WASHINGTON - eTradeWire -- The use and popularity of ICEBlock, an app used to alert those at risk of being deported, is soaring, reportedly (https://www.coastsidenews.com/news/local-networ...) hitting #8 on the charts for free social networking downloads.

Although original condemnations of the app claimed simply that it would help illegal aliens escape deportation, outcries have now intensified with recent attacks on ICE agents escalating,

But while many judicial decisions have held that there's nothing criminal about warning of nearby police activity in real time, prosecutions involving this novel app may be distinguishable, says public interest law professor John Banzhaf, who has won several important First Amendment cases.  Noted law professor Eugene Volokh seems to agree.

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The new ICEBlock app lets users anonymously drop pins (to pinpoint locations) and share real-time sightings of ICE agents, and also notifies app users when ICE officials are present in the neighborhood.

Actually it's a more sophisticated and much more powerful update of a sophisticated texting tree which was used to alert thousands of people in Maricopa County, Arizona, in real time to the details of the police sweeps which critics contended were an excuse to round up illegal immigrants.

Court decisions which has addressed a closely related issue - using physical signs or flashing headlights to warn about police traffic speed enforcement (radar) - have generally upheld this practice as free speech protected by the First Amendment, especially because of arguments that such warnings benefit the public by warning drivers to slow down.
But this line of cases, and the argument that warning of law enforcement activity constitutes protected speech, would not necessarily prevent - or even deter - the Trump administration from trying to shut it down by bringing (or even threatening to bring) a criminal action since it has repeatedly tried to stretch the bounds of existing law in many other areas, Banzhaf says.

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Prosecutors can argue that this situation is different from the speed enforcement cases because, unlike with speeding motorists and the argument used to justify flashing headlights, the warning can't encourage the recipients to obey they law; all they can do is flee or hid from ICE enforcement.

Also, it may encourage and facilitate physical attacks on law enforcement officers, something the speed-trap alerts never did.

Indeed, the very name of the app makes it clear that the intent of those operating it is to "block" ICE and its agents from performing presumably-legal law enforcement activity, and hindering law enforcement agents in the performance of their duties is a crime under Title 18 U.S. Code 111, notes Banzhaf.

http://banzhaf.net/   jbanzhaf3ATgmail.com  @profbanzhaf