Thomas Gray, a member of Gideons International, distributed Bibles from a public bike path/sidewalk near Key Largo School. The sidewalk lay within 500 feet of school property, placing it in Florida’s statutory “school safety zone.” It was a heavily used public corridor that also ran past homes, businesses, a church, and other non-school locations.
Before the planned distribution, Gray notified law enforcement and was told that distributing Bibles from the public sidewalk was permissible. Gray and other Gideons remained off school property and did not force Bibles on anyone. During the distribution, however, Sheriff’s officers arrested two Gideons under Florida’s School Safety Zone Statute. Gray immediately stopped distributing Bibles and later declined to resume similar distributions because he feared arrest and prosecution. The arrested Gideons were charged but never convicted.
Gray brought federal constitutional claims challenging the statute, including vagueness, overbreadth, free-speech, equal-protection, and free-exercise claims, as well as a claim under Florida’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Earlier orders established Gray’s standing, dismissed the state-law claim on Eleventh Amendment grounds, and dismissed redundant official-capacity claims against Officer Perez. On cross-motions for summary judgment, the court held subsections 810.0975(2)(a) and (2)(b) unconstitutionally vague, permanently enjoined their enforcement, upheld subsection (2)(c), and granted Sheriff Richard Roth summary judgment on Gray’s damages claims against him in his official capacity.
Issue #1
Whether Florida Statutes section 810.0975(2)(b), which criminalized entering or remaining in a school safety zone without “legitimate business,” was unconstitutionally vague.
Holding
Yes. Subsection (2)(b) was unconstitutionally vague because “legitimate business” gave neither fair notice of prohibited conduct nor meaningful limits on enforcement discretion.
Reasoning
Subsection (2)(b) imposed criminal liability on a person who entered a school safety zone during specified hours without “legitimate business,” authorization, a license, an invitation, or an applicable exemption. The statute did not define “legitimate business,” did not include a scienter requirement, and did not require an officer or school official first to order the person to leave. Thus, a person could commit a second-degree misdemeanor immediately upon entering the zone without a sufficiently “legitimate” reason.
The 500-foot zone around Key Largo School reached far beyond school grounds. It included public sidewalks, streets, residences, commercial businesses, and other places ordinarily open to the public. In that setting, an ordinary person could not tell whether activities such as walking, visiting a business, speaking with others, or engaging in religious outreach qualified as “legitimate business.”
Florida appellate decisions had not given the phrase a limiting construction in the context of this statute. Although a Florida court had construed “legitimate business on the campus” in a different school-trespass statute to mean a purpose connected to school operations, the present statute contained no comparable “on campus” limitation. Importing that construction would also greatly expand the statute’s sweep into public areas surrounding a school.
The phrase was impermissibly subjective. It did not merely require people to comply with an imprecise but understandable norm; it supplied no ascertainable standard for deciding which reasons for being within the zone were permitted. Citizens of ordinary intelligence therefore had to guess whether their purpose would be regarded as legitimate.
The same uncertainty gave police virtually complete discretion to decide whom to stop or arrest. Without minimal statutory guidelines, the provision invited standardless, arbitrary, and potentially discriminatory enforcement, even though protecting children and school safety is an important governmental interest. That interest could not excuse a criminal law lacking constitutional clarity.
Issue #2
Whether section 810.0975(2)(a), which directed school principals or designees to ask law enforcement to prohibit certain persons from loitering in a school safety zone, was unconstitutionally vague.
Holding
Yes. Subsection (2)(a) was unconstitutionally vague because it likewise depended on the undefined standard of “legitimate business.”
Reasoning
Subsection (2)(a) did not itself create a criminal offense. Instead, it instructed school principals or their designees to notify law enforcement to prohibit loitering by persons who lacked legitimate business, authorization, a license, or invitee status in the safety zone.
Because the directive required school officials and police to determine who had “legitimate business,” it incorporated the same undefined and subjective standard that invalidated subsection (2)(b). The court therefore declared subsection (2)(a) vague as well, although it did not independently create the same enforcement mechanism as subsection (2)(b).
Issue #3
Whether section 810.0975(2)(c), which penalized a person who refused a principal’s or designee’s request to leave after the official reasonably believed the person would commit a crime or was harassing or intimidating students, was unconstitutionally vague.
Holding
No. Subsection (2)(c) was not facially unconstitutionally vague.
Reasoning
The court rejected the argument that an order to leave can generally cure a vague statute. An order issued only after allegedly prohibited conduct has occurred cannot retroactively provide adequate advance notice of the line between lawful and unlawful conduct. The statute also did not clearly specify how long a person had to stay away or under what circumstances the person could return.
Unlike subsection (2)(b), however, subsection (2)(c) did not make mere presence in the zone without “legitimate business” criminal. Criminal liability arose only when a person refused to leave after a principal or designee, acting on a reasonable belief, concluded that the person would commit a crime or was engaged in harassment or intimidation of students.
Those additional criteria sufficiently constrained the provision. “Reasonable belief,” “harassment,” and “intimidation” provided an ordinary person with adequate notice of the relevant conduct, and Florida law separately defined harassment as a course of conduct directed at a specific person that causes substantial emotional distress and serves no legitimate purpose.
A statute need not be perfectly clear in every imaginable application to survive a facial vagueness challenge. Because subsection (2)(c) had a substantial core of understandable applications and any doubtful application could be challenged as applied, the court upheld it.
Issue #4
Whether section 810.0975(2)(c) was facially overbroad under the First Amendment.
Holding
No. Its potential unconstitutional applications were not substantial in relation to its plainly legitimate sweep.
Reasoning
The overbreadth doctrine is a limited remedy that permits facial invalidation only when a law’s unconstitutional applications are substantial compared with its legitimate reach. Courts use that remedy sparingly, especially for ordinary criminal laws regulating conduct in a content-neutral manner.
Subsection (2)(c) targeted conduct indicating an intent to commit a crime or conduct constituting harassment or intimidation of students. It did not directly regulate speech or conduct intended to communicate a message.
Although the provision might have some unconstitutional applications, those possible applications were not substantial relative to its legitimate role in protecting students from crime, harassment, and intimidation. The court therefore found no basis for facial invalidation on overbreadth grounds.
Issue #5
Whether Sheriff Roth, in his official capacity, and thus Monroe County, could be held liable under section 1983 for Officer Perez’s arrests of the Gideons.
Holding
No. Officer Perez was not a final county policymaker, and the record did not show that Sheriff Roth directed, knew of, consented to, or ratified the arrests.
Reasoning
A municipality may be liable under section 1983 for an official policy causing a constitutional injury, but it is not vicariously liable merely because one of its officers acted unlawfully. A single act can establish municipal liability only when it is made or ratified by an official with final policymaking authority over the relevant subject.
A Florida deputy sheriff or officer is not a final policymaker for the county. Such officers remain under the sheriff’s chain of command and do not stand in the sheriff’s place for purposes of establishing county policy.
There was no evidence that Sheriff Roth instructed Officer Perez to arrest the Gideons or knew of and approved the arrests beforehand. Perez’s decision was therefore a discretionary act attributable to him rather than an official policy of Monroe County.
The record also did not establish ratification after the fact. Sheriff Roth testified that Bible distribution in the safety zone would constitute legitimate business so long as it did not disrupt traffic or create other safety concerns. A contrary statement in an earlier litigation filing did not demonstrate approval of Perez’s arrests or their rationale.
Issue #6
Whether Sheriff Roth’s alleged failure to train officers on enforcement of the School Safety Zone Statute created official-capacity liability under section 1983.
Holding
No. The lack of specific training did not amount to deliberate indifference to constitutional rights.
Reasoning
Inadequate police training supports municipal liability only when the deficiency reflects deliberate indifference and is closely related to the injury alleged. Ordinarily, deliberate indifference requires notice that a particular deficiency has caused, or is likely to cause, constitutional violations.
Gray produced no evidence of prior unconstitutional enforcement of the School Safety Zone Statute or evidence that Sheriff Roth had reason to anticipate that officers would apply it unconstitutionally. The statute was one of many penal statutes enforced by the sheriff’s office, and its constitutional defects had scarcely been addressed by Florida appellate courts.
This was not the rare situation in which the need for specialized training was obvious without a history of violations. Unlike training officers on the constitutional use of deadly force during arrests of fleeing suspects, enforcing the statute against Bible distribution was not a routine, inevitable police activity whose constitutional risks were apparent. Holding otherwise would effectively require sheriffs to predict and train officers on every possible unconstitutional application of every criminal statute.