doesn't mention a time either...i remember that being a problem when it was first coming to place: people complaining it was vague

4/3/2006 2:31:28 PM

Well a nuisance party the way they defined it in the ordinance would be a nuisance party irregardless of whether or not it was at 2:30pm or 1:00am.

This case does not sound like a nuisance party to me. Besides, it seems like the cops should only show if neighbors complain.

4/3/2006 2:39:17 PM

Quote :

"or any other activity resulting in conditions that annoy, injure or endanger the safety, health, comfort or repose of the neighboring residents, or results in any obscene conduct, or results in any immoral exhibition or indecent exposure by persons at the gathering. "

its only a matter of time before this shit is slapped down.

4/3/2006 2:44:24 PM

Quote :

"He said we were in violation because he could hear us laughing from his car. The officer informed me that the only way to avoid getting a nuisance party ticket is to close all your windows and doors at dark and not to have more people outside than you live with."

(for page 2)

Quote :

"1. Definition. A nuisance party is a party or other social gathering conducted in the city and which, by reason of the conduct of those persons in attendance, results in any one or more of the following conditions or occurrences: public drinking or drunkenness; public urination or defecation; the unlawful sale, furnishing, or consumption of alcoholic beverages; the unlawful deposit of trash or litter on public or private property; the destruction of public or private property; the generation of pedestrian or vehicular traffic which obstructs the free flow of residential traffic or interferes with the ability to provide emergency services; excessive, unnecessary or unusual loud noise which disturbs the repose of the neighborhood; public disturbances, brawls, fights, quarrels, or any other activity resulting in conditions that annoy, injure or endanger the safety, health, comfort or repose of the neighboring residents, or results in any obscene conduct, or results in any immoral exhibition or indecent exposure by persons at the gathering."

Your actions: grilling hot dogs and laughing loud enough to be heard from the street, with no complaints from any neighbors.

"public drinking or drunkenness" ...nope.
"public urination or defecation" ...nope.
"the unlawful sale, furnishing, or consumption of alcoholic beverages" ...nope.
"the unlawful deposit of trash or litter on public or private property" ...nope.
"the destruction of public or private property" ...nope.
"the generation of pedestrian or vehicular traffic which obstructs the free flow of residential traffic or interferes with the ability to provide emergency services" ...nope.
"excessive, unnecessary or unusual loud noise which disturbs the repose of the neighborhood" ...nope. (no complaints from any neighbors)....plus, the casual laughter of a few people is not "excessive, unnecessary or unusual loud noise"
"public disturbances, brawls, fights, quarrels," ...nope.
"...or any other activity resulting in conditions that annoy, injure or endanger the safety, health, comfort or repose of the neighboring residents," ...nope. (again, no complaints from any neighbors)
"or results in any obscene conduct," ...nope.
"or results in any immoral exhibition or indecent exposure by persons at the gathering." ...nope.


[Edited on April 3, 2006 at 3:04 PM. Reason :

4/3/2006 3:02:20 PM

do you people really not realize that a cop can make up plenty of things to fit into those vague categories?

For instance, I got charged with loud noise, trash on property, and blocking vehicular traffic.

As for the noise: No one complained, he had to turn off his car to even here the faint noise coming from our garage.

as for the littering:there was a single beer can on our lawn, which may have been there weeks, and put there by anybody.

as for the traffic: Our street has people park on both sides of it all days of the week. It is difficult to drive up and down the road whether it is sat night or tues afternoon, and there is no way to prove who's house the cars belonged to. In fact, I'm sure that plenty of the cars were our neighbors who actually lived on the road and stuff.

So basically they can always just make up stuff to fit vague restrictions.

4/3/2006 3:08:41 PM

sounds like we have several cases that are definitely worth fighting.

if anyone receiving an NPO would like to file a complaint with the ACLU of North Carolina, please go to http://www.acluofnorthcarolina.org/casecriteria.html . They will then review your case and figure out how to approach it.

The actual complaint form is
http://www.acluofnorthcarolina.org/complaintform.html

print the form and fill it out and send that with a copy of your citation to:
ACLU of North Carolina
PO Box 28004
Raleigh, NC 27611

we can take it in for you, or you can mail it directly if you want more confidentiality. If you want to fight the citation, it's important that you do not pay the fines or anything, so send in the form as soon as possible to allow the ACLU of NC to get organized in time for your court date.

let us know when you send in a complaint form, and we will contact the ACLU Legal Foundation to make sure they get on it quickly.

4/3/2006 3:17:22 PM

^ i really think I might, the hotdog one sounds even worse than mine. You guys don't think that they might go harder on me if I'm with the aclu do you?

4/3/2006 3:21:20 PM

You guys are forgetting one magical word: Politics.

If this is ONLY happening to students, the city of Raleigh could probably care less. If this starts making its way into the Cary suburbs, THEN you might get some more backing on your side from citizens. I say fight the fight, but don't expect public support on this one. The battle will be won inside the courts, not outside of it.

4/3/2006 3:37:24 PM

It wont spread to Cary because it is a Raleigh ordinance that only applies to Raleigh. It wont affect anyone in other parts of the city because they only write these near campus.

4/3/2006 3:58:09 PM

moop....my citation/case has already been through the court system with the charge being dismissed.

i still have all my materials including letters from my neighbors, the original citation, other references, etc....

can i still fill out a complaint although i no longer have an open case?

4/3/2006 4:13:15 PM

Quote :

"because they only write these near campus"

What's the current status of the debate over selective enforcement?

Every cop should regard various violations of the same law to be "equal" in the eyes of enforcement.
Only judges should view the merits of each case individually, right?
(Note that I said "same law"--I know that enforcing laws against murder are more important than against theft….)

Or is it OK for police departments' official public positions to be, "Only enforce this law when the perpetrators are this age, this race, this gender, this level of income, live in this neighborhood, etc."??

[Edited on April 3, 2006 at 4:26 PM. Reason :

4/3/2006 4:22:49 PM

They have responded that since the majority of noise complaints are in the area surrounding campus that it justifies them assigning an officer solely for NPO enforcement. I don't know anything further than that but I know that was the justification.

[Edited on April 3, 2006 at 4:24 PM. Reason : ]

4/3/2006 4:22:52 PM

^^look at this thread http://www.thewolfweb.com/message_topic.aspx?topic=390869 on page 2. i included some statistics the city revealed about the NPO during a PROP hearing.

4/3/2006 4:37:03 PM

I wish all the old school articles were still on the Technician site. The articles only go back to the beginning of 2006. It is a college where people do research and they have no archives.

4/3/2006 4:48:39 PM

Quote :

"bring this to a courtroom and see how pissed off a judge gets for wasting the court's time. "

That shit is rediculous.

Let us know when your court date is. You can have a TDub support group there.

[Edited on April 3, 2006 at 5:18 PM. Reason : .]

4/3/2006 5:18:11 PM

Quote :

"Overall, over 860 NPO responses were made by the Raleigh Police Department city-wide in the past year related to noise or excessive party ordinance calls. By far the largest number of these (76.9%) occurred in District 26 (Southwest Raleigh). Of the 36 documented convictions, all were for nuisance party ordinance (Sec. 13-3017) violations except for 3 convictions for violations of the noise ordinance (Sec. 12-5007)."

33(36) convictions out of 860 responses. i'd say you have a decent shot in court

4/3/2006 5:22:17 PM

Quote :

"You guys don't think that they might go harder on me if I'm with the aclu do you? "

sNuwPack : no - if anything the ACLU tends to inspire a softer response from governments that want to minimize the damage to their status quo..

sandnnan : i think filling out the complaint form and providing that information should at least strengthen the argument of how this ordinance is all wrong and needs to be changed/scratched ..

4/3/2006 7:52:38 PM

^^wow, that is outrageous don't ya think

4/3/2006 10:19:22 PM

was the officer AP Draughton III? we've racked up 6 tickets from him

4/5/2006 10:29:28 AM

Fuck Officer Droughens that fucker has given us 4 of them already.

community service will get them dismissed

4/5/2006 11:43:57 AM

it is A.P. Draughon III....i've got his badge number written down somewhere

what pisses me off is when he showed up...i did everything he asked me to do, and he still writes a ticket....he said after the fact that if i didn't follow instructions he would have written me up for more serious accusations, most likely providing alcohol to a minor.

4/5/2006 1:04:08 PM

I do find it funny that it doesn't say anything in the act about "can be heard from the street", but that's what they use as the barometer. Last fall, someone called in an NPO complaint on me and 7 of my friends, for the "infraction" of eating watermelon on a front porch, talking, and laughing, on a Saturday night (don't remember what time--after dark and before midnight...). We had gone inside by the time the officer arrived, and he basically told us that *if* he had been able to hear us from the street he would have had no choice but to give us a ticket. Since we had gone inside, we didn't fit that criteria, so no ticket was given. He chatted with us for a little while and basically said that he thought the NPO was WAY over-general and that a lot of it is BS. But the broadness of it basically lets officers apply it as needed, and some take more advantage of that than others.

Hopefully if enough valid examples are taken to court, it will get struck down. Seems like a reasonable judge would have to rule it as being way too broad.

4/5/2006 7:02:05 PM

yeah.. we just need some people to actually challenge it... since the city realizes that ordinance is unreasonable, they let a lot of people off for doing 10 hours of community service ... that's them saying "we know this is bullshit, but you do something that lets us say we're achieving something, and we'll let you off easy" ...

we just a few people to say "no dammit" for tickets they didn't deserve, and we can get this out for good.

the ACLU of North Carolina can help. Since this is definitely a civil liberties issue, they will review your case and apply their legal foundation to fighting it.

http://www.acluofnorthcarolina.org/casecriteria.html .

The actual complaint form is
http://www.acluofnorthcarolina.org/complaintform.html

[Edited on April 5, 2006 at 10:37 PM. Reason : ACLU]

4/5/2006 10:35:12 PM

Quote :

"I do find it funny that it doesn't say anything in the act about "can be heard from the street", but that's what they use as the barometer."

The ordinance reads "unusually loud" which seems to be in conflict with the standards imposed by the police department. Its pretty reasonable to be able to hear sounds coming from outside when you are standing outside.

4/6/2006 1:33:59 AM

Quote :

"assigning an officer solely for NPO enforcement"

wtf... no wonder you got wrote up, i bet this dude's just pissed at life for having such a lame ass job....

4/6/2006 1:37:30 AM

Quote :

"Are you saying that it's unreasonable to grill hot dogs at 9:45pm in your own back yard? ....joe_schmoe and jbtilley seem to think so. "

i aint sayin its unreasonable, i'm just checking his statement that he was doing this "at dinner time".... as if everyone understands this like its some kind of well known fact.

well 9:45 aint "dinner time". it might be "gonna-cook-some-gotdamn-hotdogs-on-my-muthafuckin-grill time". but normal folks dont say "hey look, 10PM. Dinner Time!"

anyhow, the charge sounds like bullshit to me. take it to court and put another failed citation on that peckerwood's record.

4/6/2006 1:57:11 AM

for anyone wanting the NC-ACLU to fight an NPO ticket on their behalf:

the Legal Committee of the NC American Civil Liberties Union is meeting next tuesday (4/18), so if you got an NPO ticket, print out the complaint form at

http://www.acluofnorthcarolina.org/complaintform.html

and send it in with a copy of your citation to:
ACLU of North Carolina
PO Box 28004
Raleigh, NC 27611

Your complaint needs to reach their office by the end of this week, so get on it ! it really would only take 10 minutes to handle, and you would:
1) have the NC-ACLU to fight your ticket for you (pretty good deal)
2) help end this system of bullshit tickets, benefitting the entire NC State community
3) probably not have to do a bit of community service, unless you wanted to, which isn't a terrible idea

If you're worried the mail will be too slow, i'll meet you on campus and take your envelope to the NC-ACLU office myself.. you couldn't buy better service.

come on people ! i hate to make the selfish appeal, but getting rid of the NPO will help you too... After all, if you got one ticket, you could get more - plenty of people have. Do you really want to go through it twice?

4/11/2006 8:51:36 PM

double post .. damn you time warner

[Edited on April 11, 2006 at 9:10 PM. Reason : -]

4/11/2006 9:09:46 PM

yea stick it to the man

4/11/2006 10:19:55 PM

In this case, <3 the ACLU.

In most big cases concerning the ACLU, fuck off

4/11/2006 11:01:23 PM

Ya know, it's always the people doing the minor stuff that get the tickets, however a raging loud as can be party at 3 o'clock in the fucking morning gets no attention WTF RDP?!?!?

4/11/2006 11:13:19 PM

i think we all learned a valuable lesson here.

dont be age 18-30

4/12/2006 1:31:47 AM