Sonya Olitsky v. Peter O'Malley

597 F.2d 295, 1979 U.S. App. LEXIS 15342
CourtCourt of Appeals for the First Circuit
DecidedApril 18, 1979
Docket78-1410
StatusPublished
Cited by17 cases

This text of 597 F.2d 295 (Sonya Olitsky v. Peter O'Malley) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the First Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Sonya Olitsky v. Peter O'Malley, 597 F.2d 295, 1979 U.S. App. LEXIS 15342 (1st Cir. 1979).

Opinion

BOWNES, Circuit Judge.

Plaintiffs-appellants Sonya Olitsky and Joyce Matthews appeal the decision of the district court, 453 F.Supp. 1052 (D.Mass. 1978), denying the injunctive and declaratory relief sought and dismissing their complaint. Plaintiffs brought their action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against defendants, Boston Police Officer Peter O’Malley, Boston Police Commissioner Joseph Jordan, and members, of the Boston Licensing Board, and the members of the Alcoholic Beverages Control Commission of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (ABCC).

Plaintiffs were employed as dancers and hostesses at the Naked I Lounge, which is located at 666 Washington Street in Boston, Massachusetts. Plaintiffs charged in their complaint that defendant officials deprived them of their first amendment right to freedom of speech, and their fifth amendment right to earn a living (deprivation of property without due process of law) via the fourteenth amendment by enforcing the so-called “mingling regulations” at the lounge. 1 Plaintiffs sought a temporary restraining order and permanent injunction against defendants and all others who might prevent them from mingling in the lounge. They also asked the district court to declare the mingling regulations and Regulation 21 of the ABCC 2 unconstitutional because they are vague and over-broad.

After conducting a one day hearing, the district court refused to grant the temporary restraining order. It ruled that plaintiffs’ claim against the ABCC was not justiciable and held that the challenged mingling regulations were neither vague nor overboard. The first and fifth amendment constitutional claims were dismissed.

At the outset, we summarize the pertinent facts. Both entertainers were paid a weekly salary for performing four dance acts per daily shift. Additionally, they earned a commission for each drink purchased by a customer for them between acts. 3 Olitsky testified that Ray Comenzo, the owner and manager of the Naked I Lounge paid the commission to her in cash and that she averaged about $50 per week in commissions. Olitsky explained that she earned the commission for “[sjocializing with the clientele,” which “entailed conversation and temporary companionship for those coming to the club.” Her primary *298 objective in mingling with the clientele was, of course, to get them to buy more drinks. Olitsky testified that Comenzo instructed her when she was hired that she was to socialize with customers, but that he forbade sexual solicitation, touching customers or permitting customers to touch her, taking money or giving out her phone number.

On March 4, 1978, Officer O’Malley and two other Boston police officers entered the Naked I Lounge and observed performers sitting with customers with drinks in front of them. The officers notified Comenzo of the mingling violations. Officer O’Malley testified that it was his practice to instruct the managers of licensees, including Comenzo, that the entertainers could not “sit with customers and solicit drinks, solicit sex, insinuate they’re going to give them sex, fondle them, kiss them, put their arms around them.” Olitsky testified that Officer O’Malley’s intervention prevented her from mingling with patrons on March 4, 1978, but that she recommenced these activities after that day.

Plaintiffs raise two issues on appeal. First, they argue that the trial court erred in ruling that the mingling regulations do not violate plaintiffs’ first and fourteenth amendment rights. 4 Second, plaintiffs maintain that the trial court erred in ruling that plaintiffs did not present a justiciable claim against the ABCC. We treat these in reverse order.

A. The Justiciability Issue

Plaintiffs’ contention that the trial court “failed to account for the established connection” between a violation of the Licensing Board’s regulations and the ABCC’s Regulation 21 puts the shoe on the wrong foot. The failure below was not that of the trial court, but belonged to the plaintiffs who failed to establish more than a speculative first amendment claim against the ABCC. 5 Plaintiffs’ attack on the ABCC for the mingling regulation is misdirected. As the trial court correctly perceived, “The A.B.C.C. acts to prohibit illegality, which is defined in terms of other statutes and regulations. It has not determined what constitutes mingling, but adopts the Licensing Board’s definition of an act prohibited by the Board’s authority.” Olitsky v. O’Malley, supra, 453 F.Supp. at 1056.

Plaintiffs point to the ease of Aristocratic Restaurant of Massachusetts, Inc. v. Alcoholic Beverages Control Commission (No. 1), - Mass. -, 374 N.E.2d 1181 (1978), appeal dismissed - U.S. -, 99 S.Ct. 58, 58 L.Ed.2d 96 (1978), in which the ABCC used Regulation 21 to sustain the Licensing Board’s suspension of a licensee’s liquor license for employee mingling. This, plaintiffs posit, sufficiently substantiates their claim of the “established connection” between a mingling violation and the harm that may be caused them by the ABCC’s possible future recourse to Regulation 21.

We do not view the ABCC’s past administrative action against the licensee in Aristocratic No. 1 or the mere existence of Regulation 21, 6 as adequate bases for these plaintiffs to meet the threshold requirement of an actual case or controversy. U.S. Const, art. Ill § 2; 28 U.S.C. § 2201. Plaintiffs have failed to show that the ABCC has caused or is likely to cause them a cognizable injury through Regulation 21. As the ABCC asserts, not every mingling violation reported to it by the Licensing Board triggers enforcement through Regulation 21.

Plaintiffs cite Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U.S. 601, 612, 93 S.Ct. 2908, 37 L.Ed.2d 830 *299 (1973), for the proposition that where first amendment rights are involved, the traditional rules of standing are relaxed. However, Broadrick speaks to the standing of a plaintiff to raise the issue of the facial overbreadth of a statute or regulation as it might infringe on the rights of the parties not before the court. In this case, plaintiffs challenge the constitutionality of these mingling regulations as applied to them. We do not doubt plaintiffs’ standing to challenge the mingling regulations, but we fail to see how their claim against the ABCC meets the threshold requirements of ripe-, ness. In Golden v. Zwickler, 394 U.S. 103, 110, 89 S.Ct.

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Bluebook (online)
597 F.2d 295, 1979 U.S. App. LEXIS 15342, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/sonya-olitsky-v-peter-omalley-ca1-1979.