Activist Group Claims it Was Made to Leave Sims Park
The founder of the American Youth Movement 22211 says the group's rights were violated.
Members of the American Youth Movement 22211 went to a benefit concert in Sims Park in May with protest signs decrying corruption of police, government and corporations.
After several hours, the concert’s organizer, standing with New Port Richey police officers, asked the group to leave the city park, which was rented out for the event.
The New Port Richey Police Department is conducting an internal investigation into the incident after receiving a complaint from a Pasco County resident who wrote to the City Council and is requesting public records about the incident from the police department.
Police Chief Jeffrey Harrington said he has watched videos that a member of American Youth Movement took, and his preliminary opinion is that the police did not eject the group from the park. However, the investigation continues, he said.
"The videos that I have seen ... my interpretation is they were asked to leave by someone other than police," Harrington said to Patch.
Zachary Mitrovich, the group’s founder, says the group was invited to the concert and its rights were violated when it was told to leave.
“Who created the idea that you could make a public park private?” Mitrovich said to Patch.
Sean Kline, the event’s organizer, says that if he knew that the group’s intent, he would never have welcomed them. As the person who rented the park, he had the right to eject them, he said.
“There’s really no legal ramifications,” he said.
Daniel Callaghan, a 69-year-old Marine veteran living at 7108 Daggett Terrace outside incorporated New Port Richey, has asked the city to investigate the incident and “allow me and others to speak before the upcoming City Council regarding the treatment of these young people whose right to dissent, to assemble and conduct themselves peacefully on public property were abrogated.”
He further wrote: "I ask that the city attorney clarify Mr. Kline’s contention that the corporate sponsors of the Gaertner event could somehow change Sims Park from public to private property.”
The 12-hour Rock the Park concert held in Sims Park on May 21 was planned as a fundraiser for the Center for Independence and Lance Cpl. Justin Gaertner, a Marine whose legs were destroyed by an explosion in Afghanistan. The center is a Hudson-based nonprofit that serves individuals with developmental disabilities. Kline is an ambassador for the West Pasco Chamber of Commerce, but the chamber did not sponsor the event.
Kline, outreach coordinator for the center’s New Freedom Transportation Program, said he met Mitrovich, a Port Richey resident and part-time Pasco-Hernando Community College student, days before the event.
Kline was heading to Sims Park when Mitrovich was aiding an effort to clean the exterior of the shuttered Hacienda Hotel on Main Street in New Port Richey. The two talked. Kline said Mitrovich told him that the group was about getting kids involved in the community.
Mitrovich founded the American Youth Movement after he was arrested by Pasco County Sheriff’s deputies in January, booked into jail and taken to court, where the judge withheld adjudication. His group’s protests focus on government, police and corporate corruption.
There was no mention of American Youth Movement protesting or being "anti-anything" when he met Mitrovich, Kline said.
The day before the concert, Kline again met Mitrovich as he was unloading chairs at Sims Park.
“He was discussing the same thing, nothing negative, no anti-government sentiment or corporate persecution,” Kline wrote in an e-mail.
Kline said he invited the group to the concert and offered them a free table.
They came with signs reading “Corporate ran America is not the will of the people" and "Don't let crooked cops, corrupt politicians and Corporations take your rights away," the group said in a statement to the St. Petersburg Times posted on its Facebook fan page.
"Various vendors and event-goers complained to the point that New Port Richey Police Dept came to the event to address the situation,"
Kline wrote in an e-mail. He said vendors told him that, among other things, Mitrovich and his group had been seen marching behind Gaertner with signs and faces masked by bandanas, Mitrovich’s resembling the U.S. flag, while Gaertner was interviewed on camera by Bay News 9.
“That, to me, was completely inappropriate,” he said in an interview.
An AYM member had a camera that captured the moment when Kline and police walk up to Mitrovich’s group. The recording shows Kline telling the group:
“I’m getting complaints. The police are here. It‘s over, and that’s that."
The camera lens was then obscured, but the device records Mitrovich saying: “OK, we’ll leave.”
The police are heard saying: “Zachary, don’t argue.”
“I’m not arguing,” Mitrovich responds. ”I’m just saying we didn’t defile anybody. We didn’t curse at anybody. We just held up our signs and walked around.”
One of the police officers says: “The guy who owns the park right now is trespassing everybody. So you’re getting a warning, and you’re just going to be asked to leave.”
None of the group members were arrested or cited, the Times reports. Harrington told the Times that an entity that rents the park has a right to put on an event without disruption, and that it did not appear the group's activities amounted to one worthy of being ejected.
Mitrovich said he felt forced to leave.
“The police told me if I came back before the event was over, I would be arrested,” Mitrovch wrote in an e-mail. “So what should I have done? Disagree with the trespass and get arrested?”
Callaghan met Mitrovich and his group members at Sims Park but left before they were told to leave. He joined an American Youth Movement protest, and they joined him in one against U.S. wars that he has held with others at U.S. 19 and Ridge Road every Friday for about five years. He said he has gotten responses to his letter from four council members as of Friday and wanted to get the records requested from police by July 20.
Freelancer John Haughey contributed to this report.
*This story was last modified at 8:55 p.m., July 24
maryellen Gallagher
1:26 am on Thursday, July 21, 2011
I find it ridiculous that anyone would state that this was just inappropriate behavior for the event that was being held. If that is the case,When is it appropriate? The first amendment is a beautiful right that we have all been given. Asking these people to leave the park was a violation of their rights. A public place can not be made private because someone rents it. If this is the case then I should be able to rent the park and scare off toddlers from the swing set because I find them annoying,you know with all their yelling and such. Does this sound correct to anyone? If the police officers were interested in preserving the rights of the American Youth movement they could have asked them to move to the sidewalk with their signs. Instead they were told to leave and threatened with arrest,this is not what men give their lives for. I am saddened by this. There are many ideas and opinions that I would never agree with; picketing military funerals,protests enhancing racism,or even the guy at the local grocer who feels the need to give me his opinion on the ignorance of locals. I will always agree however that people have the right to; speak their minds,fight for their passions and hold on to their beliefs. We either have rights people or we don't.
Allan
8:11 am on Thursday, July 21, 2011
"Anyone that opposes the American Youth Movement shall face the wrath of its activists. We do not forgive, We do not forget. They should have expected us."
This certainly sounds like a threat to me. They expect free reign to spout their vitriol at will, but heaven help anyone that opposes them.
Zachary Jordan Mitrovich
2:06 pm on Thursday, July 21, 2011
The good will of we the people shall always prevail against the tyrannical injustices of those who oppress us. We do not forgive. We do not forget. They should have expected us.
Clay G. Colson
2:25 pm on Thursday, July 21, 2011
Granted the young man's words are a bit over the top but hardly constitute a threat, instead the expectation that AYM will do all in their power to expose those like Kline and the NPR Police who abused their authority while violating both the Civil and Constitutional rights of AYM members. Anyone that watches the video of the incident knows that the officers and Kline are lying in their statements to the press. The police wrongfully demanded ID (w/o cause); admitted they had no actual, real complaintant, that they themselves witnessed nothing, spoke with no one other than Kline and threatened AYM members with the charge of trespass. Under Florida's Trespass Statute at best they could have provided them with a trespass warning, wrongly, which is probably why they didn't.
Clay G. Colson
2:25 pm on Thursday, July 21, 2011
More importantly there are three very telling statements by police 1st they had no cause/complaintant and witnessed nothing themselves; 2nd that they were not taking sides, which they clearly did; 3rd that the man that owns the park was trespassing them ... for the record that "man" would be you, me, AYM members and all citizens. There is also clear precedent from our State Supreme Court that public property is NOT privatized for events, gatherings and the like, just because someone pays a user fee. I don't believe for one minute that any entity paid NPR for the private use of Sims Park, maybe a user fee such as many public facilities charge to pay the cost of cleanup and maintanence; let's see the canceled check for "privatization" of a public park and don't forget the contract!
Steven Landseadel
7:52 pm on Thursday, July 21, 2011
This is an obvious and far too often seen example of how citizen A has rights while citizen B does not unless of course his/her rights directly benefit citizen A. How much does it cost to become one of the A's?
Clay G. Colson
11:28 pm on Thursday, July 21, 2011
Well citizen A will tell you "...if you have to ask, you can't afford it!"
Dan Callaghan
7:28 pm on Friday, July 22, 2011
Please consider telling which of the following quotations by Sean Kline (the man responsible for getting three policemen to back him up and evict the kids) is most objectionable::
"I am all for First Amendment rights, but there is a time and place for it."
OR
Sean Kline Jul 20, 2011 4:41 PM About 2 days ago
"I had a disturbance at our event and handled it appropriately. What you (American Youth Movement) did was no different than a Gay Rights Activist group choosing a kindergarten graduation to voice their view. Not an appropriate venue. I would do it all over again."
So to be a true American patriot today in New Port Richey you can be the sole owner of a public park (Sims Park) and evict those you consider un-American, even though they caused no disturbance (according to the police report), either before or after the police arrived; you can be all for First Amendment rights such as peaceful assembly but you decide when and where Americans can exercise those rights; and you can believe that Gay rights activists have as one of their primary goals to voice their views at a kindergarten graduation. Take a look at the articles in both the Pasco Times and here in the Patch, then considering voicing your feelings too.
Bettejo
9:58 pm on Friday, July 22, 2011
Wow! I am grateful people like Zack and the AYM are standing up for their (our) constitutional rights. Most of America sleeps while we lose the fundamental rights assured to us by our nations founders and laid to writing in the Constitution and Bill of Rights. If American's don't stop resisting the violation of our Constitutional rights, we will surely lose them.
ken honeyman
12:28 pm on Saturday, July 23, 2011
As I've only 'washed up on NPR's shores' only recently, and am NOT impressed with the general opinions I hear around and about. I am PROUD as an Army vet [1st Cav.-1966] that I see these expressions on our First Amendment. The founding fathers[my ancestor was one of them] would be VERY PROUD !! Remember your freedom of expression ends one inch short of the other fella's nose. Doesn't seem to me this was abridged at all! The crummy Supreme court we have [with 2 of the worst-Scalia, and Alito are from my NJ.!-and the chief educated at Princeton]; even they say that right of protest cannot be abridged.
Dan Callaghan
4:41 pm on Saturday, July 23, 2011
Welcome to the ongoing skirmishes in West Pasco---glad to have air calvary on the ground backing us up (9th Marine Amphibious Brigade, 19th Special Forces Group (Airborne). Putting even tiny restrictions on First Amendment rights is like being a little pregnant. Here's hoping you'll seek out vets sick of warfare rather than bellying up to the bar at our local vet drinking holes.
joanne arneson
11:18 pm on Saturday, August 20, 2011
i went to a new port richey police/sheriff meeing in city hall last year 2010,and asked chief harrington why his officers had not approached my grandaughter who was run away,about 10 times ,in sims park..they all knew her very well.he ignorned my statement,and procided to to take other questions,as if it never happened,we have a very corrupt police force in new port richey,and i look to a means to end it,as long as the police are corrupt the people will be.