Illegal To Be Annoying

City officials in Brighton, Michigan recently passed a law making it illegal to be annoying. It reads in part:"It shall be unlawful for a person to engage in a course of conduct or repeatedly commit acts that alarm or seriously annoy another person and that serve no legitimate purpose." The law was purposely written so that a police officer has the authority to determine what is annoying.

OK - now I'm annoyed. It's hard to understand what these folks were thinking. This gives the police some pretty extraordinary power to detain people based on their own opinion of what's annoying. This opens up the floodgates for people to be arrested and fined for picketing the city hall, for having a disagreement with a neighbor, or letting kids play touch football in the street. These may be "frivolous" examples, but that's where this kind of law can lead.

Bottom line: This type of law is unconstitutional. The good people in Brighton (and Royal Oak - where a similar law was passed) should be annoying their city leaders for passing this ridiculous law and demand it be repealed.

If you read the article linked below, you will also note the Brighton police chief used to work in Royal Oak and now works in Brighton. Coincidence? I think not.

Read the full story on Click On Detroit.