LOS ANGELES Today civil rights groups filed in the Superior Court of the State of California to expand Williams v. State of California, the landmark education lawsuit to ensure that all public education students in the state be provided with the bare minimum tools necessary for educational success. Since the lawsuit was filed in May, on the 46th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education , the ACLU has fielded hundreds of calls from parents, teachers, and students interested in getting involved in the case. Plaintiffs representing 28 new schools spanning the state from Watsonville to Long Beach have joined the case, bringing the total number of schools represented by named plaintiffs to 46.

"This case has become the centerpiece in a movement committed to realizing the promise of public education for all," said Ramona Ripston, Executive Director of the ACLU of Southern California. "The students, teachers, and parents who have participated in advancing this case are committed to making public education work in every community, for every child. Creating a truly equitable and sound public education system is one of the fundamental civil rights challenges we face today."

Students, parents, and teachers from the newly added schools, almost all of which serve communities of color, economically struggling communities, or immigrant communities, reported a long list of substandard conditions at their schools, including a lack of textbooks and basic instructional materials in core courses; shortages of trained, permanently assigned teachers; overcrowding and shortages of classroom spaces; unsafe and unsanitary school conditions; buildings in poor repair, and a host of other conditions that impede learning.

"For the children attending the nearly 150 schools named in the lawsuit," said Mark Rosenbaum, legal director of the ACLU of Southern California, "the three R's of education are too often rats, rot, and remiss."

"On the day the Democratic National Convention takes up the issue of education," said Rosenbaum, "the only response to the fierce realities disclosed in our suit from the California leaders who are charged with assuring that all children receive the bare essentials necessary to secure equal educational opportunity has been to dodge responsibility."

The suit is brought by the ACLU affiliates of California, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Public Advocates, Inc., Center for Law in the Public Interest, Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights, Morrison & Foerster LLP, the Asian Pacific American Legal Center, Professors Karl Manheim and Alan Ides, Peter Edelman of the Georgetown University Law Center, and Robert Myers of Newman. Aronson. Vanaman.

LOS ANGELES - The ACLU of Southern California won a temporary restraining order today to stop the Los Angeles Police Department from continuing its pattern of harassment and intimidation of protesters. Judge Dean Pregerson enjoined the LAPD from:

"1. Seizing from the Convergence Center or destroying any puppets or printed material; 2. entering the Convergence Center on the basis of purported administrative violations, including building and safety, zoning, and fire code violations, in the absence of a prior order issued by this court."

"The Court's order sends a clear message," said ACLU of Southern California staff attorney Dan Tokaji, "that the Constitution will not be suspended because the Democratic National Convention is in town."

The ACLU of Southern California won a key victory this week in its challenge to the Constitutionality of California Penal Code ﾌ_148 6, which makes it a misdemeanor to knowingly file a false allegation of misconduct against a peace officer. The statute has frequently been used to discourage people from filing complaints, as it was in the case of La France Hamilton, an African American man who was attacked by police officers last year during a bicycle traffic stop and who later tried to file a complaint at the San Bernardino Police Department. The watch commander threatened Hamilton with criminal prosecution under Section 148 6, and Hamilton decided not to file.

"This law, which was held unconstitutional by the court today, treated complaints against police officers differently from other types of complaints," said ACLU of Southern California staff attorney Dan Tokaji. "The court's ruling sends a clear message. The people have a right to complain about police abuse without fear of criminal prosecution. Mr. Hamilton's case demonstrates that when states try to create exceptions to the U.S. Constitution, they expose their residents to grave dangers and serious abuses. The law blocks citizen complaints and frustrates the mechanisms by which police are held accountable to the communities they are supposed to serve."

Judge Robert Timlin denied the City of San Bernardino's motion to dismiss portions of the ACLU's complaint, observing that, "California courts have noted the dramatic impact peace officers tend to have on the public and the great potential for social harm if power by peace officers is abused...Debate on public issues and criticism of peace officers, just as with other public officials is speech 'at the very center of the constitutionally protected area of free discussion.'"

In a similar case, Gritchen v. Collier, the ACLU of Southern California succeeded in challenging the civil twin of this statute, which allowed peace officers to make defamation claims against those who file citizen complaints against them. That decision is on appeal.

Judge Timlin found that, "Section 148 6 impermissibly discriminates on the basis of the content of the speech which it criminalizes and, therefore, facially, violates the First Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause."