The U.S. Supreme Court passed up an opportunity to safeguard the right to protest in refusing to decide if a demonstration leader could be sued for injury to a law enforcement officer perpetrated by a member of the protest. A police officer hit in the head by a rock or piece of concrete sued Black Lives Matter activist DeRay Mckesson claiming he was liable for “the reasonably foreseeable consequences of [his] one’s own negligent, illegal and dangerous activity.” (NBC News, April 15, 2024, by Lawrence Hurley)
Ian Millhiser in VOX, April 15, 2024, denounced the court’s decision writing that it torpedoed the right to mass protests in Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. The Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled earlier that the First Amendment did not apply where a defendant created “unreasonably dangerous conditions” that led to injury. The Supreme Court did not rule on the merits of the case so could revisit it in the future.