EDITORIAL: HEAVY HANDED FIST OF ST. MARY’S SHERIFF HALL ON BLOCKING PUBLIC COMMENTS

HEAVY HANDED FIST OF ST. MARY’S SHERIFF HALL
ON BLOCKING PUBLIC COMMENTS

EDITORIAL
BY JOHN E. O’CONNOR

In an age where transparency and accountability are paramount, the St. Mary’s County Sheriff’s Department has found itself in the eye of a digital storm due to its violation of the public’s constitutional rights.

According to a response to an information request from THE CHESAPEAKE TODAY, at least 3,347 emails indicate instances where the department has deleted thousands of comments from its Facebook page. These deletions predominantly targeted comments critical of the current administration led by Sheriff Steve Hall, Assistant Sheriff Clay Safford, and Captain Shawn Moses, particularly regarding their perceived lack of transparency.

Notably, records indicate that during the tenure of the previous sheriff, Tim Cameron, the social media page rarely, if ever, required the deletion of Facebook comments. This stark contrast has raised significant concerns about censorship and the unconstitutional suppression of public discourse.

Social media platforms like Facebook have become modern public forums where citizens engage with local government and law enforcement. St. Mary’s County Sheriff’s Department’s official Facebook page was a hub for sharing updates, addressing community concerns, and responding to public queries. But as engagement grew, so did controversy. Over time, residents noticed their comments disappearing—sometimes without explanation. Was it an issue of inappropriate content moderation or something more concerning?

THE CHESAPEAKE TODAY filed a Public Information Act request to investigate the Sheriff’s Department’s social media moderation practices.

The response to the Maryland Public Information Act request confirmed suspicions that, in actuality, there are over 21,000 emails related to their Facebook page and the possible deletion of comments. However, the scope was narrowed because the sheer volume of deletions was so vast, narrowing it down to 3,347 emails directly related to deleting comments from the Facebook page that were critical of the current administration.

While it’s understandable that some deletions were to enforce community guidelines, the sheer volume makes it impossible to say that every single one was purely due to someone violating a community guideline.

The practices of the Sheriff Steve Hall administration appear to be intentionally silencing dissenting voices to shield the department from legitimate criticism and accountability in a public forum. By doing so, the administration is violating the First Amendment rights of every person who has used the Facebook page and had their freedom of speech suppressed by this totalitarian approach to content moderation.

The St. Mary’s Sheriff’s Department should be acutely aware of the constitutional implications of such actions, especially in light of the landmark 2017 case against former Maryland Governor Larry Hogan. In that instance, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a federal lawsuit alleging Governor Hogan violated constituents’ First Amendment rights by blocking users and deleting comments on his official Facebook page. The lawsuit contended that such practices unlawfully silenced dissenting voices in a public forum. The case was settled in 2018, with Governor Hogan agreeing to implement a more open social media policy that prohibits discrimination based on viewpoint and allows for broader constituent engagement.

This precedent establishes that government officials cannot censor speech on official social media platforms simply because it is critical or dissenting. By ignoring this legal precedent, the St. Mary’s County Sheriff’s Department risks eroding public trust and facing potential legal repercussions for infringing upon constitutionally protected free speech rights.

For an elected Sheriff, appointed Second-in-Command Clay Safford, and Administrative Captain Shawn Moses—leaders who have sworn an oath to uphold the law and protect the constitutional rights of the citizens they serve—their actions tell a different story. Instead of safeguarding the principles of transparency and free speech, their efforts appear more focused on shielding Steve Hall’s administration from criticism. In doing so, they undermine the rights they are sworn to protect, leaving the voices of the citizens of St. Mary’s County stifled under the weight of a leadership more concerned with self-preservation than public accountability.

This heinous violation of the constitutional rights of the citizens of St. Mary’s County notably comes twenty years after the Federal Courts found the St. Mary’s County Sheriff and his deputies violated the First Amendment rights of the public. The decision in Rossignol v Voorhaar 2003 Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that it is the right of the public to choose what to read, and the publisher of ST. MARY’S TODAY to criticize the Sheriff’s Department without a midnight raid of newsstands to remove all available copies of the Election Day 1998 edition of the newspaper before voters could read it before voting.