Free Republic

The American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia is urging the state police to ignore Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli's ruling that police can ask people about their immigration status during routine stops. The civil rights group argued that Cuccinelli's opinion lacks a legal foundation and presents constitutional and public policy problems. Cuccinelli issued the advisory opinion Monday at the request of state Delegate Robert G. Marshall. Rebecca K. Glenberg, legal director of the ACLU of Virginia, followed up with a letter to Virginia's police chiefs Thursday saying the opinion is legally flawed and should be disregarded. But so far, Virginia police...

Virginia’s Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell is catching flak from the ACLU because it does not like the fact that he has lifted the ban on police chaplains praying in Jesus’ name. Virginia’s former Democratic Gov. Tim Kaine had issued the ruling in 2008, and the ACLU gang charges that McDonnell is giving in to conservatives and Christians in revoking the Jesus ban. Well, maybe another former Virginia governor influenced McDonnell—Thomas Jefferson. The author of Virginia’s famed Statute for Religious Freedom, Jefferson never tried to suppress Virginians’ or Americans’ free exercise of religion. In fact, as president in 1802, Jefferson invited...

ACLU pushes prison to stop cutting out Bible passages included in letters from the outside.

The Virginia Citizens Defense League is used to fighting for the right to carry guns. But now it's having to defend the right to wear stickers about carrying guns. The group says officials at the Richmond Coliseum recently attempted to stop members from handing out blaze-orange "Guns Save Lives" stickers before an appearance by radio and television talk-show host Glenn Beck. "It's bad enough they're trying to trample the Second Amendment. Then you come and attack the First," President Philip Van Cleave said, referring to the U.S. Constitution's guarantees of the right to bear arms and to free speech. Dolly...

At one time, the American press was well-respected throughout the world. They earned that respect with hard work, honesty, and by reporting on important stories. Unfortunately, the MSM has abandoned all of those principles which has rendered them completely irrelevant. They now spend their time reporting on the latest drunken antics of celebrity tarts such as Britney Spears and Paris Hilton. The press now seems obsessed with whether or not Lindsay Lohan is still in rehab. Their other obsession is with the unproven and unscientific reports of global warming. Of course, they will still take time out from these issues...

RICHMOND, Va. — A Virginia high school student said she was asked by a teacher to cover up a lesbian-themed shirt or face suspension. Bethany Laccone, 17, said she was asked to cloak a logo of two interlocked female symbols while attending a class this month at I.C. Norcom High School in Portsmouth. She's a full-time senior at nearby Woodrow Wilson High School, where she has not faced a similar ultimatum. In a letter sent Thursday, the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia asked Norcom administrators to remove any mention of the incident from Laccone's records and agree not to...

ACLU Lawyer Convicted of Child Porn Possession Sentenced to 7 years in prison By Hilary White ALEXANDRIA, Virginia, September 11, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Charles Rust-Tierney, an attorney who served as the president of the Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) from 1993 to 2005, was arrested February 23, 2007 and charged with possession of child pornography. He pleaded guilty to one count of receipt of child pornography, was convicted and on September 8, was sentenced to seven years in prison. Tierney had downloaded and paid for what the judge called "abhorrent" child pornography including torture and sexual...

A former president of the Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union pleaded guilty Friday to federal child pornography charges. 51-year-old Charles Rust-Tierney entered his plea to one count of receipt of child pornography in US District Court in Alexandria. He had been indicted last month on one count each of receipt and possession of child pornography. Prosecutors say from March 2005 until October 2006, Rust-Tierney bought at least five subscriptions to child pornography Web sites and downloaded other illegal materials offered at additional cost. Rust-Tierney, who also coached Little League baseball in Arlington, has been in jail since...

A former Arlington County youth sports coach and civil rights lawyer who once headed Virginia's American Civil Liberties Union chapter was sentenced today to seven years in federal prison for buying child pornography that prosecutors labeled sadistic and masochistic. Charles Rust-Tierney, 51, pleaded guilty in June to downloading hundreds of pornographic images of children as young as 4. Authorities said Rust-Tierney used a computer in his 11-year-old son's bedroom to view the files, which included a six-minute video that depicted sexual torture of children, set to a song by the rock band Nine Inch Nails.

(AP) A man who for 12 years served as president of the Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union was sentenced to seven years in prison for downloading what authorities said was some of the "most abhorrent" child pornography they have ever seen. The prison term for Charles Rust-Tierney, 52, of Arlington, is one year less than the minimum sentence suggested under federal sentencing guidelines, and more than the five-year term defense attorneys wanted. Rust-Tierney said depression and "plummeting self-esteem" led him astray.

NEW ORLEANS -- Joe Cook has formally retired from the Louisiana American Civil Liberties Union after directing the state's chapter for more than a decade. Cook, who announced several months ago that he would retire at the end of June, is moving to Norfolk, Va. Monroe attorney and ACLU spokesman Charles Kincade said Cook will be remembered for standing up for the U.S. Constitution even when doing so was unpopular, especially in matters of separation of church and state. Cook has led several lawsuits to stop certain types of prayer in public schools or government meetings throughout Louisiana, most often...

McLEAN, Va. (AP) - Court records show a former president of the Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union is expected to plead guilty to charges stemming from child pornography possession case. A judge in Alexandria today scheduled a plea agreement hearing for 51-year-old Charles Rust-Tierney of Arlington. It was not clear what charges would be included in the plea agreement. A grand jury indicted Rust-Tierney earlier this month on one count each of receipt and possession of child pornography. According to federal sentencing guidelines, a conviction at trial on both counts could have resulted in a prison sentence...

Anderson Urrutia, 8, complained of a headache on Sunday night. Then his tummy started hurting. At 2:15 a.m., he walked into his parents' bedroom and asked if he had to go to school. "I don't want to get in trouble again," he told his mother. Anderson, a second-grader at Occoquan Elementary School, went to school on Monday with 5-year-old kindergartner Joseph Soriano after the two were not allowed to attend class Friday for wearing T-shirts that were deemed potentially disruptive by the principal. Printed in large blue letters with red trim, the T-shirts stated in Spanish "Latino Forever" on the...

Two Gideons International representatives were in the Robert S. Payne Elementary School cafeteria Friday alongside a table of small red Bibles. The two men had permission to be there from Lynchburg City Schools. Superintendent Paul McKendrick said city school policy requires students to give the Gideons representative a form signed by a parent before they can accept a Bible. Gideons representatives were scheduled to visit fifth-graders at Payne, Heritage, Sandusky and Perrymont elementary schools Friday, according to a school activity and events calendar posted on the Lynchburg City Schools Web site. The executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union...

RICHMOND -- Civil liberties lawyers have appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to allow a Wiccan priestess to offer prayers before a public board's meetings. Cynthia Simpson was turned down in 2002 when she asked the Chesterfield Board of Supervisors to add her name to the list of people who customarily open the board's meetings with a religious invocation. The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the suburban Richmond county. In their petition, received by the court yesterday, American Civil Liberties Union lawyers accuse the federal appeals court of trying to "obscure with legal smoke and mirrors" Chesterfield's...

RICHMOND -- Civil liberties lawyers have appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to allow a Wiccan priestess to offer prayers before a public board's meetings. Cynthia Simpson was turned down in 2002 when she asked the Chesterfield Board of Supervisors to add her name to the list of people who customarily open the board's meetings with a religious invocation. The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the suburban Richmond county. In their petition, received by the court yesterday, American Civil Liberties Union lawyers accuse the federal appeals court of trying to "obscure with legal smoke and mirrors" Chesterfield's...

The American Civil Liberties Union has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review a decision that allows the Chesterfield County Board of Supervisors to exclude a local witch from leading the prayer at open meetings. The ACLU of Virginia yesterday filed its petition with the court seeking to reverse a Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals decision, said ACLU attorney Rebecca K. Glenberg. "Our position is that the 4th Circuit did something really extreme in its decision," she said. "It held that it was acceptable for a government body to treat people differently because of religion." Cynthia Simpson, a witch who...

The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled a Virginia county can refuse to let a witch give the invocation at its meetings by limiting the privilege to clergy representing Judeo-Christian monotheism. Lawyers for Wiccan practitioner Cynthia Simpson planned to file a motion this week asking the full court, based in Richmond, Va., to review the three-judge panel’s decision. While the U.S. Supreme Court has limited government entanglement with religion in the past, the 4th Circuit’s decision relies heavily on a case in which the high court carved out separate and broader boundaries and guidelines for prayer at legislative...

Members of municipal bodies in Virginia will be able to say Christian prayers just before the beginning of their official meetings under a measure the General Assembly unanimously approved this session. The measure, sponsored by Delegate Robert D. Orrock Sr., creates a period for "meditation" immediately before an official government body is called to order. The measure also allows local government officials to invoke the name of Jesus Christ and say sectarian prayers without violating the separation of church and state. Mr. Orrock said the prayers will be protected by free-speech laws. "Under the First Amendment, you can say whatever...

Virginia Court Strikes Down Law Against Sex By Singles POSTED: 4:20 pm EST January 14, 2005 RICHMOND, Va. -- The Virginia Supreme Court on Friday struck down an archaic and rarely enforced state law prohibiting sex between unmarried people. The unanimous ruling strongly suggests that a separate anti-sodomy law in Virginia also is unconstitutional, although that statute is not directly affected. The justices based their ruling on a U.S. Supreme Court decision voiding an anti-sodomy law in Texas. "This case directly affects only the fornication law but makes it absolutely clear how the court would rule were the sodomy law...