A homeless couple filed a lawsuit against a small Missouri town on Monday, saying their constitutional rights were violated when they were ordered to leave.
Brandalyn Orchard and Edward Gillespie were standing on a street corner in Miner, Missouri on Sept. 26, Reuters reported. The couple was holding a sign that said "Traveling. Anything helps. God Bless." Police told the couple they were violating town mandates against loitering, vagrancy and begging. The police showed the couple copies of the laws and threatened to arrest them if they did not leave town, Reuters reported.
The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit on the couple's behalf. The lawsuit said the mandates the police cited are false. Orchard and Gillespie, who are from Missouri, are seeking unspecified reparations along with an injunction to stop Miner, a town of 980 residents, from practicing unconstitutional "policies and customs," Reuters reported.
"The ACLU is stepping in because it is especially egregious when police try to intimidate those who are least likely to have the resources to defend their rights," Reuters reported.
"The police are our first line of defense and we entrust them with the ability to arrest, but in return we need some checks and balances," said ACLU of Missouri Executive Director Jeffry Mittman in a press release, Reuters reported.
Mittman told Al Jazeera America it's not illegal for someone to be homeless, stand on a street corner and ask for help in Missouri.
"Similarly, people have he right to convey a message," he said.
As for the laws the police said the couple violated, Missouri ACLU Attorney Anthony Rothert said it's not clear where they came from. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled over thirty years ago that laws against homelessness were unconstitutional, he told Reuters.
Miner defense attorney Joe Fuchs declined to comment to Reuters. The lawsuit did not identify the two police officers involved.
