Judge rules in Wisconsin teen's favor after sheriff threatened jail over Covid post
A federal judge ruled that a Wisconsin sheriff violated free speech protections guaranteed by the first amendment when he asked a teen to remove an Instagram post about Covid-19 that “upset” local parents in March last year.
The teen, Amyiah Cohoon, and her parents sued the sheriff’s department after a deputy threatened to arrest family members if Amyiah did not delete an Instagram post which described her experiences when possibly infected by Covid-19. She was 16 at the time.
“Labeling censorship societally beneficial does not render it lawful,” wrote Brett Ludwig, a district court judge in Milwaukee. “If it did, nearly all censorship would evade first amendment scrutiny.”
According to Ludwig’s ruling, the post, made in mid-March 2020, was the subject of “numerous” calls to health and school officials in Marquette county. At the time, the county had not yet had a case of Covid-19.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/sep/27/wisconsin-sheriff-covid-teen-instagram-post
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