Newspaper Clippings of the Christmas Day

Via Newspapers.com

This year, I am doing something a bit different with my annual roundup of Christmas clippings: instead of a number of assorted news items, I am focusing on one story.  Because, honestly, I can’t imagine anyone who personifies the Strange Company Yuletide Spirit better than Sarah Childs, of Denham Springs, Louisiana.  No one can say she didn’t give her neighbors a Christmas to remember.  The “Daily Review,” January 8, 2013:

BATON ROUGE (AP) — The holidays may be over, but a Louisiana woman wants to keep a light display on her roof extending a middle finger to her neighbors. 

U.S. District Judge James Brady heard testimony Monday about whether Sarah Childs should be granted a preliminary injunction, barring the city of Denham Springs and police from requiring her to remove the display. The judge didn’t rule and the hearing will continue next week. 

Childs said she put up the roof message in November because she believed a neighbor stole her dog. She said police threatened her with fines and arrest because of the lights. She and the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana sued the city, its mayor and police. 

Lawyers for Denham Springs and police say officials didn’t threaten Childs and the case has no merit. But they also argue the display isn’t protected speech under the U.S. Constitution because the extended finger is designed to attack her neighbor. 

The judge issued a temporary restraining order in mid-December, prohibiting city officials from interfering with the lights and saying efforts to take down the display would violate her rights to free speech and due process. 

With the Christmas holidays wrapped up and many people packing up their holiday lights, the federal judge asked Monday if the lawsuit still was needed. “Is this matter now moot? Are the lights still up?” he asked. 

“The lights are still up,” said Justin Harrison, an ACLU lawyer representing Childs. 

“And she intends to keep them up?” Brady asked. 

“I think she intends to keep them up, your honor,” Harrison replied. 

According to the lawsuit, Childs removed the lights twice: once after a police officer told her she could be fined and again after another officer threatened to arrest her. But she has reinstalled them, after getting representation from the ACLU and the judge’s temporary order in her favor. 

In Monday’s testimony, Denham Springs police officer Jared Kreamer described two visits to Childs’home in response to complaints from Childs that her neighbors were harassing her. Under initial questioning from Childs’ lawyer, Kreamer said he didn’t recall if he told her to take down the light display or told her she could go to jail because of it. He said he found the lights offensive and thought it could be considered disturbing the peace. 

“I remember telling her if she didn’t take it down, it could lead to trouble,” the police officer said. 

Then, Childs’ lawyers played a partial recording that Childs had made with her cell phone during one conversation with Kreamer in which he told her she could end up in jail because of the lights. Kreamer said he wasn’t threatening her, but was just advising her that she could run into a complaint by her neighbors accusing her of disturbing the peace.

As a side note, we are also told that Childs' version of Christmas caroling was to stand in her driveway singing obscene songs about her neighbors.  The conclusion to this unusual legal fracas was reported in the Opelousas “Daily World” on March 3, 2013:

A lawsuit over a Denham Springs woman's light display, which extended a middle finger to her neighbors, has been settled. Final dismissal documents were filed in Baton Rouge-based federal court this week. 

Sarah Childs said she put up the roof message in November because she believed a neighbor stole her dog. She said police threatened her with fines and arrest because of the lights. She and the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana sued the city, its mayor and police. ACLU of Louisiana Executive Director Marjorie Esman described the final settlement as allowing Childs to keep the lights up without harassment and requiring the city to make a payment to the ACLU to cover legal costs. 

"The city agreed to leave her alone and paid $15,000 in attorney's fees," Esman said Friday. 

Lawyer Brad Myers, representing Denham Springs, said the city's insurance company covered the cost, and he said city officials continue to deny any harassment ever happened. 

"The city agreed not to do what it had not done in the first place," Myers said in an email. 

Esman said Childs moved out of the house a few weeks ago. When she left, she kept the lights on the roof.

I’d love to know if the next residents of her house left the lights up.  You must admit, they make a striking display.  

Via Dailymail.com

I'd also like to know one very important fact left unaddressed by the newspaper reports:  What happened to Childs' dog?  It seems to me that the answer to that question would show whether our Middle-Finger Queen was a screwball, or a woman with a legitimate grievance.