State v. Rose

335 N.E.2d 758, 44 Ohio Misc. 17, 73 Ohio Op. 2d 77, 1975 Ohio Misc. LEXIS 91
CourtToledo Municipal Court
DecidedApril 21, 1975
DocketNos. MCR-74-14905, 14096, 15121
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 335 N.E.2d 758 (State v. Rose) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Toledo Municipal Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Rose, 335 N.E.2d 758, 44 Ohio Misc. 17, 73 Ohio Op. 2d 77, 1975 Ohio Misc. LEXIS 91 (Ohio Super. Ct. 1975).

Opinion

Gabeibl, J.

This ease is before the court upon a motion to dismiss, the stipulated facts, the brief of defendant in support thereof and the answer brief of the prosecution in opposition thereto.

The defendant is charged with disorderly conduct under R. C. 2917.11 (A) (2), by an affidavit or complaint which states, in part, that “on or about the 9th day of November 1974 * * * one Richard C. Rose # * * did recklessly cause inconvenience and annoyance to persons in the Eranklin Park Mall in front of the Albert’s store by boycotting the said store and asking persons not to buy at their said store * #

This section of the Revised Code reads, in part, as follows:

“(A) No person shall recklessly cause inconvenience, annoyance or alarm to another, by doing any of the following:
C( * # *
“(2) Making unreasonable noise or offensively coarse utterance, gesture, display, or communicating grossly abusive language to any person; ’ ’

It is patently obvious that the complaint in question does not state the essential facts constituting an offense as required by Crim. R. 3. By no stretch of the imagination can the facts alleged fall within the purview of R. C. 2917.11 (A) (2) as the activity proscribed therein. In so ruling it is not necessary to inquire into the question of whether or not this section is per se too vague to be constitutional. Whatever is meant thereby certainly does pot encompass the activity actually described in the complaint.

Moreover, it is clear that, as worded, the complaint is too vague to meet the constitutional standards of due process under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U. S. Constitution and Section 10, Article I of the Ohio Constitution. In the charging document, the defendant should be apprised of an offense clearly definable by the facts alleged and, if proven, which would warrant his conviction. See Lerch v. Sandusky (1926), 23 Ohio App. 109, 155 N. E. 393.

[19]*19The motion to dismiss as to the charge of disorderly conduct is therefore found well taken and granted. It is not necessary to pass upon the additional contention of defendant that, as applied, this charge would deny him of his right to free speech protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U. S. Constitution.

Defendant, however, raises this latter argument in respect to two charges of criminal trespass brought against him under R. C. 2911.21 (A) (4), which reads, in part, as follows:

“(A) No person, without privilege to do so, shall do any of the following:
<< # # #
‘ ‘ (4) Being on the land or premises of another, negligently fail or refuse to leave upon being notified to do so by the owner or occupant, or the agent or servant of either.”

These charges, according to the stipulated facts, grew out of incidents occurring at the Franklin Park Mall located at Monroe Street and Talmadge Road in the city of Toledo, Ohio. This shopping center is a privately owned large complex housing approximately 100 stores under a huge, enclosed mall area. Access to the enclosed mall is gained by mads leading off the aforementioned two major thoroughfares (Monroe and Talmadge) over some 500 feet of parking area to the mall itself.

On each of the two occasions, resulting in these two charges of criminal trespass, Richard C. Rose, the defendant, was peacefully distributing handbills or leaflets to passers-by in the enclosed area of the mall directly in front of the entrance to Albert’s Ladies Wear and not blocking ingress or egress thereto. The sole subject matter of these handbills was directed to a labor dispute which existed between Albert’s and Amalgamated Clothing Workers of .America, AFL-CIO, and the distribution was to publicize 'this fact and to exhort the recipients to not support law breakers by shopping at Albert’s. Also enumerated were the eight unfair labor practices of which Albert’s had been found guilty by an Administrative Law Judge of the National Labor Relations Board. On November 8, 1974, and [20]*20again on November 15, 1974, while engaged in this activity, Rose was ordered to cease by an off-dnty deputy sheriff acting as an agent for the mall. When Rose refused to leave or cease distributing these handbills he was placed under arrest on each occasion for criminal trespass.

The court finds on authority of Marsh v. Alabama (1946), 326 U. S. 501, Amalgamated Food Employees Union Local 500 v. Logan Valley Plaza (1968), 391 U. S. 308, Lloyd Corp. v. Tanner (1972), 407 U. S. 551, and Central Hardware Co. v. NLRB (1972), 407 U. S. 539, that defendant’s motion to dismiss is well taken and granted. A review of the impact of these decisions and the standards evolved therefrom clearly makes the prosecution of the defendant for criminal trespass a violation of his right to free speech as protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U. S. Constitution.

Also directly in point and providing an excellent analysis of the foregoing U. S. Supreme Court decisions is the case of Handen v. Colorado Springs, No. C 459, October 7, 1974, 88 LRRM 2203, decided by the Colorado Supreme Court.

The U. S. Supreme Court early established that this type of activity and peaceful picketing, as well, could not be abridged on the ground that title to the property was owned by the municipality. Lowell v. Griffin (1938), 303 U. S. 444; Hague v. C. I. O. (1939), 307 U. S. 496; Schneider v. State (1939), 308 U. S. 147; Jamison v. Texas (1943), 318 U. s; 413.

•However, it was in Marsh v. Alabama, supra, that the U. S. Supreme Court first enunciated that private property may, for First Amendment purposes, be treated' as public property.

Logan Valley Plaza, supra, extended the doctrine in Marsh, supra, to a shopping center holding that, under the circumstances, a shopping center was clearly the functional equivalent of the community business block involved therein, and was therefore imbued with public attributes for First Amendment purposes.

Lloyd Corp., supra, further refined this doctrine to in-[21]*21(ánde two additional criteria: (1) The message sought to be conveyed must be directly related to the purpose to which the property is put; and (2) there must be no other reasonable opportunities available upon public property for conveying the message to the intended audience. This resulted from the activity involved which was anti-war protests at a shopping center. The TJ. S.

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Related

State v. Burgun
359 N.E.2d 1018 (Ohio Court of Appeals, 1976)

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Bluebook (online)
335 N.E.2d 758, 44 Ohio Misc. 17, 73 Ohio Op. 2d 77, 1975 Ohio Misc. LEXIS 91, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-rose-ohmunicttoledo-1975.