The town of Gilbert had two lawsuits filed against it May 22 related to the ejection of three residents from a Sept. 20, 2022, Gilbert Town Council meeting.
Residents Brandon Ryff, Ryan Handelsman and Joanne Terry, represented by attorney Timothy La Sota, filed suit in the U.S. District Court of Arizona, asserting the town and council denied them their First Amendment rights to freedom of speech, assembly, association and to communicate with their elected officials, along with their 14th Amendment rights to due process and equal protection under the law.
Additionally, Ryff filed suit in Maricopa County Superior Court alleging the town’s actions defamed him and subjected him to a false light invasion of property.
The town received service on the lawsuits May 31.
The federal suit seeks $1 in nominal damages but unspecified amounts of compensatory and punitive damages and reasonable attorneys fees and costs. Ryff asks for unspecified amounts of compensatory and punitive damages and “all other relief that is just and appropriate under the circumstances" in the Superior Court suit.
A notice of claim filed last fall offered to settle the matter for $1, an apology from Mayor Brigette Peterson and for the mayor to receive “remedial” training in the U.S. Constitution.
The incident that launched the matter happened at a standing-room-only Sept. 20, 2022, council meeting at the Public Safety Training Facility’s Atlas Auditorium. That meeting had been particularly raucous as residents came out to protest the idea of council bringing light or commuter rail to town, though council had no such proposal and a previous item to study commuter stations was not on the agenda.
Many of the residents were carrying signs that read, “Stop Lying” or “Don’t Mesa my Gilbert.”
After once asking police to remove a sign from one resident, Peterson later asked police to remove three residents at the back for “waving” signs. The suit claims and other witnesses confirmed the three residents — Ryff, Handelsman and Terry — were only holding the signs.
Peterson said that without her glasses, she could not read the signs or know who she was ejecting, but the suit asserts that Peterson is not being truthful.
The suit also challenges a subsequent ethics complaint report that cleared the mayor, noting that the plaintiffs were not interviewed by the investigator, who only spoke to the mayor and people sympathetic to her viewpoint, according to the lawsuit.
Both lawsuits allege that Ryff suffered reputational damage in his dental practice as patients asked him about the news reports on the incident and the business has suffered a decline in revenue as a result of the town’s actions.
Ryff said Peterson ordering police to remove them from the meeting could have been just a lapse in judgment in a heated moment.
“However, later on refusing to admit making a mistake, then twisting the story and spreading lies to justify one’s wrongful actions is a very different kind of problem,” he said in a text message to the Daily Independent. “It’s a moral one. When a person with compromised morals is placed into a position of power and when that person shows they are not afraid to use that power against others, it’s a threat to our freedoms as American citizens.”
Ryff noted that the average person does not have the time or money to take on the government in court.
“We tried to settle this with just a simple apology,” he said. “The mayor stubbornly refused. So off to court I shall go, where I will spend my money defending our constitutional rights — and Mayor Brigette Peterson will spend taxpayer money defending her ego.”
Gilbert spokesperson Jennifer Harrison said the town has engaged outside counsel to review and defend the town in litigation, but will not be commenting further.
Tom Blodgett can be reached by email at tblodgett@iniusa.org or follow him @sp_blodgett on Twitter. We would like to invite our readers to submit their civil comments, pro or con, on this issue. Email AZOpinions@iniusa.org.
Tom Blodgett Senior News Editor | Gilbert @sp_blodgett
Meet Tom Tom Blodgett joined Independent Newsmedia, Inc., USA, in 2022, when the company acquired Community Impact Newspaper's Phoenix-area properties. Raised in Arizona, he has spent more than 35 years in journalism in the state.
Community: He has served as an instructional professional in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication since 2005, and is editorial adviser to The State Press, the university's independent student media outlet. He also is director of operations for an 18U girls fastpitch softball team from Gilbert.
Education: Arizona State University with a BS in Journalism.
Random Fact: He lived in Belgium during his freshman year of high school.
Hobbies: Tweeting enthusiastically about ASU softball (season-ticket holder) and grumpily about other local sports (pessimistic fan).
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