Can police remove lawn sign protesting police brutality?

Answer

As to your specific question about whether police could properly object to a sign in your front yard, laws restricting what kinds of signs residents could place on their property have sometimes been struck down as unconstitutional (depending on the specific law at issue). The question is generally whether the restriction is based on the content of the particular sign or is instead content-neutral (e.g., a restriction on all signs of a particular size). In this case, it sounds like there may not be a anti-sign law at issue, and that instead the police may have objected to the sign because it communicated something about the incident you mention.

Speaking very generally, there are few situations in which it is unlawful to truthfully communicate information on your own property. Whatever justification the police gave for objecting to the sign might give you a starting point for evaluating whether there is any possible legitimate grounds for the objection.

It sounds as though you are dealing with some very serious issues that may call for attention by an attorney who could give you specific legal advice or by non-legal professionals. If you have not already done so, you might want to try contacting the California State Bar’s Lawyer Referral Services to locate an attorney who might be able to assist you with the underlying issues you are dealing with

Other organizations that might be able to offer useful information or help include RAINN (http://www.rainn.org/) and the National Police Accountability Project (http://www.nlg-npap.org/).