Today the ACLU of Southern California filed a class action lawsuit against the Los Angeles Unified School District, its Superintendent and Board of Education, the State Superintendent of Public Education, and the State Department of Education on behalf of children attending Rosemont Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles. The suit challenges school administrators' decision to conduct five separate classes (four classes of third-graders, and one class of second-graders) simultaneously in the Rosemont school auditorium, without sound barriers, floor-to-ceiling visual barriers or adequate space for learning and safety. [click here to view a floor plan of the auditorium]

'Subjecting these young seven-to nine-year-old children to this learning environment denies the children their Constitutional right to a free, adequate and equal public education,' said ACLU-SC Executive Director Ramona Ripston. 'Given the deplorable conditions under which these classes are forced to operate, how can we reasonably expect these teachers and students to succeed? '

During the 1998-1999 school year, Rosemont Avenue Elementary School conducted three third-grade classes simultaneously in the school auditorium. Beginning last July, when the year-round school year began, and continuing to this day, four third-grade classes and one second-grade class, totaling five classes and one hundred students, are forced to coexist in the Rosemont Avenue Elementary School auditorium. Teachers had to ask for donations of cloth partitions to use to separate the classes. Unfortunately, those partitions provide no sound barrier between the classes. The students often cannot hear their teachers, each other, or school loud-speaker announcements because of the noise level in the auditorium.

'The days of the one-room schoolhouse ended with the last millennium. But at Rosemont, students are being warehoused, divided only by ramshackle partitions, as if education were taking place in a M.A.S.H unit,' said ACLU-SC Legal Director Mark Rosenbaum. 'This is the first case of its kind in the state, and we're hopeful that the school district will seek a quick resolution to ensure that these children are not denied the same educational opportunities that the majority of children throughout the state receive.'

'I want my daughter to be in a classroom like other third graders,' said Adrian Rios, the father of plaintiff Daisy Rios. 'The walls in the auditorium are not appropriate for the five classes. The children sometimes yell and everything is audible. Even when the children are just speaking normally in class, all they say can be heard.'

The suit alleges that the second- and third-grade children attending Rosemont Avenue Elementary School are being denied their right to equal protection of the law because they must learn under conditions that fall fundamentally below prevailing statewide standards. In addition, the suit will challenge the conditions of the school for having a racially discriminatory impact on these children, 99.5% of whom are children of color. Third grader Natalie Molina, on of the plaintiffs in the case, said 'I want to learn more because I don't want to go low, I want to go high ... to the next level.'

The ACLU is seeking to have the children placed in separate classrooms, where they will be able to hear their teachers, move around their room safely and take full advantage of their right to a quality education.

Catherine Lhamon, an ACLU-SC staff attorney, added, 'The children at Rosemont, 99.5% of whom are children of color and more than 90% of whom receive free or reduced priced meals, are the forgotten children in our state. Through this lawsuit, the ACLU seeks to make the state and the school district remember these children, and be accountable to them.'

The ACLU of Southern California today announced the filing of a legal action to prevent the City of Los Angeles, including officers from the Los Angeles Police Department and Recreation and Parks Department, from interfering with the activities of Food Not Bombs, a group dedicated to raising public awareness of homelessness, hunger, and poverty in Los Angeles by providing food to some of the city's most needy residents.

In December, 1999, Los Angeles authorities arrested eight people for exercising their basic rights to expression and association in downtown's Pershing Square Park. On December 26, 1999, six volunteers from Food Not Bombs were arrested as they attempted to provide free food to the homeless in Pershing Square. The six were arrested after they refused to move from the area where they have served food for the past two years to a less visible part of the park. None of the volunteers were blocking access to any park facility. In addition to the six volunteers arrested that evening, another individual - who was not feeding people and is not a member of Food Not Bombs - was arrested simply for videotaping the actions of officers of the Los Angeles Police Department and Park Rangers in Pershing Square. These seven arrests followed the arrests of another Food Not Bombs volunteer the previous Sunday, December 19, 1999, also for feeding homeless people and for speaking out on their behalf. As a result of these eight arrests, Food Not Bombs and its members have already been forced to curtail their speech and feeding activities in Pershing Square.

'The holiday season is traditionally a time for giving to those who are homeless and needy,' said ACLU attorney Daniel Tokaji. 'Unfortunately, this year, the city of Los Angeles has instead taken something vital away from its neediest residents: not only the food they depend upon, but also their voice. Our request for a temporary restraining order is an attempt to ensure that 'Food Not Bombs' can continue to feed homeless people and speak out against poverty and hunger without fear of being arrested.'

Today the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals denied a petition to rehear arguments in a pivotal case involving the alleged policies of Los Angeles Police Department and Santa Monica Police Department officers to interrogate suspects 'outside Miranda' despite the suspects' invocation of their right to remain silent and their requests for an attorney. The case is California Attorneys for Criminal Justice v. Butts (U.S. District Court for the Central District, Case No. 97- 56499). The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, along with Boalt Hall professor Charles Weisselberg, had argued successfully that police officers were not free to ignore a suspect's assertion of Miranda rights whenever they chose.

ACLU Legal Director Mark Rosenbaum praised today's Appeals Court ruling, declaring that, 'the failure of the Los Angeles and Santa Monica Police Departments to secure even a single vote from any Ninth Circuit judge in support of their petition for rehearing is a stinging repudiation of their efforts to subvert the Supreme Court's mandate in Miranda. Apparently, respect for the Constitution was not on the LAPD or SMPD's list of New Year's resolutions and despite the almost daily revelations in the Rampart scandal, neither department has sought reform in any meaningful way. In any case, the Ninth Circuit has decreed that when a suspect invokes the right to remain silent, the LAPD and SMPD must remain silent, too, prohibited from the coercive tactics to extract confessions they had come to rely upon.'

The initial suit was brought on behalf of James McNally and James Bey, each of whom repeatedly asked for a lawyer during interrogation. But police disregarded their requests, continuing to ask questions while falsely assuring the suspects that because they had requested counsel, nothing else they said could be used against them. Filed in December, 1995, the suit sought to redress the deprivation of defendant's rights, privileges and immunities arising under the Fifth, Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments. The lawsuit challenged the common police practice of continuing to conduct interrogations of suspects even after they have clearly invoked their right to silence or their right to consult with an attorney.