Philadelphia didn't violate rights of cops fired over offensive Facebook posts, court rules

PHILADELPHIA — The Philadelphia police department did not violate the First Amendment rights of several officers who were fired or suspended for racist and violent social media posts, a federal judge has ruled.

U.S. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone issued her ruling Monday, just days before the case was set to go to trial. She determined the officers’ posts and comments were “likely to cause significant interference” with the police department and the city’s operations and did not constitute protected speech.

The officers’ social media accounts were included in a database, published in 2019 and known as the Plain View Project, that catalogued thousands of bigoted or violent posts by active-duty and former police officers in several states.

In Philadelphia, nearly 200 officers were disciplined, including 15 who were forced off the job. Most of those who were fired ultimately had their dismissals overturned by an arbitrator and were permitted to return to the force, while some retired. The firing of one officer was upheld by an arbitrator.

Twenty of the disciplined officers eventually filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city, asserting the police department had retaliated against them for exercising their First Amendment rights.

A federal judge dismissed the lawsuit in February 2022, but the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed that decision in June 2023, saying the lawsuit had been tossed prematurely. The city then argued that the case should not go to trial and that Bettlestone should determine the outcome, a motion she approved.

In her ruling, Beetlestone described in detail how each officer’s statements could degrade public trust, demean populations they are tasked with protecting, and make the officers unreliable witnesses if called to testify in court cases.

Lawyers for the city and the attorney who represents eight of the officers declined comment on the ruling, while the attorney for the other officers did not respond to a request for comment.

The Facebook posts, all of which were public, were uncovered by a team of researchers who spent two years looking at the personal accounts of police officers from Arizona to Florida. They found officers bashing immigrants and Muslims, promoting racist stereotypes, identifying with right-wing militia groups and, especially, glorifying police brutality.