but successfully shut down our free speech on the dohertydeceit.com message board by contacting the board server and advising them (by fax only) that a criminal investigation was being pursued against certain posters on that board, and requested that the entire board be shut down. The server complied. In Dec. a federal lawsuit was filed for violation of constitutional rights, and the ACLU entered an appearance on behalf of the website owners, myself and my husband. We were successful in obtaining an injunction against the State Police enjoining them from interfering again with the message board without proper due process. The board is up and running again. The supposed criminal investigation has been dropped. In fact, the police report stated that there was not enough evidence or information to continue it. Of course, this determination was made after the damage had been done. And, the alleged victim of the posts was not even interviewed by the police until 10 days after the board was shut down.

The PA State Police acted in conjunction with several local officials and private persons to shut down the entire message board without following due process for such action. Legally, they should have obtained a court order which would authorize their request for IP information about the individual perpetrator, which person they then could have attempted to have charges filed against, while not infringing upon the rights of hundreds of other posters' free speech rights. They didn't do that. That was wrong, and illegal. While we have the injunction in place now, the litigation continues.

It is interesting to note that the website www.dohertydeceit.com focused on the misconduct of the current mayor of Scranton, and exposed corruption and pay to play politics. The attendant message board, "Scranton Political Times" contained over 3.000 posts from over 300 registered users, was shut down just prior to a hotly contested and debated mayoral race. Coincidence? The posts complained of related to one public official who was hired by the mayor for the OECD director's position. That public official has repeatedly refused to provide information to city council requests and public requests for information that should have been available under the Right to Know Act, among other things. Posters on that board were intensely interested in why this official would refuse to cooperate in the public's best interests. Is it illegal or contrary to free speech rights to inquire of an official's motivations for such misconduct? For more info, check out the website, there is a link to the story.

This is scary stuff, folks. For public officials and private citizens to have such influence over the State Police as to have them act without due process for suppression of constitutional rights is an indication that 'big brother' is alive and well.  Free speech is fundamental to our political system and thereby protected by the constitution. In years of late, internet anonymous free speech has been highly protected with several cases making it to the Supreme Court and decisions handed down that unequivocably preserves free speech on the internet.