LAS VEGAS — A federal judge again has declared unconstitutional a county law aimed at stopping hawkers from handing out handbills advertising sexual entertainment on the Las Vegas Strip.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada lawyer who argued the decade-long lawsuit on Friday hailed the ruling by U.S. District Judge Lloyd George as a complete victory for free speech.
"The ordinance was declared facially invalid," ACLU attorney Allen Lichtenstein said. "The judge made it clear that attempts at circumventing First Amendment protections are not going to be tolerated."
The newest and biggest resorts on the Las Vegas Strip are in Clark County, where spokesman Erik Pappa said officials had not fully reviewed the 19-page ruling and had not decided whether to appeal.
"We will be examining our options," Pappa said.
The 1997 law prohibited "repetitively distributing or offering" printed or written materials primarily proposing commercial transactions. It applied to the areas surrounding the Las Vegas Strip and the Las Vegas Convention Center.
In his ruling, signed March 9 and filed Tuesday, the judge noted the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco rejected previous county efforts to tailor the law to apply only to those officials deride as "smut peddlers."
He branded the latest county effort as "overbroad and vague."
Tourism officials say they regularly field complaints from visitors about advertisers handing out playing card-sized cards advertising erotic entertainers "direct to your room."
While prostitution is legal in some rural Nevada counties, it is illegal in the state's largest cities including Las Vegas and surrounding Clark County. Many tourists refuse the cards or drop them on the ground, where phone numbers and photos of nearly naked women litter sidewalks and gutters.
The lawsuit was brought by Richard Soranno and his outcall dancers service, S.O.C. Inc., against the county, its seven-member commission, the Nevada Resort Association, several hotels and the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. The ACLU joined the lawsuit as a plaintiff shortly after it was filed in January 1997.
Hawkers have a free-speech right to distribute fliers, Lichtenstein said Friday.
"I don't think they can rewrite the ordinance to do what they want to do, which is to allow police or other authorities to pick and choose those whose leaflets they will allow and those they will not," Lichtenstein said.
George, in Las Vegas, said the county law also could have been used to block distribution of newspapers, religious pamphlets, or ACLU fliers containing advertising or solicitations for membership.
Lichtenstein called streets and sidewalks "the quintessential public forum" and said the ACLU was committed to fighting municipal efforts to privatize public space.
He estimated the legal costs to the ACLU of the decade-long legal battle at more than $100,000, and said the organization would seek attorney fees.
"This has been a real waste of taxpayer money," Lichtenstein said. "The county would have been much better off if they had adhered to the First Amendment in the first place."
The organization also continues to challenge city of Las Vegas laws aimed at curbing peddling, panhandling and pamphleteers at the downtown Fremont Street Experience pedestrian mall, which is inside city limits.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last year declared a similar 1997 city law unconstitutional.