A man in Alabama is facing potentially weeks of jail time over a ridiculous court order to apologize, in writing, for telling a cop to move in a slightly rude manner back in December. The driver is rightly refusing to do so, and is ready to go to jail to protect his First Amendment rights.
It all started on December 13, 2023 when Reginald Burks was on his way to drop his kids off at school in the town of Ozark, Alambama, when he was pulled over for speeding. The trouble started when the officer told Burks how he knew how fast he was going.
The officer said his radar gun was broken, so he used cruise control to estimate the speed, Burks said.
“And I told him he was full of crap because there’s no way that he clocked my speed by cruise control,” Burks said.
Things went downhill from there. The officer gave Burks the ticket, and then stood in front of his car, Burks said, forcing the driver to back up and go around him.
“I said, ‘Get your ass out of the way so I can take my kids to school,’” Burks said. “My daughter’s like, ‘Daddy you cursed.’ And I said, ‘I’m sorry boo.’”
Keep in mind that Burks was never charged with anything like disorderly conduct “…or any other wrongdoing related to his interaction with the officer.” He said that he has friends and family in law enforcement who all advised him not to fight the ticket. With that thinking he arrived in court ready to plead guilty, pay the fine and get everything over with. That’s when Ozark Municipal Court Judge Nicholas Bull hit him with the outrageous ultimatum: write a letter of apology to the ticketing officer or face 10 to 30 days in jail.
Jenny Carroll, a professor of criminal law at the University of Alabama says that this is just an instance of a small town judge unduly flexing their judicial power since the jail time doesn’t fit the crime. While Alabama does have a disorderly conduct ordinance about cursing in public, Carroll says he should have been charged with that instead of speeding.
“He’s not able to make a choice about whether or not he wants to apologize,” Carroll said. “And he’s not a child, he’s an adult man. He’s not being allowed to exercise his own decision-making process about whether or not his behavior warrants issuing an apology to the officer.”
Burks has a hearing date of June 4 where he expects to go to jail, so much so that he’s already made arrangements for his kids to stay with their mother while he’s gone. Even facing jail time, Burks isn’t backing down. He says he would apologize if he had done something wrong. “But I didn’t do anything to this officer besides curse. And there’s no law saying that I can’t curse or speak my mind.”
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