Viewing a gay-oriented Website having nothing to do with adult material but offering a pack of services, programs, and travel tips got Carlos Hernandez booted out of the Hawaii State Library.
Now Hernandez is hitting the state with a lawsuit.
The American Civil Liberties Union sued on behalf of Hernandez and The Center, a Honolulu-based services-and-programs group for local gay/bi/trans/intersexual communities. The challenge involves a state law signed in early May, known as Act 50, authorizing law enforcement or other authorized persons to ban a library user for up to a year with nothing more than a warning advising the user that his presence isn't desired. The law was believed to be aimed mostly at the homeless.
A published report indicated a library security guard issued Hernandez a written warning under Act 50 banning him for a year because he was looking at "a pornographic Website." The ACLU, however, doesn't exactly think Act 50 should be used against someone like Hernandez for accessing a non-adult Website known as GayHawaii.com, even if it does feature images of shirtless but otherwise clothed men.
“This law gives unbridled discretion to police and others to engage in arbitrary and capricious denials of protected expression based on nothing more than their individual prejudices and predilections,” Hawaii ACLU legal director Lois K. Perrin said in a statement following the lawsuit, which names Gov. Linda Lingle and state Attorney General Mark Bennett. “This statute is a classic, standardless law in blatant violation of the United States and Hawaii Constitutions.”
The Center's executive director, Ken Miller, said in his own statement that Act 50 is bad law that his group is dedicated to striking down. “[Act 50] allows the police and others to continue to oppress the thoughts and views of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transexual, intersex and questioning community,” Miller said.
The Hawaii ACLU said that Act 50 is broad and vague enough that, in theory, a lifeguard could ban someone from the beach for carrying a sign protesting water pollution, the governor could bar people from a courthouse to stop them from filing a lawsuit, or the state could even ban all political party workers from schools and other facilities set up for state and national voting.
