News

Good evening. My name is Kelli Evans and I am the new Associate Director of the ACLU of Northern California. I am also a civil rights attorney and have spent a number of years working on police accountability and integrity issues across the country. I want to thank Commissioner DeJesus for inviting me here to speak tonight.Last week I sent Lieutenant Reilly a memorandum prepared by my office for i... Read More

Download the Winter 2010 ACLU-NC Newsletter and read about our latest events and initiatives. Read More

The American Civil Liberties Union sent a letter to Fresno City College today demanding that the school ensure that all its health science classes teach unbiased and medically accurate information. According to students at the college, lectures by Professor Dr. Bradley Lopez, who teaches an introductory health class, often present religiously-based and anti-gay views as "science" or "fact." Read More

Over 12,000 individuals, from California and across the country, have submitted comments objecting to the new execution plan recently released by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR). The revised plan, released for public comment on January 4, 2010, is part of the CDCR's efforts to kick-start executions which have been on hold in California for four years. Read More

Download the Fall 2009 ACLU-NC Newsletter and read about our latest events and initiatives. Read More

San Francisco – A lawsuit filed today by the ACLU of Northern California seeks to stop California's policy of mandating that DNA is collected from anyone arrested for a felony, whether or not they are ever charged or convicted. The ACLU opposes this law because it violates constitutional guarantees of privacy and freedom from unreasonable search and seizure, and because of the rmful impact on comm... Read More

Download the Summer 2009 ACLU-NC Newsletter and read about our latest events and initiatives. Read More

The ACLU of Northern California has filed a friend of the court brief with the Solano County Superior Court urging it to limit the overly broad scope of a proposed gang injunction in the City of Fairfield. The ACLU-NC is concerned with several aspects of the injunction, including the ability of the police to serve the injunction on an individual without presenting clear and convincing evidence of ... Read More

Today the ACLU of Northern California has asked school districts in Sonoma County to comply with California law by replacing abstinence-only sex education with curricula that teach about condoms and contraception, as well as abstinence. the ACLU has requested written confirmation that abstinence-only instruction currently provided in some junior and high schools by an outside agency called Free to... Read More

Today, in a 6 to 1 decision, the California Supreme Court upheld Proposition 8, the ballot measure that eliminated the right of same sex couples to marry. In the ruling authored by Chief Justice Ronald George, the Court stated "We emphasize only that among the various constitutional protections recognized in the Marriage Cases as available to same-sex couples, it is only the designation of marria... Read More

The ACLU of Northern California announced today that it has reached a settlement agreement with the Vallejo City Unified School District on behalf of a high school student who faced anti-gay harassment and discrimination from teachers and school staff and was required to participate in a school-sponsored "counseling" group designed to discourage students from being lesbian, gay, bisexual, or trans... Read More

Join the math club, take a drug test. That was the rule in the Shasta Union High School District until today, when a California Superior Court judge put a stop to the district's policy of requiring students to consent to random drug testing in order to participate in school-sponsored activities like marching band and math club. The court granted a preliminary injunction, voiding the district's dru... Read More