Here's a shocking turn of events

[Czarina]

Police Apologize, Drop Charge Vs. Sheehan

Feb 01 7:10 PM US/Eastern

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By LAURIE KELLMAN

Associated Press Writer

 

 

WASHINGTON

 

 

Capitol Police dropped a charge of unlawful conduct against anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan on Wednesday and apologized for ejecting her and a congressman's wife from President Bush's State of the Union address for wearing T-shirts with war messages.

 

"The officers made a good faith, but mistaken effort to enforce an old unwritten interpretation of the prohibitions about demonstrating in the Capitol," Capitol Police Chief Terrance Gainer said in a statement late Wednesday.

 

"The policy and procedures were too vague," he added. "The failure to adequately prepare the officers is mine."

 

The extraordinary statement came a day after police removed Sheehan and Beverly Young, wife of Rep. C.W. "Bill" Young, R-Fla., from the visitors gallery Tuesday night. Sheehan was taken away in handcuffs before Bush's arrival at the Capitol and charged with a misdemeanor, while Young left the gallery and therefore was not arrested, Gainer said.

 

"Neither guest should have been confronted about the expressive T- shirts," Gainer's statement said.

 

Gainer added that he was asking the U.S. attorney's office to drop the charge against Sheehan. The statement also said he apologized to the Youngs and "share the department's plans for avoiding this in the future."

 

"A similar message has been left with Mrs. Sheehan," Gainer said.

 

For his part, Bill Young said he was not necessarily satisfied.

 

"My wife was humiliated," he told reporters. He suggested that "sensitivity training" may be in order for Capitol Police.

 

A foreign-born American citizen who was the guest of Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Fla., also was taken by police from the gallery just above the House floor, Hastings said Wednesday.

 

The congressman met with Gainer and House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R- Ill., about the incident.

 

"I'd like to find out more information," Hastings said in an interview, identifying the man only as being from Broward County in Florida. "He is a constituent of mine. I invited him proudly."

 

Sheehan's T-shirt alluded to the number of soldiers killed in Iraq: "2245 Dead. How many more?" Capitol Police charged her with a misdemeanor for violating the District of Columbia's code against unlawful or disruptive conduct on any part of the Capitol grounds, a law enforcement official said. She was released from custody and flew home Wednesday to Los Angeles.

 

Young's shirt had just the opposite message: "Support the Troops _ Defending Our Freedom."

 

The two women appeared to have offended tradition if not the law, according to several law enforcement and congressional officials. By custom, the annual address is to be a dignified affair in which the president reports on the state of the nation. Guests in the gallery who wear shirts deemed political in nature have, in past years, been asked to change or cover them up.

 

Rules dealing mainly with what people can bring and telling them to refrain from reading, writing, smoking, eating, drinking, applauding or taking photographs are outlined on the back of gallery passes given to tourists every day.

 

However, State of the Union guests don't receive any guidelines, according to Deputy House Sergeant at Arms Kerri Hanley. "You would assume that if you were coming to an event like the State of the Union address you would be dressed in appropriate attire," she said.

 

So there wasn't an offensive banner, or some attempt to disrupt the proceedings as we'd been led to believe before. I for one am shocked by this whole thing. While I totally agree that Sheehan is a few donuts short of a dozen, she's not the one looking stupid today.

[Azazello1313]

i doubt this would be coming out if one of the "offended" weren't a congressman's wife.

 

anyway, who are they trying to kid? we all know these keystone cops are really operatives in karl rove's thought police gestapo, under direct orders from the top to remove cindy sheehan and stifle her patriotic dissent.

 

also...if the rules against protest paraphenalia in congress are "unwritten", maybe somebody ought to write them. some things deserve a certain amount of seriousness and decorum.

[sundaynfl]

i doubt this would be coming out if one of the "offended" weren't a congressman's wife. 

 

 

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Sheehan was on the late news following her arrest. I saw or heard nothing about Beverly Young 's being asked to leave the gallery, until this morning's new's reports which focused mostly on Sheehan's arrest nad dismissal of charges.

 

When Young was asked to leave the gallery she left of her own free will, Sheehan on the other hand refuses to leave and gets arrested; getting the publicity she so desperately needs!

 

I completely disagree with the three of them being asked to leave and think it very Keystone Cop like! But it just shows who needs to be in the spotlight!

[Beaumont]

When Young was asked to leave the gallery she left of her own free will, Sheehan on the other hand refuses to leave and gets arrested; getting the publicity she so desperately needs!

 

 

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Well, no, Young was escorted to the hall at which time she publicly chewed out the officers and called them "idiots" ... Sheehan certainly did no worse, as no one of which I am aware has claimed that she resisted or even that she created a scene ... but Sheehan was (admittedly wrongfully) arrested and Young was not, even after berating officers ...

 

You have your facts wrong ...

[Randall]

Isn't a free sociey wonderful?

 

Last year during the election 16 year old high school students with John Kerry cards in heir wallets were a threat, now a grieving mother. Typical.

[H8tank]

http://www.moveshoot.com/forum/viewtopic.p...055fc283652940b

[sundaynfl]

Well, no, Young was escorted to the hall at which time she publicly chewed out the officers and called them "idiots" ... Sheehan certainly did no worse, as no one of which I am aware has claimed that she resisted or even that she created a scene ... but Sheehan was (admittedly wrongfully) arrested and Young was not, even after berating officers ...

 

You have your facts wrong ...

 

 

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Sheehan was taken away in handcuffs before Bush's arrival at the Capitol and charged with a misdemeanor, while Young left the gallery and therefore was not arrested , Gainer said.

 

Sorry Beau... I am just reading "the facts" from the story posted...

[Azazello1313]

Well, no, Young was escorted to the hall at which time she publicly chewed out the officers and called them "idiots" ... Sheehan certainly did no worse, as no one of which I am aware has claimed that she resisted or even that she created a scene ... but Sheehan was (admittedly wrongfully) arrested and Young was not, even after berating officers ...

 

You have your facts wrong ...

 

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dam bushuckse gestapo!!

 

 

[Czarina]

Florida Rep.'s Wife Says She Was Ejected From State Of Union

 

POSTED: 7:07 am EST February 1, 2006

 

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- The wife of Rep. C.W. Bill Young, R-Indian Shores, told a newspaper that she was ejected during the State of the Union address for wearing a T-shirt that says, "Support the Troops Defending Our Freedom."

 

Beverly Young told the St. Petersburg Times that she was sitting in the front row of the House gallery Tuesday night when she was approached by someone who told her she needed to leave.

 

She said she reluctantly agreed, but argued with several officers in an outside hallway.

In a telephone interview with the newspaper, Young said she told them her shirt wasn't a protest but a message of support.

 

Capitol Police Sgt. Kimberly Schneider said Young wasn't ejected from the gallery and she left on her own. She couldn't provide additional details.

 

Young's husband found out about the incident after Bush's speech and called it unacceptable.

 

Mrs. Young certainly did argue with the police outside the hall.

 

Where did you get that Sheehan refused to leave? I think this is an assumption that you're making that hasn't been reported anywhere.

[Beaumont]

2 ejections from House denounced

Capitol police chief apologizes to G.I.'s mom, lawmaker's wife

 

Marc Sandalow, Washington Bureau Chief

 

Thursday, February 2, 2006

 

Washington -- Anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan said she had just settled into her front row seat in the elevated public gallery surrounding the House of Representatives chamber awaiting President Bush's State of the Union address when a U.S. Capitol police officer noticed her T-shirt.

 

"Protester!" he yelled, before he "dragged me out of my chair, pinned my arm around my back, and roughly pushed me up the stairs," Sheehan told The Chronicle Wednesday.

 

The Vacaville woman said she was handcuffed, led to a holding cell just outside of the Capitol, transported to two facilities, accused of disorderly conduct and released roughly four hours later.

 

The T-shirt read: "2,242 Dead. How many more?"

 

Several hundred feet away, Beverly Young, wife of Rep. C.W. Young of Florida -- Republican chairman of the House Defense Appropriations subcommittee -- sat down in her seat about six rows from first lady Laura Bush when another officer noticed her T-shirt.

 

She also was told to leave the chamber, according to the St. Petersburg Times, and left voluntarily -- then argued once in the hallway.

 

"They said I was protesting," she told the paper. "I said, 'Read my shirt, it is not a protest.' They said, 'We consider that a protest.' I said, 'Then you are an idiot.' "

Her shirt read: "Support the Troops -- Defending our Freedom."

 

The rare ejections prompted Capitol Police Chief Terrance Gainer to apologize late Wednesday to both women and said charges would be dropped against Sheehan.

 

Nonetheless, the incident provoked angry reactions, threats of lawsuits, a demand for an investigation and several unanswered questions.

 

Why was Sheehan arrested and not Young? Why was either woman ejected?

A 1946 law prohibits demonstrations within any of the Capitol buildings. But a subsequent U.S. Capitol Police Board regulation clarified "demonstration activity" to include "parading, picketing, speechmaking, holding vigils, sit-ins, or other expressive conduct ... but does not include merely wearing Tee-shirts, buttons or other similar articles of apparel that convey a message."

 

And what sort of message does it send when visitors to the U.S. Capitol passively expressing a sentiment -- either in support of or opposition to the president -- are not allowed to observe the State of the Union address?

 

"The U.S. Capitol is not private property that belongs to the president, or even the speaker of the House, it belongs to the people," said Jamin Raskin, a constitutional law professor at American University in Washington who has discussed legal options with Sheehan.

"The great irony was that Bush was extolling the virtue of freedom and civility in America, at the same time the police were dragging Cindy Sheehan out of the chamber."

 

Gainer, the police chief, issued a statement late Wednesday taking responsibility for the ejections.

 

"The officers made a good faith, but mistaken effort to enforce an old unwritten interpretation of the prohibitions about demonstrating in the Capitol," Gainer said in a statement. "The policy and procedures were too vague. The failure to adequately prepare the officers is mine."

 

Gainer said he had asked the U.S. attorney's office to drop the charges against Sheehan. He explained that Beverly Young wasn't arrested because she initially had cooperated and left the House gallery voluntarily.

 

"Neither guest should have been confronted about the expressive T-shirts," Gainer's statement said.

 

Sheehan said she had no intention of disrupting Bush's speech and intends to sue for damages or an injunction preventing police from repeating their behavior.

 

"If I wanted to disrupt it, I would have waited until (President Bush) started talking," Sheehan said by phone from Los Angeles. "My shirt was a statement. I wasn't going to disrupt anything."

 

Sheehan, whose son Casey was killed in Iraq, gained attention last summer when she set up camp outside Bush's Crawford, Texas, ranch -- attracting dozens of supporters -- in the hopes of talking to him about the war. She has traveled the country protesting the war since then. She continues to seek an audience with Bush and was arrested outside the White House in a protest in September.

 

Sheehan was given a ticket to the State of the Union address by Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Petaluma, after attending an event sponsored by the Congressional Progressive Caucus to oppose the president's policies. Just last weekend Sheehan, attending the World Social Forum in Caracas, Venezuela, suggested she might challenge California's senior Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein in the June primary.

 

Sheehan said she had hoped that the television cameras might notice her and show her "2,242 Dead" shirt during the president's speech, but she doubted Bush would have been able to notice her from her elevated perch.

 

"Everyone in America should be appalled that that many were killed," Sheehan said Wednesday. "What's more obscene, me wearing the number, or that there is a number at all? My son is one of those numbers."

 

The White House did not comment on the incident, but there were numerous angry reactions to the ejections on Capitol Hill.

 

Young took to the House floor Wednesday to decry the removal of his wife.

 

"Because she had on a shirt that someone didn't like that said support our troops, she was kicked out of this gallery," Young said, displaying the gray shirt that had caused her trouble. "Shame, shame."

 

Rep. Pete Stark, D-Fremont, introduced a resolution calling for an investigation.

 

Woolsey insisted that Sheehan, "who gave her own flesh and blood for this disastrous war, did not violate any rules of the House of Representatives. She merely wore a shirt that highlighted the human cost of the Iraq war and expressed a view different than that of the president."

 

Although security is tight in the House and Senate chambers, ejections for merely wearing political statements are rare. A Pennsylvania man was ejected from the Senate chamber in 1999 during the impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton for wearing a shirt that read: "Bill Doesn't Inhale. He Just Sucks."