Judge upholds North Carolina’s anti-rioting law, dismisses civil liberties suit

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by a civil rights group challenging North Carolina’s anti-rioting law, whose criminal penalties were raised last year by state legislators.

The American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina sued over the law, after the Legislature increased punishments in response to protests against racial injustice and police brutality in 2020 that at times became violent.

In a dismissal order sought by attorneys for the state and three district attorneys who also were sued, U.S. District Judge Loretta Biggs ruled Tuesday that the law withstands challenges by the ACLU alleging that the language was unconstitutional through being both overbroad and vague.

Biggs cited in large part previous state appellate court rulings examining previous versions of the anti-rioting law that she declared protects free speech and peaceful protestors whom the ACLU feared could be wrongly arrested.

“This Court concludes that the Anti-Riot Act does not criminalize a substantial amount of protected expressive activity relative to the Act’s plainly legitimate sweep,” wrote Biggs in her order released Wednesday. The decision, barring an appeal, would uphold the law’s enforcement, paving the way for the higher penalties to become enforced permanently.

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