Cited by

In the supreme court held that section 609.72, subdivision 1(3), as enacted, “clearly contemplates punishment for speech that is protected under the First and Fourteenth Amendments.” Id.

Cerney contends that he did not commit the crime of disorderly conduct while in A.P.’s house based on the second prong of the disorderly-conduct statute, which may criminalize certain “language,” because speech generally is protected by the First Amendment, unless it consists of “fighting words.” In the supreme court held that section 609.72, subdivision 1(3), as enacted, “clearly contemplates punishment for speech that is protected under the First and Fourteenth Amendments.” Id.

Forcia suggests that is dispositive here.

d 412, 418–19 (Minn. 1978).

419-20 (Minn. 1978) ("While it is true that no ordered society would condone the vulgar language used by this 14-year-old child, and as the [juvenile] court found, her words were intended to, and did, arouse resentment in the officers, the constitution requires more before a person can be convicted for mere speech."

417 (Minn. 1978) (explaining that government power to regulate must not unduly infringe a protected freedom).

It is true that “[t]he Minnesota Supreme Court has ruled that a conviction of disorderly conduct cannot be predicated only on a person’s words unless those words are ‘fighting words,’” -11 (Minn. App. 2003) (), defined as “words ‘which by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace,’” State 4 v. Crawley, n.9 (Minn. 2012) (quoting Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U.S. 568, 572, 62 S. Ct. 766, 76

1(2), arguing that it is both vague and overly broad.2 “To be a constitutional exercise of the police power of the state, a statute that punishes speech must be neither overly broad nor unduly vague.”

“The Minnesota Supreme Court has ruled that a conviction of disorderly conduct cannot be predicated only on a person’s words unless those words are ‘fighting words.’” –11 (Minn. App. 2003) ().

The Minnesota Supreme Court has explicitly held that the disorderly conduct statute can punish speech in accordance with the First Amendment if applied only to “fighting words.”

-60 (Minn. App. 1997) (reversing disorderly conduct juvenile adjudication when juveniles swore loudly at police officers).

5 We have said that “[a] vague law impermissibly delegates basic policy matters to policemen, judges, and juries for resolution on an ad hoc and subjective basis, with the attendant dangers of arbitrary and discriminatory application.” (quoting Grayned v. City of Rockford, 408 U.S. 104, 108 , 92 S.Ct.

(disorderly conduct statute limited to “fighting words” to preserve constitutionality); see also New York v. Ferher, 458 U.S. 747, 769, n. 24 , 102 S.Ct.

A statute is over-broad “if it deters the exercise of First Amendment rights by unnecessarily punishing constitutionally protected along with unprotected activity.”

In -20 (Minn.1978), the supreme court held that a retreating 14-year-old girl’s statement to police, “f* *k you pigs,” did not constitute fighting words because she directed it at two police officers sitting in a squad car located 15 to 30 feet away.

1686 , 29 L.Ed.2d 214 (1971) (White, J., dissenting))); , 419 n. 5 (Minn.1978) (“The Supreme Court, in fact, has encouraged state supreme courts to sustain the constitutionality of their offensive-speech statutes by construing them narrowly to punish only fighting words.

argues that the officers did not have probable cause to arrest her for disorderly conduct because swearing at police officers cannot alone constitute disorderly conduct, relying on

(“Although the overbreadth and vagueness doctrines are conceptually distinct, in the First Amendment context they tend to overlap, since statutes are often overly broad because their language is vague as to what behavior is proscribed.”); -49 (Minn.App.

The Minnesota Supreme Court has ruled that a conviction of disorderly conduct cannot be predicated *811 only on a person’s words unless those words are “fighting words.”

1(3), the Minnesota Supreme Court held that the statute must be construed narrowly so that it only applies to “fighting words.”

See, -18 (Minn.1978) (construing disorderly conduct statute as prohibiting only “fighting words”).