Opinion ID: 166426
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Denver's policy

Text: 13 The parties dispute the precise parameters of Denver's unwritten policy and refused to stipulate to any single version of the policy at oral argument. The evidence before us on summary judgment presents a somewhat contradictory picture. In some instances, Defendants describe Denver's policy broadly as prohibiting all expression on all overpasses. 3 We also used regrettably imprecise language in Faustin I when we said that closer analysis of the complaint, the motions for summary judgment, and the briefing before us indicates that Faustin also challenges defendants' policy of prohibiting all expression on overpasses. Defendants admit this policy exists. 268 F.3d at 950. Faustin emphasizes these all expression references and argues the policy therefore prohibits not just her protest activities but every kind of expression on overpasses, including bumper stickers on cars and conversations among pedestrians. 4 14 However, Faustin has offered no evidence to prove Denver's policy has ever reached beyond expression visible to the traffic below. To the contrary, the evidence that Faustin has submitted suggests that Denver has only restricted signage on overpasses—evidence that an animal rights protestor was previously arrested after displaying a large protest sign on a highway overpass in Denver. 5 Indeed, except for intermittent references to all expression, Defendants have consistently articulated a more narrow version of the policy that prohibits only the display of signs and banners on overpasses. 6 Indeed, Lt. Donald Fink himself demonstrated in an affidavit before the district court that all expression on overpasses is not nearly as inclusive as Faustin hypothesizes, where he stated: 15 It has been the uniform and consistent policy and practice of the Denver Police Department to prohibit all speech or expressive activities on all highway overpasses located in the City and County of Denver. Put another way, it is the Denver Police Department's policy and practice to advise all persons who wish to engage (or are engaging) in speech activities at these sites that they cannot display banners or signs while at these locations, whether or not such signs or banners are attached to protective fencing. 16 (Emphasis added.) 17 The district court analyzed this case based only on this broadest all expression language. The court acknowledged that the parties dispute the exact nature of defendants' policy. Nonetheless, relying on our discussion in Faustin I, the district court concluded that the law of the case mandates that defendants' uniform and consistent policy and practice ... is to prohibit all speech or expressive activities on all highway overpasses located in the City and County of Denver. 18 However, although our language in Faustin I was unfortunately ill-defined, nothing in our prior opinion nor in the factual record would support a finding of any policy that broad. 7 Given the tortuous history of this litigation, caused in no small measure by the imprecision of the parties' positions at various stages of this litigation, it would be a waste of judicial resources and an injustice to the parties to keep this controversy alive longer to obtain a further refinement of precisely what Denver's policy is. We will simply conduct our review based on the broadest policy reasonably inferable from the record. Upon our de novo review of this evidence, we determine that the broadest possible policy that Denver could have had was a policy prohibiting all expressive conduct on overpasses that was visible to traffic below and potentially disruptive to that traffic on the underpass. 8