Sen. Craig: Hand Signals Protected Speech

Source: CBS News

Sen. Craig: Hand Signals Protected Speech
Seeking To Nix Guilty Plea, Lawyers Say Act Wasn't Criminal Since It Didn't Involve Multiple Victims

ST. PAUL, Minn., Jan. 8, 2008

AP) Seeking to have his guilty plea in a bathroom sex sting erased, the attorneys for Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho argue in a new court filing that the underlying act wasn't criminal because it didn't involve multiple victims.

An appeals brief filed Tuesday contends that Minnesota's disorderly conduct law "requires that the conduct at issue have a tendency to alarm or anger 'others"' - underscoring the plural nature of the term.

Craig's brief goes on to cite other convictions that were overturned because the multiple-victim test wasn't met. His lawyers apply the same logic to his case.

The Republican senator pleaded guilty in August after his arrest two months earlier at the Minneapolis airport. It was part of a broader undercover push targeting men soliciting sex in public restrooms.



Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/01/08/national/main3689686.shtml?source=mostpop_story

:spray:

the audacity of this man is astounding

Hey, people have the right to say whatever they want, whereever they want.

If he's hoping to stay in politics, that's a pipe dream.

Multiple victims were not involved (only one?) so it is ignorable?

:wow:

what the definition of S is????!!!:shrug:

Larry, time to maybe have a long talk with the wife and family... hang up the political hat. Take a long vacation. Look in the mirror and decide whether you want to be remembered as a coward-- or accept the plea, apologize to those you may have hurt, and move on. Do something constructive with your life, some charity work perhaps? There's still time.

1. Larry Craig is 100% Heterosexual, bangs his wife three times a day then beats up some sissys
2. But if Larry Craig did perchance proposition a male cop for whatever it is those guys do in bathroom stalls - it was free speech.

Yeah, okay.

Put me in the case and I'll make it plurals

its time for a guy with two first names dammit!!!

;)

:D :hi:

"Protected speech"?

This poor toad is beyond clueless.

mikey_the_rat

It doesn't have to require victims to be a crime. As far as the language "tendency to alarm or anger others" I bet the majority of the citizens in that area would be angry enough at anyone trying to have any kind of sex in the restroom. Especially considering that an airport restroom is more public than most other restrooms.

Too bad it isn't a crime for an attorney to be an annoying creep.

Maybe we should allow sex to be performed in a restroom and require the attorney to take his kids into the restroom and see what would be happening. I would love to have the prosecutor use that in his closing statement.

for luring men to that hotspot via lustful internet ads with "hot" pics of hot guys, and then busting them once they got there. What kind of policing is that?

What was in it for the airport cops? What gives them the right to conduct sleazy operations like this?

This was an alert warning posted on Craiglist in August, so it is doubtful these links still work:

href="http://minneapolis.craigslist.org/m4m/407334497.html">http://minneapolis.craigslist.org/m4m/407334497.html</a>

Caution: Airport Hookups on CL - 30
Reply to: <a href="pers-407334497@craigslist.org">pers-407334497@craigslist.org</a>
Date: 2007-08-27, 1:43PM CDT

FYI: Men on other sites have reported entrapment by police officers at the Minneapolis-Saint Paul airport using CL M4M, posing as online cruisers to arrange sex meets/hook-ups and then arresting the dude(s) who show up, typically at the shoe-shine T-room (men's room) in the main terminal.

Be very careful about hooking up with people who run ads for layovers or "fun at the airport." Not every man who posts on here looking for MSP action is a cop, but familiarize yourselves with your rights if arrested, and use common sense. Google "Lambda Black Book" for legal info on cruising and arrest.

The social consequences are increasingly severe. Men arrested for cruising are sometimes now charged, amazingly, with "sexual assault" and/or have to report, if convicted, as sexual predators for the rest of their lives. Ridiculous, reactionary, anti-sex, and homophobic, yes. But also now more and more a reality, even with the best attorneys (and even in a "progressive" state like MN).
...

And these are a few testimonials from a site called "Crusing for Sex" from guys who were busted:

Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport

New comments added June, 2007
<a href="http://listings.cruisingforsex.com/cfs/index.php?file=sp&p_id=145477">http://listings.cruisingforsex.com/cfs/index.php?file=sp&p_id=145477</a>
Just a heads up. I exchanged some messages on Craigslist about meeting a guy here, actually pretty tame exchanges. He told me what he was wearing and I sat in the stall next to him. When I showed him my cock, I got busted. I wont be doing that again, obviously.

<a href="http://listings.cruisingforsex.com/cfs/index.php?file=sp&p_id=145547">http://listings.cruisingforsex.com/cfs/index.php?file=sp&p_id=145547</a>
Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport

New comments added June, 2007

I just got busted here. Young white guy sitting in the stall, waiting for you to show cock and then he flashes his badge. I think he and his partner tag team. They cruise lots of sex sites looking for guys to set up.

<a href="http://listings.cruisingforsex.com/cfs/index.php?file=sp&p_id=145952">http://listings.cruisingforsex.com/cfs/index.php?file=sp&p_id=145952</a>
Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport

New comments added June, 2007

Twenty people were arrested within the past week. Plainclothes officers wait in the stalls and tap their feet and even put their foot on yours and then arrest you when you look under the stall wall. This is a very homophobic group.

<a href="http://listings.cruisingforsex.com/cfs/index.php?file=sp&p_id=150704">http://listings.cruisingforsex.com/cfs/index.php?file=sp&p_id=150704</a>

....

Anyway, 41 guys, if I recall correctly, took the bait and were busted. If they all pled guilty and paid $575 fines, like Craig, that makes, let's see: 41 times 575 makes how much? From one perspective, at least, all in all, not a bad haul.

Who's policing these police? Why are they engaged in this depraved behavior?

trigger an alarm in any public restroom in the Senate. In addition, a red lite should go on outside the restroom whenever he goes into a public restroom in the Senate. That would provide a warning to anyone to get out while they still had a chance especially if children are present.

Poor guy. Nobody will touch him with a ten foot pole. Sorry, had to do it.

lololol

specializing in gently humorous performance art--kind of like William Shatner or Bob Eucker. That's the only reason I can imagine why he keeps trying to keep this sordid incident at the forefront of the media.

Simply incredible. A week into the new year and already a nominee for Most Outrageous Moment of 2008.

So long as they only solicit one child at a time.

Slippery slope?????

His lawyers are really reaching with that one! That's got to be just about the lamest argument I've ever heard a professional lawyer make. :rofl: :rofl:

It is pretty pathetic. I wonder how much he's paying for such profound advice??

they pay them fot their political influence and judge shopping ability.

Why don't you have a seat over there?

Sounds like he's now admitting he did the hand signal thing, but his defence is that it's OK.

nt

Craig's earlier attempt to withdraw his plea was turned down by a district court judge, and the case is now before the Minnesota Court of Appeals.

Besides attacking the law he was prosecuted under, Craig's legal team argues that the hand signal allegedly used to communicate a desire to engage in sexual conduct would be constitutionally protected speech. They also say the plea is technically flawed because it lacked a judicial signature.

Patrick Hogan, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Airports Commission, which oversees the Minneapolis airport and which brought the charges, said he was confident the guilty plea will stand.

"Facts are resilient, and Sen. Craig's continued, transparent efforts to escape them don't change the truth of his behavior in an airport restroom or the fact that he admitted guilt last August," Hogan said.

Prosecutors have 45 days to respond, and then the case will be scheduled for oral arguments. Once heard, a ruling is required within 90 days.

Craig has said he will finish his term, which ends in January 2009.