Judge Dismisses Insane Clown Posse Civil Liberties Lawsuit
By Chuck Sudo in News on Jul 8, 2014 6:05PM
A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by Insane Clown Posse claiming the constitutional rights of their fan base, the Juggalos, were violated when they were included in a 2011 FBI gang assessment report.
ICP and the American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit in January claiming Juggalo Nation “are fighting for the basic American right to freely express who they are, to gather and share their appreciation of music, and to discuss issues that are important to them without fear of being unfairly targeted and harassed by police.”
The 2011 FBI Gang Threat Assessment Report listed Juggalos among "ethnic-based and non-traditional gangs" with the likes of Somali, Asian and Jamaican gangs, that Juggalos were engaging in criminal activity ranging from felony assaults, thefts and robberies to drug sales, and used social media for communication and recruitment, when they weren’t painting their faces, heading to The Gathering, spraying each other with Faygo and engaging in extreme body modification such as slicing off their own nipples for money.
Federal prosecutors asked ICP to drop the lawsuit because the FBI merely labeled a “subset” of Juggalos as gang members and it isn’t their fault if local law enforcement agencies target them because of their looks. U.S. District Judge Robert Cleland apparently agreed with prosecutors and wrote in his ruling the report “does not recommend any particular course of action for local law enforcement to follow, and instead operates as a descriptive, rather than prescriptive, assessment of nationwide gang trends.”
ICP member Joseph Bruce, aka Violent J, vowed to appeal the case.
“While it is easy to fear what one does not understand, discrimination and bigotry against any group of people is just plain wrong and un-American,” he said.
ICP previously filed a lawsuit in September 2012 after the FBI failed to respond to a Freedom of Information Act request for any information that led the agency to add Juggalos to the report.