Lawsuit against DeKalb police ok'd

A federal appeals court says a lawsuit can proceed against DeKalb County police officers who arrested two people after a peaceful vegetarian protest at a HoneyBaked Ham store. Caitlin Childs and Christopher Freeman were among a group demonstrating and handing out vegan and vegetarian information on public property in 2003. They claimed their constitutional rights were violated when they were ordered to stop distributing literature by Officer Mark Graham Maphet and later arrested for disorderly conduct by Maphet and Detective D.A. Gorman for refusing to hand over a piece of paper on which Childs had written down the tag number of Gorman's unmarked car. A federal judge refused to dismiss the suit, and the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that ruling Friday.

(Associated Press)