Jennifer Reisinger was the owner of a web design business in
Sheboygan in Wisconsin and a political activist who had called for
the recall of Mayor Juan Perez and created a website to support the
campaign for his recall.
Separately, a link existed on her business website to the
Sheboygan police department's website, a link her suit describes as
'non-descript'.
The City Attorney for Sheboygan wrote to Reisinger in 2007
demanding that the link be removed.
"The City has not authorized this connection to its Police
Department website, and we wish to have the link severed until such
time as the City were to give authorization," wrote City Attorney
Stephen McLean to Reisinger.
Reisinger removed the link but on later consultation with a
lawyer reinstated it and has now sued the City of Sheboygan.
Her suit claims that McLean had already given advice to Mayor
Perez that said that Reisinger was entitled to publish the link.
"Anyone can create a link to someone else’s website very easily
without the knowledge or consent of the linked party," it quoted
McLean as advising in an email. The suit also claims that McLean
had checked and found that the City itself did not ask permission
for the links published on its own sites.
"However, City Attorney McLean indicated that, nonetheless, he
could issue a “cease and desist” letter to Ms. Reisinger, if the
Mayor so desired," claims the suit. "In response to that email,
Mary Rajer, Assistant to the Mayor, indicated that Mayor Perez, in
his official capacity, wanted City Attorney McLean to issue a cease
and desist letter regarding the link Ms. Reisinger had on her
business website to the City of Sheboygan Police Department."
After removing the link Reisinger said that she received a phone
call from an investigation officer from the police department
saying that he was conducting an investigation into the link.
When Reisinger employed a lawyer the request to refrain from
linking and police investigation were dropped, her suit said.
Her suit claims that the actions were retaliation for
Reisinger's political activity. "The combined retaliatory actions
taken against Ms. Reisinger by the City of Sheboygan and by Mayor
Perez, personally and in his official capacity as Mayor, were a
willful, wanton and intentional disregard of her constitutional
rights, designed to punish Ms. Reisinger for her past and present
political activity involving Mayor Perez, and to cause her public
humiliation and ridicule, making punitive damages against the
defendants in their individual capacities appropriate and necessary
to stop these repeated patterns from occurring," said the suit. The
suit claims damages of $250,000.
The ability to link from one site to others is the basic
building block of the World Wide Web, but the right of sites to
link to content has been challenged a number of times.
It is rare for the owners of sites to try to prevent others from
linking to them. More common are attempts to stop a site linking to
material that a party considers damaging.
Earlier this year the French courts ruled that blogs committed
an invasion of actor Olivier Martinez's privacy when they posted
links to articles which invaded his privacy.
More commonly, disputes centre on the release of information
which a party wants to suppress or links to copyright-infringing
material. Though courts in the US have found that publishing links
to infringing material is not in itself copyright infringement,
they have found that it contributes to it.
A court found in 2000 in a case involving Ticketmaster that
providing links to copyright infringing material could count as
contributory copyright infringement.
In the UK a man was arrested last year over the publication of a
website which published links to copyright-infringing television
content. Intellectual property expert Kim Walker of Pinsent Masons,
the law firm behind OUT-LAW.COM, said at the time that it would be
difficult, though not impossible, to charge the man with a criminal
offence.
"We don't have an offence in the UK for facilitation of
copyright infringement," said Walker. "Instead, it is possible that
prosecutors could attempt to characterise this as an offence of
'distributing' infringing copies or 'communicating' copies to the
public in the course of a business."
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