3 Outlaws file suit against Summerfest
Men say they were wrongly booted for wearing logo 
Summerfest smiley face, meet Charlie.
That's the nickname of the skull above a set of crossed pistons on the Outlaws Motorcycle Club patch that's at the crux of a civil rights lawsuit filed Monday by three of the club's members.
In the federal free-speech suit filed Monday against Milwaukee police and Summerfest, the Outlaws claim they wrongly were booted from the music festival July 2 because they refused to take off or obscure their "colors" showing the toothy logo.
The three, Chris Gunderson of Greenfield, Jack Daugherty of Elkhorn and Jim Sworske of Hubertus, were each issued $150 trespassing tickets by Milwaukee police and eventually left without incident.
Summerfest officials declined to comment on the lawsuit.
Milwaukee City Attorney Grant Langley said in a telephone interview that, from the police standpoint, it was a trespassing issue, and not a lofty First Amendment case.
Michael Hupy, the Outlaws' attorney, said, in fact, it was.
"After they paid admission and were admitted they were kicked out . . . for wearing their colors," he said at a news conference at the Summerfest gate, flanked by Gunderson, Daugherty and their Harleys. "We still have free speech in this country."
Hupy denied that, as some law enforcement officials have suggested privately, that the Outlaws purposely tried to get arrested.
He also challenged Summerfest to come up with other instances of anyone being bounced or cited for wearing gang logos at the festival.
Summerfest is run quasi-publicly; the city-owned land is leased by Milwaukee World Festival Inc. Nevertheless, Hupy said, "It's a public event."
Daugherty, who produced his combat medals from his Army tour in Vietnam, said police humiliated him when they told him to take off his colors in front of 15 friends.
"I fought in Vietnam," he said. "I have a right to be in this place."
J.D. Davies, an Outlaws member also at the news conference, but not party to the lawsuit, said that it was just the latest in a long string of harassment of Outlaws by law enforcement. He said he thought the tickets were issued to send a message to the Outlaws before the Harley-Davidson 100th birthday celebration this week.
Since the late 1990s, a Hydra-headed investigation of the Outlaws in the Midwest produced 23 racketeering convictions and implicated members of the club in bombings, executions and narcotics trafficking.
Monday's news conference reflected the familiar relationship between the burly Outlaws and their law-enforcement minders.
At the Summerfest main gate, a Milwaukee sheriff's detective captain chatted amiably with the Outlaws. A television reporter tried to ply an Outlaws member for a tour of the club's south side clubhouse.
The Summerfest grounds, Harley says in promotional materials, will be the "epicenter of the celebration" for its 100th birthday party. Amy Alarupi, a Harley spokeswoman, said that members of biker gangs wearing their colors would not be prohibited from official events.
Several law enforcement agents have said they anticipated trouble in the days ahead between the rival Hell's Angels and the Outlaws, as well as with other of the hard-core biker gangs coming into town.
But Alarupi said that there were no problems among the gangs at the 90th and 95th birthday bashes here, and neither has there been any violence on the road leading up to this week's events.
"We have good relationships with (the biker gangs) and we're pretty confident that they understand that this is a fun and safe event that everyone is going to attend," she said.
Davies, the Outlaws member, said that in the ramp-up to the Harley festivities, local tavern owners have been asked by police not to serve Outlaws and he said that Outlaws members have copiously been given parking tickets by undercover cops.
"This kind of stuff happens all the time," he said.