L.A. Police Protective League v. City of L.A.

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF

CALIFORNIA

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE,

Plaintiff and Respondent,

v.

CITY OF LOS ANGELES et al.,

Defendants and Appellants.

S275272

Second Appellate District, Division Seven

B306321

Los Angeles County Superior Court

BC676283

November 10, 2025

Justice Groban authored the opinion of the Court, Chief

Justice Guerrero and Justices Corrigan, Kruger, Evans, and

Jenkins* concurred.

Justice Liu filed a dissenting opinion.

*

Retired Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, assigned

by the Chief Justice pursuant to article VI, section 6 of the

California Constitution.

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

S275272

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

California requires law enforcement agencies to

investigate complaints against peace officers. (See Pen. Code,

§ 832.5, subd. (a)(1).) Penal Code section 148.6, subdivision (a)

(section 148.6(a))1 makes it a crime to file a knowingly false

allegation of misconduct against a peace officer. (See § 148.6,

subd. (a)(1) [section 148.6(a)(1) or subdivision (a)(1)].) The

statute also mandates that before accepting a complaint, law

enforcement agencies must require the complainant to read and

sign an advisory informing the complainant that filing a

knowingly false complaint of police misconduct is a crime.

(§ 148.6, subd. (a)(2) [section 148.6(a)(2) or subdivision (a)(2)].)

The issue presented in this case is whether section 148.6(a)’s

provisions violate constitutional free speech rights. We conclude

that they do.

This is not the first time we have considered this issue. In

People v. Stanistreet (2002) 29 Cal.4th 497 (Stanistreet), the

defendants argued that section 148.6(a) violated the rule set

forth in R. A. V. v. St. Paul (1992) 505 U.S. 377 (R. A. V.), which

generally requires that courts apply heightened scrutiny to

regulations that discriminate on the basis of content within a

1

Except where noted, all further statutory citations are to

the Penal Code.

1

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

proscribable category of speech. (See Stanistreet, at p. 507.)

More specifically, the defendants argued that heightened

scrutiny was warranted under R. A. V. because section 148.6(a)

“appl[ied] one defamation rule to citizen complaints against

peace officers, and a different rule to those made against other

public officials.” (Stanistreet, at p. 507.) We agreed that section

148.6(a) constituted a content-based regulation within a

proscribable category of speech, which we described as

“knowingly false statements of fact.” (Stanistreet, at p. 508.) We

concluded, however, that the statute fell within various

categories of content discrimination within a proscribable class

that R. A. V. had recognized as generally permissible.

After Stanistreet was decided, multiple federal decisions

rejected its analysis and held that section 148.6(a) violated the

First Amendment. (See Chaker v. Crogan (9th Cir. 2005)

428 F.3d 1215 (Chaker); Hamilton v. City of San Bernardino

(C.D.Cal. 2004) 325 F.Supp.2d 1087, 1091 (Hamilton II);2 accord

Eakins v. Nevada (D.Nev. 2002) 219 F.Supp.2d 1113 (Eakins)

[adopting Hamilton I’s reasoning in striking down Nevada

statute making it a misdemeanor to file knowingly false

allegations of misconduct against a peace officer].) In the wake

of those decisions, the City of Los Angeles (the City) entered into

a consent decree barring it from requiring complainants to sign

2

The district court issued two published opinions in the

Hamilton matter, both of which are cited in this opinion. The

first opinion denied the City of San Bernardino’s motion to

dismiss the plaintiff’s constitutional challenge to section

148.6(a) (see Hamilton v. City of San Bernardino (C.D.Cal. 2000)

107 F.Supp.2d 1239 (Hamilton I), while the second granted the

plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment on that claim (see

Hamilton II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d 1087).

2

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

the advisory described in section 148.6(a)(2). The consent decree

expired in 2013, but the City still does not require a signed

advisory from complainants.

In 2017, the Los Angeles Police Protective League

(LAPPL) filed the current action seeking an injunction that

would require the City to comply with section 148.6(a)(2)’s

advisory requirement. Relying on the reasoning of the federal

authorities cited above, the City argued that section 148.6(a)

was an unconstitutional regulation of speech. The trial court

concluded it was bound by Stanistreet and enjoined the City

from accepting any complaint alleging misconduct by a peace

officer unless the complainant had signed the advisory required

by section 148.6(a)(2). The Court of Appeal affirmed, concluding

(as the trial court had) that it was bound by Stanistreet. (See

Los Angeles Police Protective League v. City of Los Angeles (2022)

78 Cal.App.5th 1081, 1088.) As a result of the ruling, the City

was ordered to advise complainants that it was a crime to file a

knowingly false claim of misconduct against a peace officer

despite the fact that multiple federal decisions had found that

criminal provision to be unconstitutional. The City petitioned

for review, arguing that Chaker and other intervening federal

decisions cast doubt on Stanistreet’s reasoning. We granted

review.

In the intervening years since Stanistreet was decided, the

United States Supreme Court has issued additional guidance on

First Amendment issues that relate both to R. A. V. and, more

generally, prohibitions on knowing falsehoods. This new

guidance compels us to reconsider our decision in Stanistreet. In

Davenport v. Washington Educ. Ass’n (2007) 551 U.S. 177

(Davenport), the court discussed when speech restrictions that

3

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

fall outside “ ‘the general prohibition’ ” (id. at p. 188) on content-

based regulations may nonetheless warrant heightened

constitutional scrutiny. The court’s analysis indicates that

when content-based regulation occurs within a proscribable

class, the key inquiry is whether the statute risks

“impermissibly distort[ing] the marketplace of ideas” (id. at

p. 189) by “ ‘ “driv[ing] certain ideas or viewpoints” ’ ” from the

public sphere (id. at p. 188; accord R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at

pp. 387–388). And in United States. v. Alvarez (2012) 567 U.S.

709 (Alvarez), the court announced for the first time that even

well-intentioned prohibitions on knowing falsehoods can trigger

heightened constitutional scrutiny if they go too far in chilling

protected speech. (See id. at pp. 709, 723, plur. opn. of Kennedy,

J. [criminal statute that targets “falsity and nothing more”

would risk “cast[ing] a chill [on speech that] the First

Amendment cannot permit”]; id. at p. 736, conc. opn. of Breyer,

J. [statute criminalizing any knowingly false claim of receiving

military award raised sufficient “risk of chilling” to warrant

heightened scrutiny].) Most recently, in Free Speech Coalition,

Inc. v. Paxton (2025) 606 U.S. 461 (Free Speech Coalition), the

court held that content-based restrictions that regulate

unprotected speech are subject to heightened constitutional

scrutiny if they have an “incidental burden” on protected speech.

(Id. at p. 495; see id. at pp. 482–483.)3

3

The United States Supreme Court decided Free Speech

Coalition shortly after we held oral argument in this matter. We

vacated submission and directed the parties to submit

supplemental briefing addressing the effect, if any, of Free

Speech Coalition on the issues here.

4

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

The fundamental principle we derive from these

subsequent cases, read in conjunction with R. A. V., is that when

assessing a statute like section 148.6(a) — which discriminates

on the basis of content within a proscribable class of falsity

(defamation) — courts must evaluate whether the risk of

“ ‘driv[ing] certain ideas or viewpoints’ ” (R. A. V., supra,

505 U.S. at p. 387) from the public sphere is so “inconsequential”

(Davenport, supra, 551 U.S. at p. 188) that no further

constitutional scrutiny is warranted. Stated differently, courts

should ask whether the content-based regulation of proscribable

speech is structured in such a manner that it either disfavors

certain subjects or viewpoints (as in R. A. V.) or burdens

protected forms of speech (as in Alvarez and Free Speech

Coalition).4

4

As discussed in more detail below, R. A. V. concluded that

the statute at issue in that case risked driving out certain

viewpoints by criminalizing hate speech made in connection

with certain topics (race, religion and gender), while leaving

unregulated hate speech pertaining to any other topics (such as

political affiliation or sexual orientation). Although the statute

did not burden any form of protected speech (as all forms of hate

speech are unprotected), the court reasoned that heightened

scrutiny was warranted because it imposed “special prohibitions

on those speakers who express views on disfavored subjects.”

(R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 391.) In this case, however, we

focus not on whether section 148.6(a) impermissibly targets

defamatory speech on disfavored topics, but rather whether the

statute risks driving out certain viewpoints or ideas by

regulating a subset of defamation in a manner that sufficiently

burdens protected speech so as to warrant heightened scrutiny.

(See Free Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. at pp. 482–483;

Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at pp. 709, 723, plur. opn. of Kennedy,

J.; id. at p. 736, conc. opn. of Breyer, J.)

5

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Applying those principles here, we conclude that section

148.6(a)’s criminal provision (§ 148.6(a)(1)) and its

accompanying admonition requirement (§ 148.6(a)(2)) exhibit

numerous characteristics that, considered together, sufficiently

burden a protected form of speech — namely, truthful (or at

least well-intentioned) complaints of police misconduct — so as

to warrant heightened constitutional scrutiny. Those features

include: (1) singling out for criminal treatment knowingly false

allegations of misconduct that are filed against a category of

government official whose job duties are of particular concern to

the public; (2) asymmetrically criminalizing knowingly false

allegations that are filed against law enforcement, while leaving

unregulated false statements that witnesses might make in

support of law enforcement during the course of the ensuing

investigation that is required under section 832.5; (3) barring

law enforcement from accepting a formal complaint of police

misconduct unless complainants agree to read and sign an

admonition warning that they can be criminally prosecuted if

their claims are disbelieved; (4) providing complainants ill-

defined and inconsistent descriptions of what specific types of

false statements might trigger criminal liability; and (5) failing

to require that the statements actually be material to an

actionable type of misconduct or that they cause any harm to

the falsely accused. (See post, at pp. 38–48.) While we express

no view whether any of these elements might unduly burden

speech when considered in isolation, we think it clear that,

considered together, they “threaten censorship of ideas”

(R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 393) by deterring citizens from

filing truthful (or at least not knowingly false) complaints of

police misconduct.

6

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

There is still a question under United States Supreme

Court jurisprudence as to whether strict or intermediate

scrutiny should apply to a content-based regulation like section

148.6(a), which discriminates within a proscribable class of

knowing falsehoods (defamation) in a manner that incidentally

burdens protected speech. (Compare R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at

p. 395 [applying strict scrutiny to a viewpoint-based regulation

that discriminated within a proscribable class of speech] with

Free Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. at pp. 482–483 [content-

based restrictions that regulate unprotected speech but

incidentally burden protected speech are subject to intermediate

scrutiny]; compare Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 724, plur. opn.

of Kennedy, J. [certain forms of regulations on false statements

of fact should be subject to strict scrutiny] with id. at pp. 730–

731, conc. opn. of Breyer, J. [restrictions on false statements of

fact should generally be reviewed under intermediate scrutiny].)

For the purposes of this case, however, we need not resolve that

question because we conclude that section 148.6(a) cannot

survive even the less exacting standard of intermediate

scrutiny, which requires that “a law must be ‘narrowly tailored

to serve a significant governmental interest.’ ” (Packingham v.

North Carolina (2017) 582 U.S. 98, 105–106 (Packingham).)

Applying that test here, we conclude that while the

Legislature had a legitimate and significant interest in

remedying the harmful effects of abusive false claims of police

misconduct, section 148.6(a) is not narrowly tailored to meet

those objectives. Instead, the statute establishes an ill-defined,

asymmetrical criminal provision (see § 148.6(a)(1)) that is

accompanied by an unusual admonition requirement.

Considered together, those elements “create[] a potent

7

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

disincentive for citizens to file” even well-intentioned complaints

of police misconduct. (Hamilton II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d at

p. 1094.) Thus, while we reaffirm Stanistreet’s conclusion that

the Legislature is authorized to take steps to protect the

integrity of the peace officer complaint process (see Stanistreet,

supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 510), we part ways with Stanistreet by

now concluding that, as presently drafted, section 148.6(a)

“ ‘burdens substantially more speech than is necessary to

further the government’s legitimate interests.’ ” (Packingham,

supra, 582 U.S. at p. 105 [describing intermediate scrutiny

standard].)

I. BACKGROUND

A. Regulation of Complaints Against Peace

Officers

Section 832.5 requires “[e]ach department . . . that

employs peace officers” to “establish a procedure to investigate

complaints by members of the public against the personnel of

these departments . . . , and . . . [to] make a written description

of the procedure available to the public.” (§ 832.5, subd. (a)(1).)

The statute further requires that “[c]omplaints and any reports

or findings relating to these complaints . . . shall be retained for

a period of no less than 5 years.” (Id., subd. (b).) Complaints

“that are determined . . . to be frivolous, . . . or unfounded or

exonerated” are not to be retained in the officer’s general

personnel file (id., subd. (c)) and “shall not [be] use[d] . . . for

punitive or promotional purposes” (id., subd. (c)(2)).

The Penal Code provision at issue in this case, section

148.6(a), makes it a misdemeanor for any person to “file[] any

allegation of misconduct against any peace officer . . . knowing

the allegation to be false.” (§ 148.6(a)(1).) The statute

8

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

separately provides that any law enforcement agency accepting

an allegation of misconduct against a peace officer “shall require

the complainant to read and sign” an advisory explaining that

California provides citizens “the right to make a complaint

against a police officer for any improper police conduct” and

requires law enforcement agencies to investigate such

complaints. (§ 148.6(a)(2), all caps and boldface omitted.) The

admonition goes on to warn the complainant that “it is against

the law to make a complaint that you know to be false. If you

make a complaint against an officer knowing that it is false, you

can be prosecuted . . . .” (Ibid., all caps and boldface omitted.)

The statute further mandates that the advisory shall be written

in all capital letters and boldface. (Ibid.)5

5

Section 148.6(a)(2) requires that the admonition include

the following language:

“YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO MAKE A COMPLAINT

AGAINST A POLICE OFFICER FOR ANY IMPROPER

POLICE CONDUCT. CALIFORNIA LAW REQUIRES

THIS AGENCY TO HAVE A PROCEDURE TO

INVESTIGATE CIVILIAN’ COMPLAINTS. YOU HAVE A

RIGHT TO A WRITTEN DESCRIPTION OF THIS

PROCEDURE. THIS AGENCY MAY FIND AFTER

INVESTIGATION THAT THERE IS NOT ENOUGH

EVIDENCE TO WARRANT ACTION ON YOUR

COMPLAINT; EVEN IF THAT IS THE CASE, YOU HAVE

THE RIGHT TO MAKE THE COMPLAINT AND HAVE IT

INVESTIGATED IF YOU BELIEVE AN OFFICER

BEHAVED IMPROPERLY. CIVILIAN COMPLAINTS

AND ANY REPORTS OR FINDINGS RELATED TO

COMPLAINTS MUST BE RETAINED BY THIS AGENCY

FOR AT LEAST FIVE YEARS. [¶] IT IS AGAINST THE

9

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Prior to section 148.6(a)’s enactment, a different statute

“made (and still makes) it a misdemeanor to report a felony or

misdemeanor knowing the report to be false. (§ 148.5.)

However, . . . courts had interpreted section 148.5 as not

applying to complaints of police misconduct from members of the

public. [Citations.] The Legislature enacted section 148.6 to fill

this gap.” (Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 502.) Section

148.6(a), however, “does not merely extend section 148.5’s

protection to peace officers. Section 148.5 applies only to

knowingly false reports ‘that a felony or misdemeanor has been

committed,’ i.e., to reports of a criminal offense. By contrast,

section 148.6 applies to all ‘citizens’ complaints of police

misconduct during the performance of an officer’s duties that

may or may not rise to the level of a criminal offense.’ ”

(Stanistreet, at p. 503.)

The legislative materials accompanying the assembly bill

that added section 148.6(a) explained that “[s]ince the Rodney

King incident in March 1991, law enforcement agencies

throughout the state have revised their citizen complaint

procedures to promote greater accountability on the part of their

line officers. [¶] . . . [One] glaringly negative side-effect which

has resulted has been the willingness on the part of many of our

less ethical citizens to maliciously file false allegations of

misconduct against officers in an effort to punish them for

simply doing their jobs. [¶] Unfortunately for the officers, these

complainants usually become a permanent part of their

LAW TO MAKE A COMPLAINT THAT YOU KNOW TO BE

FALSE. IF YOU MAKE A COMPLAINT AGAINST AN

OFFICER KNOWING THAT IT IS FALSE, YOU CAN BE

PROSECUTED ON A MISDEMEANOR CHARGE.”

10

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

personnel jackets. . . . [M]ost of the officers find they have very

little recourse against the complaints.”6 (Assem. Com. on Public

Safety, Analysis of Assem. Bill No. 1732 (1995–1996 Reg. Sess.)

April 18, 1995, at p. 1 (Assem. Com. on Public Safety Analysis);

see Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at pp. 502–503.)

The arguments in favor of the bill similarly explained that

section 148.6(a) would “finally address[] the issue of knowingly

making false allegations of misconduct against any peace officer.

These false accusations can adversely affect the officer’s position

within the Department, and this legislation will discourage such

false reports. [¶] . . . [¶] Yearly hundreds of unfounded and false

complaints are filed against Peace Officers. In the Los Angeles

County Sheriff’s Department alone, over 500 complaints were

received of which approximately 60 to 70% were unfounded. [¶]

This bill will help prevent frivolous complaints which can affect

the individual officer’s future. For example, a Deputy Sheriff on

a list for promotion to Sergeant receives a false report of

misconduct, after which his promotion is deferred until the

matter is resolved. After which, the complaint being found

unfounded, the Deputy has no recourse for any financial loss due

6

The legislative history of section 148.6(a) does not explain

how law enforcement agencies had “revised their citizen

complaint procedures to promote greater accountability on the

part of their line officers.” (Assem. Com. on Public Safety

Analysis, supra, at p. 1.) Whatever the nature of the revisions,

it appears that such changes were not compelled by section

832.5. That statute was originally passed in 1974 and remained

in its original form when section 148.6(a) was enacted.

11

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

to the delay.” (Assem. Com. on Public Safety Analysis, supra, at

p. 2.)

Although not mentioned in the reports before the

Legislature, several enrolled bill reports stated that section

148.6(a) would also save “department resources and time by not

having to investigate unfounded complaints.” (Dep. of Forestry

and Fire Protection, Enrolled Bill Rep. on Assem. Bill No. 1732

(1995–1996 Reg. Sess.) Sept. 8, 1995, p. 1; see Dep. Parks and

Recreation, Enrolled Bill Rep. on Assem. Bill No. 1732 (1995–

1996 Reg. Sess.) Sept. 8, 1995, p. 1; Governor’s Office of

Planning and Research, Enrolled Bill Rep. on Assem. Bill No.

1732 (1995–1996 Reg. Sess.) Sept. 8, 1995, p. 2.)

B. Procedural History

As discussed in more detail below, in Stanistreet, supra,

29 Cal.4th 497, we ruled that section 148.6(a) did not violate the

First Amendment because it fell within each of the categories

that R. A. V. had identified as permissible forms of content-

based regulation within a proscribable category of speech. Two

years after we decided Stanistreet, a federal district court

expressly rejected our analysis and held that section 148.6(a)

“does not come within the . . . R. A. V. categories of permissible

content-based subclass regulation” and was thus

“unconstitutional in violation of the First Amendment.”

(Hamilton II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d at p. 1091; accord Eakins,

supra, 219 F.Supp.2d 1113.) The United States Court of

Appeals for the Ninth Circuit shortly followed suit, reasoning

that section 148.6(a)(1) unlawfully discriminated on the basis of

viewpoint by criminalizing knowingly false speech that is

critical of police officers while leaving unregulated knowingly

false speech that is supportive of police officers. (See Chaker,

12

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

supra, 428 F.3d at p. 1227 [“The imbalance generated by section

148.6 — i.e., only individuals critical of peace officers are subject

to liability and not those who are supportive — . . . turns the

First Amendment on its head”].)

Following those federal decisions, the City entered into a

consent decree with the federal government that prevented the

City from enforcing the advisory requirement set forth in section

148.6(a)(2). After the decree expired in 2013, the City —

presumably concerned about Chaker’s holding that section

148.6(a)(1)’s criminal provision was unconstitutional —

continued not to comply with the admonition requirement. In

2017, the LAPPL filed the current action against the City, which

seeks an injunction requiring it to comply with section

148.6(a)(2)’s advisory requirement. Concluding that it was

bound by Stanistreet, the trial court entered judgment in favor

of the LAPPL and enjoined the City from accepting any

complaint alleging misconduct by a peace officer unless the

complainant has signed the advisory described in section

148.6(a)(2). The Court of Appeal affirmed. We granted review.

II. DISCUSSION

The City argues that Chaker, supra, 428 F.3d 1215, and

other intervening federal authorities cast doubt on the

continuing validity of Stanistreet.7 As discussed below, while we

apply different reasoning than the Chaker court, we agree that

7

In challenging the constitutionality of section 148.6(a), the

City appears to rely solely on the free speech clause set forth in

the First Amendment of the federal Constitution; it has not raised

any argument that the California Constitution provides a separate

basis of relief.

13

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

subsequent developments in the law warrant a reconsideration

of our holding in Stanistreet.

A. Relevant Case Law

In order to understand the complex First Amendment

issues presented in this case, it is necessary to review the series

of cases that preceded the challenge before us.

1. R. A. V. v. City of St. Paul

In R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. 377, the Supreme Court

considered a constitutional challenge to a City of St. Paul

ordinance that made it a crime to display a symbol “ ‘which one

knows or has reasonable grounds to know arouses anger, alarm

or resentment in others on the basis of race, color, creed, religion

or gender.’ ” (Id. at p. 380, italics added.) The Minnesota

Supreme Court had previously construed the ordinance as

reaching only “fighting words,” a well-established category of

unprotected speech.

In its analysis, the Supreme Court accepted the state

court’s conclusion that the statute only reached speech that

amounted to fighting words. The court explained, however, that

even those “limited” categories of speech that may be subjected

to regulation (fighting words, defamation, obscenity, fraud, etc.)

are not “entirely invisible to the Constitution.” (R. A. V., supra,

505 U.S. at p. 383.) R. A. V. established a general rule that

“while certain categories of speech . . . may be regulated, such

regulation may not discriminate within that category on the

basis of content.” (Stanistreet, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 507.)

Thus, for example, “the government may proscribe libel; but it

may not make the further content discrimination of proscribing

only libel critical of the government.” (R. A. V., at p. 384.)

14

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Critically, however, the court went on to explain that the

First Amendment’s general prohibition against content

discrimination “applies differently in the context of proscribable

speech than in the area of fully protected speech.” (R. A. V.,

supra, 505 U.S. at p. 387.) According to the court, while the

“rationale of the general prohibition . . . is that content

discrimination ‘raises the specter that the Government may

effectively drive certain ideas or viewpoints from the

marketplace,’ [citations] . . . content discrimination among

various instances of a class of proscribable speech often does not

pose this threat.” (Id. at pp. 387–388.)

The court next described some categories of content

discrimination within a proscribable class of speech that

generally do not threaten to drive viewpoints from the public

sphere. The first of those categories is “[w]hen the basis for the

content discrimination consists entirely of the very reason the

entire class of speech at issue is proscribable.” (R. A. V., supra,

505 U.S. at p. 388.) Providing illustrations of regulations that

might fall within this category, the court explained that “[a]

State might choose to prohibit only that obscenity which is the

most patently offensive in its prurience — i.e., that which

involves the most lascivious displays of sexual activity. But it

may not prohibit, for example, only that obscenity which

includes offensive political messages. [Citation.] And the

Federal Government can criminalize only those threats of

violence that are directed against the President [citation] —

since the reasons why threats of violence are outside the First

Amendment (protecting individuals from the fear of violence,

from the disruption that fear engenders, and from the possibility

15

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

that the threatened violence will occur) have special force when

applied to the person of the President.” (Ibid.)

Second, citing Renton v. Playtime Theatres, Inc. (1986)

475 U.S. 41, 48 (Renton), the court explained that content-based

regulations within a proscribable category of speech are

generally “valid” (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 390) when the

regulation is “aimed only at the ‘secondary effects’ of the speech”

(id. at p. 394). The court noted, for example, that a state could

“permit all obscene live performances except those involving

minors.” (Id. at p. 389.)

Finally, the court recognized a “more general exception for

content discrimination that does not threaten censorship of

ideas.” (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 393.) As explained by the

court, “Where totally proscribable speech is at issue,” there need

not be any specific “ ‘neutral’ basis [to justify the regulation] so

long as the nature of the content discrimination is such that

there is no realistic possibility that official suppression of ideas

is afoot. (We cannot think of any First Amendment interest that

would stand in the way of a State’s prohibiting only those

obscene motion pictures with blue-eyed actresses).” (Id. at

p. 390.)

Having laid out the general principles applicable to

content-based regulations within a proscribable category of

speech, the court concluded that the statute under review was

impermissible because it created a special prohibition on hate

speech that insults or provokes violence “ ‘on the basis of race,

color, [or] creed,’ ” while permitting symbols that are intended

to express hostility for other reasons, such as “political

affiliation, union membership, or homosexuality.” (R. A. V.,

supra, 505 U.S. at p. 391.) The court further concluded that the

16

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

prohibition went “even beyond mere content discrimination, to

actual viewpoint discrimination. Displays containing some

words — odious racial epithets, for example — would be

prohibited to proponents of all views. But ‘fighting words’ that

do not themselves invoke race, color, creed, religion, or gender

. . . would . . . be usable ad libitum.” (Ibid.)

The court next addressed why the statute did not fall

within any of the three categories of generally permissible

content-based regulations it had described earlier in the

opinion. Turning to the first category — “content discrimination

based on the very reasons why the particular class of speech at

issue . . . is proscribable” (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 393) —

the court explained that fighting words are excluded from First

Amendment protection because their “content embodies a

particularly intolerable . . . mode of expressing whatever idea

the speaker wishes to convey” (ibid., italics omitted). The court

reasoned, however, that the ordinance at issue had “not singled

out an especially offensive mode of expression. . . . Rather, it

has proscribed fighting words of whatever manner that

communicate messages of racial, gender, or religious

intolerance.” (Id. at pp. 393–394.)

The court also concluded the ordinance did not fall within

the exception for content discrimination “aimed only at the

‘secondary effects’ of the speech.” (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at

p. 394.) St. Paul had argued this exception was applicable

because the intent of the ordinance was not to limit the speech

rights of the accused, but rather to protect “ ‘particularly

vulnerable’ ” groups that had ‘ ‘historically . . . been

discriminated against.’ ” (Ibid.) The court disagreed, explaining

that “ ‘[t]he emotive impact of speech on its audience is not a

17

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

“secondary effect.” ’ ” (Ibid.) The court likewise concluded that

the “general exception” (id. at p. 393) for restrictions that are

“beyond the suspicion of official suppression of ideas” (id. at

p. 395) was clearly inapplicable because St. Paul had expressly

argued that the intent of the statute was to suppress ideas

expressed against specific classes of persons.

Having found that the ordinance was an impermissible

content-based regulation on hate speech because its application

turned on the viewpoint of the speaker, the court went on to

apply strict scrutiny and found the statute unconstitutional.

2. People v. Stanistreet

In Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th 497, the defendants

challenged their convictions under section 148.6(a)(1),

contending that the statute violated R. A. V.’s rule against

content-based regulations within proscribable categories of

speech. The defendants argued that while California was

permitted to ban all defamatory statements made against public

officials (or at least those that meet the heightened mens rea

requirement of New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (1964) 376 U.S.

254 (New York Times)), the state was not permitted to “apply

one defamation rule to citizen complaints against peace officers,

and a different rule to those made against other public officials.”

(Stanistreet, at p. 507.)

We agreed with the defendants that section 148.6(a)’s

distinct treatment of complaints against peace officers versus

complaints against other public officials qualified as a content-

based regulation within a proscribable category of speech, which

we described as “knowingly false statements of fact.”

(Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 508.) We further held,

18

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

however, that the statute fell within each of the three categories

of content-based regulations of proscribable speech that R. A. V.

identified as generally not posing any threat to the marketplace

of ideas.

Applying the first category — “ ‘[w]hen the basis for the

content discrimination consists entirely of the very reason the

entire class of speech at issue is proscribable’ ” (Stanistreet,

supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 508) — we reiterated that the relevant

“[proscribable] class of speech at issue” was “knowingly false

statements of fact.” (Ibid.) Relying on R. A. V.’s example that

“ ‘the reasons why threats of violence are [proscribable] . . . have

special force when applied to the President’ ” (ibid.), we

concluded that the reason false statements are generally

proscribable likewise “has ‘special force’ [citation] when applied

to false accusations against peace officers. When a person

makes a complaint against a peace officer of the type that

section 148.6 governs, the agency receiving the complaint is

legally obligated to investigate it and to retain the complaint

and resulting reports or findings for at least five years. (§ 832.5.)

Thus, the potential harm of a knowingly false statement is

greater here than in other situations.” (Ibid., italics omitted.)

We also found section 148.6(a) valid under R. A. V.’s

second category of generally permissible forms of regulations,

reasoning that false accusations against peace officers have

“substantial secondary effects — they trigger mandatory

investigation and record retention requirements” that compel

law enforcement agencies to expend “[p]ublic resources . . . that

could otherwise be used for other matters.” (Stanistreet, supra,

29 Cal.4th at p. 509.) We further noted that once triggered,

those mandatory requirements could “adversely affect the

19

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

accused peace officer’s career, at least until the investigation is

complete.” (Ibid.)

Finally, we held that the statute was valid under R. A. V.’s

general “catchall exception,” concluding there was “no realistic

possibility” (Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 509) that section

148.6(a)’s criminalization of knowingly false complaints against

police was meant to suppress any particular idea or viewpoint.

Rejecting the Court of Appeal’s conclusion that the law might

operate “ ‘to suppress . . . citizen complaints of police

misconduct,’ ” we explained that “[t]he Legislature is not

suppressing all complaints of police misconduct, only knowingly

false ones.” (Stanistreet, at p. 509.) We further noted that

rather than disfavoring police complaints, the Legislature had

in many respects “favored” such speech by requiring their

investigation. (Id. at p. 510.) We explained that “[t]he

Legislature may elevate the status of a category of complaints”

by mandating that they be investigated and that the records of

the investigation be retained, “and at the same time penalize

those” who choose to file a knowingly false complaint after

having received an admonition explaining that their allegations

would trigger an investigation under California law. (Ibid.) “No

one has a constitutional right to make a complaint of misconduct

knowing both that the complaint must be investigated and that

it is false.” (Ibid.)

In a concurring opinion, Justice Werdegar (joined by

Justice Moreno) agreed that section 148.6(a) was constitutional

under R. A. V.’s secondary effects category of regulation but

disagreed that either of the other two categories applied. As to

the first R.AV. category, the concurrence defined the relevant

“class of speech at issue” as “defamation,” which is generally

20

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

subject to regulation because defamatory statements “may

injure personal reputations without making any positive

contribution to the democratic process.” (Stanistreet, supra,

29 Cal.4th at p. 513, conc. opn. of Werdegar, J.) The concurrence

reasoned that “section 148.6 does not target speech that is

especially worthless or especially injurious to reputation. . . .

[N]othing about false speech affecting peace officers . . .

distinguishes it from false speech affecting other governmental

officials with respect to the grounds on which defamation is

proscribable in the first place.” (Ibid.)

The concurrence also rejected the majority’s application of

the “catchall” exception, explaining that the Legislature had

created a special crime that applies only to allegations against

peace officers while simultaneously creating a “unique . . .

mandate” that “prospective complainants” be warned of the

“possibility of criminal sanctions.” (Stanistreet, supra,

29 Cal.4th at p. 513, conc. opn. of Werdegar, J.) Justice

Werdegar explained that, “[r]ealistically,” these features of the

law would cause “some complainants . . . to choose not to go

forward — even when they have legitimate complaints.” (Id. at

p. 514.)

3. Cases decided after Stanistreet

Since Stanistreet was decided, several federal decisions

have weighed in either specifically on the constitutionality of

section 148.6(a) or more generally on issues that relate to the

analysis in R. A. V. and Stanistreet.

21

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

a. Federal cases finding section 148.6(a)

unconstitutional

In Hamilton II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d 1087, a plaintiff

brought a federal civil rights action against the City of San

Bernardino arising out of his interactions with law enforcement.

(See Hamilton I, supra, 107 F.Supp.2d at pp. 1240–1241.) The

plaintiff, a Black man, alleged that he had been unlawfully

stopped on his bicycle and was then handcuffed and beaten. He

was taken into custody and later released with a citation for not

having a bicycle license. The plaintiff later returned to the

police to lodge a citizen’s complaint. According to the complaint,

the watch commander questioned his story and orally advised

the plaintiff that he could be prosecuted for knowingly filing a

false complaint and provided a copy of the written admonition

required under section 148.6(a)(2). After receiving those

warnings, the plaintiff chose not to file a complaint. The

plaintiff subsequently filed a civil rights complaint against the

police department that included a claim alleging section

148.6(a) was unconstitutional.

The district court granted the plaintiff summary judgment

on his challenge to section 148.6(a), concluding that Stanistreet

had erred in finding that the statute fell within the categories of

generally permissible content-based regulations of proscribable

speech described in R. A. V. Regarding the first category, the

court rejected Stanistreet’s rationale that “the reasons for

proscribing defamation have special force when applied to law

enforcement officers” because false complaints trigger

investigation requirements that might result in “greater harm

to law enforcement officers than to other groups of persons.”

(Hamilton II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d at p. 1091.) Echoing Justice

22

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Werdegar’s concurrence in Stanistreet, the court found that the

state had failed to show there was anything “ ‘about the position

of a peace officer [that] is inherently tied to the policies

underlying the law of defamation, as compared to the position of

other government officers.’ ” (Hamilton I, supra, 107 F.Supp.2d

at p. 1246.) The court explained that, in fact, “[p]ublic officials

are generally entitled to less protection from defamatory

statements since they hold positions of prominence.” (Hamilton

II, at p. 1092, italics added.)

Regarding the “secondary effects” exception, the court

concluded that “even if [California] was partly motivated by the

desire to curb the harmful effects of wasted investigative

resources and damage to officers’ reputation, . . . these motives

focus on the direct impact of the speech, not its ‘secondary’

effects.” (Hamilton II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d at p. 1093.)

Because section 148.6(a) “is justified only by reference to the

content of the speech . . ., the ‘secondary effects’ doctrine” does

not apply. (Id. at p. 1093.)

Finally, the court rejected Stanistreet’s conclusion that

“ ‘the nature of the content discrimination is such that there is

no realistic possibility that official suppression of ideas is

afoot.’ ” (Hamilton II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d at p. 1090.)

According to the court, section 148.6(a)’s criminal provision,

combined with its “mandat[e] that an individual wishing to

register a complaint . . . first receive the sobering forewarning

that she or he can be criminally prosecuted for making a

knowingly false complaint against an officer” (id. at p. 1094),

were “high[ly] like[ly] [to] . . . cause individuals to refrain from

filing a complaint against law enforcement officers” (ibid.).

23

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Shortly after Hamilton II was decided, the Ninth Circuit

held that section 148.6(a)(1)’s criminal provision violated the

First Amendment. (See Chaker, supra, 428 F.3d 1215.) Unlike

Stanistreet, the court did not focus on the fact that section

148.6(a) treats misconduct claims made against peace officers

differently than complaints made against other types of public

officials. Instead, Chaker concluded that the statute

“discriminates on the basis of a speaker’s viewpoint” (Chaker, at

p. 1217) by “holding . . . citizen complainants accountable for

their knowing falsehoods, while leaving unregulated the

knowingly false speech of a peace officer or witness.” (Id. at

p. 1226.) The court observed that the state’s “asserted interest”

(ibid.) in passing section 148.6(a) — to save valuable public

resources and maintain integrity in the complaint process —

was undermined by “its choice to prohibit only the knowingly

false speech of those citizens who complain of peace officer

conduct.” (Chaker, at p. 1226.)

b. First Amendment decisions implicating issues

related to R. A. V. and Stanistreet

In Davenport, supra, 551 U.S. 177, a union filed a free

speech challenge to a state law that placed certain restrictions

on public employee unions’ ability to spend fees that they collect

from employees who are not union members but who are

represented by the union in collective bargaining. The law at

issue required the unions to obtain affirmative consent from

nonunion members before using their funds for election-related

expenditures but permitted the union to expend nonmember

fees for other purposes without obtaining such consent. The

union argued that by placing restrictions on expenditures

related to elections but not for other purposes, the statute

24

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

effectively imposed a content-based regulation that must be

evaluated under strict scrutiny.

The court agreed that the statute constituted a content-

based regulation and that such regulations are generally treated

as “presumptively invalid.” (Davenport, supra, 551 U.S. at

p. 188.) Quoting R. A. V., the court explained that “ ‘[t]he

rationale of the general prohibition’ ” on content-based

discrimination is that such regulations “ ‘ “raise[] the specter

that the Government may effectively drive certain ideas or

viewpoints from the marketplace.” ’ ” (Id. at p. 188.) The court

further explained, however, that its prior cases had “identified

numerous situations in which that risk is inconsequential . . . so

that . . . strict scrutiny is unwarranted.” (Ibid.) As an example,

the court again cited R. A. V., explaining that “content

discrimination among various instances of a class of

proscribable speech does not pose a threat to the marketplace of

ideas when the selected subclass is chosen for the very reason

that the entire class can be proscribed.” (Ibid.) The court then

applied those general principles to the statute before it,

concluding that placing a “reasonable” and “viewpoint-neutral

limitation” on the manner in which nonunion members’ fees

could be expended did not “impermissibly distort[] the

marketplace of ideas.” (Id. at p. 189.) Notably, in discussing

R. A. V. and other First Amendment decisions addressing

situations where content-based regulations are generally

permissible, the court focused on the minimal risk that those

forms of regulations posed to suppressing certain ideas or

viewpoints, not on whether the government was in fact

attempting to suppress such speech.

25

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

In Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. 709, the Supreme Court

considered a First Amendment challenge to “The Stolen Valor

Act of 2005” (the Stolen Valor Act or the Act), a federal law that

made it a crime to falsely represent having been awarded the

Congressional Medal of Honor. Although six justices found the

law to violate the First Amendment, no opinion secured a

majority.

The four-vote plurality opinion began its analysis by

rejecting the government’s contention that false statements of

fact constitute a general category of speech that lack First

Amendment protection. (See Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 722,

plur. opn. of Kennedy, J. [“The Government has not

demonstrated that false statements generally should constitute

a new category of unprotected speech”].) While acknowledging

that prior opinions contained language that could be read to

support that conclusion, the plurality clarified that those cases

involved false statements that were associated with a “legally

cognizable harm” such as defamation or fraud. (Id. at p. 719.)

In contrast, the plurality reasoned, the Act extended criminal

liability to false claims regarding military medals, no matter the

context in which they were made and regardless of whether they

had caused harm. (Id. at pp. 722–723.) Although the plurality

concluded that the Act furthered a legitimate state interest —

“protecting the integrity of the military honors system” (id. at

p. 725) — it explained that approving a criminal statute that

targeted “falsity and nothing more” (id. at p. 719) would risk

“cast[ing] a chill . . . [on speech that] the First Amendment

cannot permit” (id. at p. 723). According to the plurality,

because the Act “conflict[ed] with free speech principles” it was

subject to strict scrutiny and could not satisfy that “exacting”

26

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

level of review because there were less speech-deterring ways to

address the state’s interests. (Id. at p. 724.)

In a concurring opinion, Justice Breyer (joined by Justice

Kagan) likewise rejected the government’s theory that “false

factual statements” are entitled to “ ‘no [constitutional]

protection at all.’ ” (Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 732, conc. opn.

of Breyer, J., at pp. 732, 733.) Unlike the plurality, however, the

concurrence concluded that when evaluating a regulation of

“false statements about easily verifiable facts” (id. at p. 732),

courts should apply intermediate scrutiny, asking whether “the

statute works speech-related harm that is out of proportion to

its justifications” (id. at p. 730). In applying that test, the

concurrence noted that the Act lacked any of the “limiting

features” (id. at p. 736) that were evident in numerous other

prohibitions on falsity the court had previously endorsed. Those

limitations included, for example, “requiring proof of specific

harm to identifiable victims” or limiting the reach of the statute

to statements made in “contexts in which a tangible harm to

others is especially likely to occur.” (Id. at p. 734.) In contrast,

the Act’s broad prohibition on any knowing false claims about

being a medal recipient “create[d] a significant risk of First

Amendment harm” by (among other things) broadly applying to

contexts in which the falsity would be unlikely to cause harm,

inviting selective prosecutions on the part of the government

and “chilling . . . [speakers who] might still be worried about

being prosecuted for a careless false statement.” (Id. at p. 736,

italics omitted.) The concurrence ultimately concluded that

while the Act had laudable objectives, it could not pass

intermediate scrutiny because the government had failed to

27

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

show “why a more finely tailored statute would not” satisfy those

goals. (Id. at p. 739.)

Finally, in Free Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. 409, the

court addressed the constitutionality of a state law requiring

“commercial websites that publish sexually explicit content to

verify the ages of their visitors.” (Id. at p. 462.) The state

argued that the law was only subject to “rational-basis review”

(id. at p. 477) because it regulated an unprotected form of

speech, namely “speech that is obscene to minors” (id. at p. 482).

While the court agreed that the statute did not “directly regulate

. . . protected speech” (ibid.), it concluded that heightened

scrutiny was nonetheless warranted because the age

verification statute had an “incidental burden” on protected

speech, namely “adult[s’] . . . right to access speech that is

obscene only to minors” (id. at p. 495, italics added).

The court went on to hold that intermediate scrutiny was

the appropriate standard of review for laws that “directly

regulate[] unprotected activity . . . while only incidentally

burdening protected activity.” (Free Speech Coalition, supra,

606 U.S at p. 492.) The more “unforgiving” strict scrutiny

standard, the court explained, is reserved for restrictions that

“direct[ly] target[] . . . fully protected speech.” (Id. at p. 484.)

According to the court, while not as exacting as strict scrutiny,

intermediate scrutiny nonetheless “plays an important role in

ensuring” that statutes with an “ostensibly legitimate

purpose[]” are not structured in a manner that threatens to

“suppress fundamental rights.” (Id. at p. 495.) The court

explained for example, that while merely requiring an adult to

verify their age through a routine credit-card transaction was

28

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

permissible, the state could not “require as proof of age an

‘affidavit’ from the individual’s ‘biological parent.’ ” (Ibid.)

B. Is There an Adequate Basis to Reconsider

Stanistreet?

Before addressing the merits of the parties’ arguments

regarding section 148.6(a), we first address whether there are

appropriate grounds to reconsider our holding in Stanistreet,

supra, 29 Cal.4th 497, given the doctrine of stare decisis.8 (See

Moradi-Shalal, supra, 46 Cal.3d at p. 296 [stare decisis requires

that “prior applicable precedent usually must be followed even

though the case, if considered anew, might be decided differently

by the current justices”].) For the reasons explained below, we

conclude that a re-examination is warranted.

While we do not “lightly” depart from past precedents,

stare decisis nonetheless remains a “ ‘a flexible [policy].’ ”

(People v. Mendoza (2000) 23 Cal.4th 896, 924.)

“[R]eexamination of precedent may become necessary when

subsequent developments indicate an earlier decision was

unsound, or has become ripe for reconsideration.” (In re Jaime

P. (2006) 40 Cal.4th 128, 133.) “ ‘This is especially so when [the

issues under consideration] . . . relate[] to “matter[s] of

continuing concern” to the community at large.’ ” (Moradi-

Shalal, supra, 46 Cal.4th at p. 296.)

8

Although the LAPPL has not raised any arguments

directly predicated on the stare decisis effect of Stanistreet, we

nonetheless think it appropriate to address this “fundamental

jurisprudential policy.” (Moradi-Shalal v. Fireman’s Fund Ins.

Companies (1988) 46 Cal.3d 287, 296 (Moradi-Shalal).)

29

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Those factors are clearly implicated here. We are

presented with a constitutional question regarding the validity

of a statute that implicates a subject — “ ‘[c]riticism of public

officials[ — that] lies at the very core of speech protected by the

First Amendment.’ ” (Green v. City of St. Louis (8th Cir. 2022)

52 F.4th 734, 739 (Green); accord Hernandez v. City of Phoenix

(9th Cir. 2022) 43 F.4th 966, 981.) What restrictions, and in

particular what criminal restrictions, our government may

place on speech related to the misconduct of police officers is

clearly a matter of continuing concern to the public at large.

Moreover, in the years since Stanistreet was decided,

multiple federal decisions have rejected its reasoning, creating

a split of authority that has resulted in a mandatory injunction

issued by a state superior court (and affirmed by the Court of

Appeal) directing that the City enforce section 148.6(a)(2)’s

admonishment requirement despite the fact that the Ninth

Circuit has held that the criminal provision that section

148.6(a)(2) references is unconstitutional. (See Swift & Co. v.

Wickham (1965) 382 U.S. 111, 116 [reevaluation of precedent

may be necessary where prior holding has created practical

complications or resulted in “mischievous consequences to

litigants and courts”].)9

9

The potential problems that split has caused are not just

theoretical. In Cuadra v. City of South San Francisco (N.D.Cal.,

Jan. 4, 2010, No. C 08-3439 TEH) 2010 WL 55875 (Cuadra), the

plaintiff brought a federal civil rights action against the City of

South San Francisco after being arrested for violating section

148.6(a)(1). The officers who prepared the police report that led

to the plaintiff’s arrest moved for summary judgment on the

30

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Most critically, as discussed in more detail below, since

Stanistreet was decided, the United States Supreme Court has

issued multiple rulings that provide further guidance regarding

how we should evaluate the constitutionality of a statute like

section 148.6(a), which discriminates based on content within a

proscribable class of knowing falsehoods (defamation). (See

Davenport, supra, 551 U.S. at p. 188 [describing when

restrictions on speech that fall outside “ ‘the general

prohibition’ ” on content-based regulations warrant heightened

scrutiny]; Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 709 [false statements do

not qualify as a category of unprotected speech]; Free Speech

Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. at p. 495 [content-based restrictions

that regulate unprotected speech are subject to heightened

review if they incidentally burden protected speech].)

For all those reasons, we believe this is an appropriate

case in which to revisit our prior precedent in Stanistreet.

C. Is Section 148.6(a)(1) a Valid Restraint on

Speech?

1. Section 148.6(a) qualifies as a content-based

regulation within a proscribable category of speech

The question we must address in this case is whether

section 148.6(a) constitutes an impermissible content-based

restriction on speech. The parties do not dispute that the

statute, which makes it a crime to file a knowingly false

“allegation” of police misconduct and compels complainants to

basis of qualified immunity. The federal court denied the

motion, explaining that there “was no probable cause to arrest

[plaintiff] for breaking a law that had already been held

unconstitutional [by the Ninth Circuit], which means a

constitutional right was violated.” (Id. at pp. *28–29.)

31

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

read and sign an admonition acknowledging it is a crime to file

a knowingly false “complaint against an officer,” qualifies as a

content-based regulation of speech. (§ 148.6(a), capitalization

and boldface omitted; see generally Reed v. Town of Gilbert

(2015) 576 U.S. 155, 163 (Reed) [a law is content based if it

“applies to particular speech because of the topic discussed or

the idea or message expressed”]; McCullen v. Coakley (2014)

573 U.S. 464, 479 [law is content based if it “require[s]

‘enforcement authorities’ to ‘examine the content of the message

that is conveyed to determine whether’ a violation [of the law]

has occurred”].)

Content-based laws are presumptively unconstitutional

and generally subject to strict scrutiny. (Reed, supra, 576 U.S.

at p. 163.) Notwithstanding that general rule, our high court

has identified limited situations in which strict scrutiny does not

automatically apply. It is well-established, for example, that

content-based restrictions are permissible on speech that falls

within certain “ ‘ “historic and traditional categories [of

expression] long familiar to the bar,” ’ ” including (among other

categories) defamation, fraud, fighting words and obscenity.

(Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 717, plur. opn of Kennedy, J.; see

R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 388.) R. A. V., in turn, established

an alternate framework of analysis for “content discrimination

among various instances of a class of proscribable speech.”

(R. A. V., at p. 388; see Chaker, supra, 428 F.3d at p. 1224 [“The

leading case establishing the First Amendment’s application to

proscribable classes of speech is R. A. V.”].)

Accordingly, the first issue we must address is whether

section 148.6(a) qualifies as a content-based restriction within a

proscribable category of speech, thus triggering review under

32

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

the principles of R. A. V., or whether it implicates “fully

protected speech” (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 387), thus

automatically triggering strict scrutiny review. As explained

above, Stanistreet concluded that review under R. A. V. was

appropriate because “[s]ection 148.6 proscribes only

constitutionally unprotected speech — knowingly false

statements of fact.” (Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 501,

italics added; see id. at p. 508 [“the entire class of speech at

issue — knowingly false statements of fact — is proscribable”].)

Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. 709, however, has since suggested that

we were incorrect in concluding that knowingly false statements

of fact qualify as a category of proscribable speech. (See ante, at

pp. 26–28.)

While true that without the benefit of Alvarez, Stanistreet

broadly characterized the relevant category of proscribable

speech as “knowingly false statements of fact” (Stanistreet,

supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 508), our analysis in that case

nonetheless makes clear that we also viewed section 148.6(a) as

regulating a subclass of false statements that unquestionably

falls outside the protections of the First Amendment, namely

defamatory falsehoods. Our decision, for example,

characterized the defendants’ core constitutional argument to be

that section 148.6(a) impermissibly establishes different

“defamation rule[s]” for complaints against peace officers.

(Stanistreet, at p. 507.) Further, when summarizing the

applicable First Amendment principles at issue, we focused

almost exclusively on Supreme Court precedent addressing the

limitations on defamation actions against public officials. (See

id. at pp. 505–506 [discussing New York Times, supra, 376 U.S.

254 and Garrison v. Louisiana (1964) 379 U.S. 64].) And when

33

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

addressing why we need not consider “the California

Constitution as a separate basis to invalidate section 148.6,” we

explained that “California law regarding defamation is

coterminous with that of the United States Constitution.”

(Stanistreet, at p. 504, fn. 3; see id. at p. 507, fn. 4 [noting that

R. A. V. “cited defamation as an example of the kind of

proscribable speech it was talking about”].)

We now confirm what we implied in Stanistreet: section

148.6(a) criminalizes allegations of police misconduct that are

defamatory in nature. Indeed, the legislative history makes

clear that one of the primary motivations in enacting section

148.6(a) was to protect law enforcement from the professional

and reputational harms that result from knowingly false

allegations of misconduct. (See ante, at pp. 10–12; Stanistreet,

supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 503 [§ 148.6(a) was intended to address

“frivolous complaints which can affect the individual officer’s

future” and have an “ ‘adverse impact’ ” on peace officers’

careers], italics added; see also Rest.2d Torts, § 569, com. e

[statements that “attribute . . . conduct or characteristics

incompatible with the proper conduct . . . or with the proper

discharge of . . . duties as a public officer” are generally deemed

to be defamatory].) Accordingly, we conclude that section

148.6(a) constitutes a content-based regulation within a

proscribable category of speech and is therefore subject to

review under the framework set forth in R. A. V.

2. Application of R. A. V.

a. General principles guiding the evaluation of

content-based regulations of defamation

R. A. V. makes clear that some forms of content-based

regulation within a proscribable class of speech warrant

34

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

heightened scrutiny while others do not. (See R. A. V., supra,

505 U.S. at p. 384.) The high court’s decision, however, leaves

some uncertainty as to how, exactly, courts should evaluate

whether a particular form of content-based regulation within a

proscribable class of speech warrants additional scrutiny.

Broadly speaking, the court explained that while content-based

regulations are generally prohibited because they “ ‘raise[] the

specter that the Government may effectively drive certain ideas

or viewpoints from the marketplace’ ” (id. at p. 388), many forms

of “content discrimination among various instances of a class of

proscribable speech . . . do[] not pose this threat” (id. at p. 388).

The court then described three categories of content

discrimination within a proscribable category of speech that

generally “do not threaten to drive ideas or viewpoints from the

marketplace and hence are permissible.” (Stanistreet,

29 Cal.4th at p. 508, citing R. A. V., at pp. 388–390.)

While these three categories play an important role in

assessing whether a content-based regulation within a

proscribable category of speech warrants further scrutiny, we

believe they are best understood as proxies for the ultimate

question that courts must decide when evaluating such a

regulation: Does the form of regulation that the Legislature

adopted create a consequential risk of “ ‘driv[ing] certain ideas

or viewpoints’ ” from the public sphere? (R. A. V., supra,

505 U.S. at p. 387; see Davenport, supra, 551 U.S. at p. 188

[characterizing the first R. A. V. “category” of permissible

regulation — “when the selected subclass is chosen for the very

reason that the entire class can be proscribed” — as one

situation where “the risk” that the regulation “will

35

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

impermissibly interfere with the marketplace of ideas” is so

“inconsequential” that further scrutiny “is unwarranted”].)

Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S 709, applied similar principles in

the context of regulations that prohibit knowing falsehoods. A

majority of the court there concluded that some forms of

prohibitions on knowingly false statements, even well-

intentioned ones, can trigger constitutional scrutiny if the

prohibition is written in such a manner that it unduly burdens

protected speech. (See id. at p. 723, plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.

[permitting the government to criminalize any knowingly false

statement regarding the receipt of a military medal, regardless

of context, would “cast[] a chill . . . the First Amendment cannot

permit”]; id. at p. 736, conc. opn. of Breyer, J. [while limiting the

Act to “knowing and intentional acts of deception . . . reduc[es]

the risk that valuable speech is chilled,” the “breadth” of the

statute nonetheless “creates a significant risk of First

Amendment harm”; “a speaker might still be worried about

being prosecuted for a careless false statement, even if he does

not have the intent required to render him liable”], italics

omitted.) Thus, much like content-based regulations within a

proscribable category of speech, a core concern with statutes

targeting knowing falsehoods is whether they risk driving out

certain forms of ideas from the marketplace, which includes

“true” (or at least well-intentioned) speech. (Id. at pp. 733, 736,

conc. opn. of Breyer, J. [prohibitions on falsity “can inhibit the

speaker from making true statements, thereby ‘chilling’ a kind

of speech that lies at the First Amendment’s heart”; “a speaker

might . . . be worried about being prosecuted for a careless false

36

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

statement, even if he does not have the intent required to render

him liable”], italics omitted.)10

Most recently, the Supreme Court’s decision in Free

Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. 461, confirmed what was

implied in R. A. V. and Davenport: Statutes that regulate only

unprotected categories of speech can be subject to heightened

scrutiny if they have “ ‘an incidental effect on protected

speech.’ ” (Free Speech Coalition, at p. 478, quoting Boy Scouts

of America v. Dale (2000) 530 U.S. 640, 659.) Thus, the mere

fact that we have construed section 148.(6)(a) as applying to an

unprotected category of speech — knowingly false, defamatory

claims of police misconduct — does not foreclose the possibility

that the statute’s impacts on protected speech (truthful or well-

intentioned claims of police misconduct) might warrant

heightened review.

While there remains some uncertainty regarding the

specific contours of the high court holdings discussed above, the

fundamental principle we derive from those cases is that when

assessing a content-based regulation within a proscribable class

of speech, courts must evaluate whether the “risk” (Davenport,

supra, 551 U.S. at p. 188) that the prohibition will “ ‘drive

certain ideas or viewpoints’ ” (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 387)

10

In Alvarez, 567 U.S 709, the court expressed concerns

about multiple effects of the Stolen Valor Act, which broadly

criminalized knowingly false claims of having received certain

types of military medals. Those concerns included prohibiting

lies in contexts where they were unlikely to cause harm (e.g.,

private conversations in the bedroom) and chilling nonmalicious

forms of speech, including true speech. (See id., plur. opn. of

Kennedy J., at pp. 722–723; conc. opn. of Breyer, J., at pp. 733–

734, 736.)

37

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

from the public sphere is so “inconsequential” (Davenport, at

p. 188) that further constitutional scrutiny is unwarranted.

(See R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 387.) Stated differently,

courts should ask whether the regulation disfavors certain

viewpoints (as in R. A. V.) or is structured in a manner that

burdens protected forms of speech, whether directly (as in

Alvarez) or incidentally (as in Free Speech Coalition). Alvarez

suggests that when a statute targets a form of knowing

falsehood (as section 148.6(a) does), the court’s evaluation

should take into account whether the prohibition is drafted in

such a manner that it creates a consequential risk of chilling

citizens from engaging in protected forms of speech, including

truthful speech. Consideration should also be given to the

various categories of content discrimination described in

R. A. V. that generally “do[] not threaten censorship of ideas.”

(R. A. V. at p. 393; see id. at p. 388.)

Finally — and critically — while R. A. V. includes

language suggesting as much, cases like Davenport, Alvarez,

and Free Speech Coalition make clear that in conducting this

inquiry, the ultimate question is not whether there is reason to

believe that the government actually intended to drive out

certain viewpoints or forms of protected speech, but rather

whether the means that government has selected — even if well-

intentioned — create a substantial risk of doing so. (See

R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at pp. 387, 388 [some forms of content-

based regulations within proscribable classes of speech do not

“pose [the] . . . threat” of “ ‘effectively driv[ing] certain ideas or

viewpoints from the marketplace’ ”], italics added; Davenport,

supra, 551 U.S. at pp. 188, 189 [describing relevant inquiry as

38

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

whether regulation “pose[s] a threat to the marketplace of ideas”

or “impermissibly distort[s] the marketplace of ideas”].)

b. Section 148.6(a) raises substantial risks to the

marketplace of ideas

Applying the R. A. V. framework, as supplemented by the

high court’s analysis in Davenport, Alvarez, and Free Speech

Coalition, we conclude that section 148.6(a)’s criminal provision

(subdivision (a)(1)) and its accompanying admonition

requirement (subdivision (a)(2)) exhibit numerous

characteristics that, considered together, “incidental[ly]

burden” (Free Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. at p. 483) or

otherwise present a reasonable risk of driving certain forms of

protected speech — namely, truthful (or at least not knowingly

false) complaints of police misconduct — from the public sphere

so as to warrant additional scrutiny.

First, section 148.6(a) does not merely regulate speech,

but imposes criminal liability on speech. As our high court has

repeatedly explained, “[T]he severity of criminal sanctions may

well cause speakers to remain silent rather than communicate

even arguably unlawful words, ideas, and images. [Citation.]

As a practical matter, this increased deterrent effect . . . poses

greater First Amendment concerns than those implicated by . . .

civil regulation.” (Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union (1997)

521 U.S. 844, 872 (Reno); see City of Houston v. Hill (1987)

482 U.S. 451, 459 [“Criminal statutes [involving speech] must

be scrutinized with particular care”]; U.S. v. Caronia (2d Cir.

2012) 703 F.3d 149, 163 [“Criminal regulatory schemes [on

speech] . . . warrant even more careful scrutiny”]; Ashcroft v.

American Civil Liberties Union (2004) 542 U.S. 656, 660

[“Content-based prohibitions, enforced by severe criminal

39

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

penalties, have the constant potential to be a repressive force in

the lives and thoughts of a free people”].)

Second, section 148.6(a) singles out for criminal treatment

speech that is critical of a particular class of government

official — law enforcement — whose “duties . . . tend naturally

to have a relatively large or dramatic impact on members of the

public.” (Kahn v. Bower (1991) 232 Cal.App.3d 1599, 1611

(Kahn).) Courts have long emphasized that “the freedom to

criticize public officials and expose their wrongdoing is a

fundamental First Amendment value.” (Arnett v. Myers (6th

Cir. 2002) 281 F.3d 552, 560; see Rosenblatt v. Baer (1966)

383 U.S. 75, 85 [“Criticism of government is at the very center

of the constitutionally protected area of free discussion.

Criticism of those responsible for government operations must

be free, lest criticism of government itself be penalized”].) Thus,

section 148.6(a) is rare not only in that it imposes a form of

penalty that has been recognized to have a particularly

deterrent effect on speech — criminal liability — but also

implicates a topic — criticism of law enforcement — that “ ‘lies

at the very core of . . . the First Amendment.’ ” (Green, supra,

52 F.4th at p. 739.)

Adding to those concerns, section 148.6(a)(1)’s criminal

provision is asymmetrical in its application, criminalizing

knowingly false complaints filed against law enforcement

personnel — and expressly requiring complainants be told of

that possibility — while leaving unregulated (and requiring no

admonition against) knowingly false claims that a witness

might make against the complainant during any ensuing

40

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

investigation.11 LAPPL argues that this asymmetry is

understandable given that a knowingly false allegation of

misconduct triggers a mandatory investigation but a knowingly

false statement supportive of law enforcement has no such

effect. That does not change the fact, however, that

complainants face a situation in which they can be prosecuted if

authorities believe they are lying about their allegations of

misconduct — and are forcefully reminded of that possibility

through the admonition requirement (discussed more below) —

but witnesses speaking in favor of the accused officers would

face no such consequence under this law were they to lie about

the events in question. The concern with the statute then is not

its “ ‘underinclusiveness’ ” per se (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at

p. 387) — i.e., extending speech-related protections to one

11

Multiple federal courts have held that section 148.6(a)’s

disparate treatment of false claims made against police versus

false claims made in support of police in the context of an official

investigation qualifies as a form of “viewpoint” discrimination,

a subset of content-based restrictions that can “rarely, if ever,

. . . withstand [constitutional] . . . scrutiny.” (Sons of

Confederate Veterans, Inc. ex rel. Griffin v. Commissioner of

Virginia Dept. of Motor Vehicles (4th Cir. 2002) 288 F.3d 610,

616, fn. 4; see Chaker, supra, 428 F.3d at p. 1227 [§ 148.6(a)

“regulates an unprotected category of speech, but singles out

certain speech . . . based on the speaker’s viewpoint”]; Hamilton

II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d at p. 1094 [§ 148.6(a) “discriminates

based on viewpoint”].)

Because we conclude that section 148.6(a) is an invalid

content-based regulation, we need not address whether it might

also qualify as an invalid viewpoint-based regulation. (See

generally Iancu v. Brunetti (2019) 588 U.S. 388, 418, conc. & dis.

opn. of Sotomayor, J. [“the line between viewpoint-based and

viewpoint-neutral content discrimination can be ‘slippery’ ”].)

41

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

category of public official that other persons do not enjoy — but

rather that it does not treat defamatory expressions made in the

context of the same official police misconduct proceeding the

same way.12

More troubling still, section 148.6(a)(1)’s criminal

provision is accompanied by an admonition requirement that

contains various speech deterring elements. Section 148.6(a)(2)

prohibits law enforcement from accepting an official claim of

misconduct unless the complainant reads and signs an

admonition, which must be written in bold printed capital

letters, warning that “IT IS AGAINST THE LAW TO MAKE

A COMPLAINT THAT YOU KNOW TO BE FALSE. IF YOU

MAKE A COMPLAINT AGAINST AN OFFICER

KNOWING THAT IT IS FALSE, YOU CAN BE

12

The dissent argues that these asymmetry concerns are

unfounded because a witness testifying in support of a peace

officer would still be subject to criminal liability under section

132. (See dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at pp. 9–10.) That provision

directs that, in any trial or official proceeding, it is a crime to

submit a knowingly forged or fraudulently altered “instrument

in writing.” (§ 132.) The asymmetry remains, however, because

section 132 would not appear to reach oral statements a witness

for the peace officer might make during an official investigation.

The dissent also relies on section 118, which is California’s

prohibition on perjury. But section 118 pertains only to people

who have taken an oath and the dissent has provided no basis

to conclude that witness statements made in the context of

section 832.5 police investigations are generally required to be

made under oath. Nothing in section 132 or section 118 alters

the basic fact that section 148.6(a) criminalizes knowingly false

allegations of misconduct that are filed against a peace officer

while leaving unregulated knowingly false allegations that are

made in support of an accused peace officer.

42

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

PROSECUTED.” (Ibid.) Potential complainants are thus

effectively told: To lodge a complaint against a police officer, you

must first sign an acknowledgment that we can charge you with

a crime if we think you are being knowingly untruthful about

the allegations of misconduct levied against the employees of

our agency. Those concerns are compounded by the fact that, at

least in some situations, it appears that the admonition will be

provided by another law enforcement agent in the setting of a

police station. And these concerns are further exacerbated by

the fact that the very entity the citizen is making the complaint

to will often be the same entity that decides whether the

complainant has committed a crime pursuant to this statute for

purposes of effectuating their arrest. (See Cuadra, supra, 2010

WL 55875 [supervising captain of precinct found the defendant’s

allegations of misconduct untruthful and prepared report

referring the defendant for prosecution under section 148.6(a)].)

As Justice Werdegar astutely observed in Stanistreet,

supra, 29 Cal.4th 497, subdivision (a)(2) “is unique in its

mandate that the possibility of criminal sanctions for knowingly

false complaints be prominently held up before prospective

complainants at a critical juncture. In many police misconduct

situations, it inevitably will come down to the word of the citizen

against the word of the police officer or officers, in which case

law enforcement authorities will conduct an investigation to

determine who is telling the truth. If authorities for any reason

disbelieve the citizen, the citizen (whether guilty or innocent)

may then . . . face both criminal prosecution and the burden and

expense of retaining a defense attorney. Prospective

complainants cannot help but be aware of these realities when

deciding whether to go forward with their complaints by signing

43

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

the statute’s required admonition. Realistically, some

complainants are likely to choose not to go forward — even when

they have legitimate complaints.” (Id. at pp. 513–514, conc. opn.

of Werdegar, J., italics omitted; accord Hamilton II, supra,

325 F.Supp.2d at p. 1094 [“There is a high likelihood that

Section 148.6’s warning will cause individuals to refrain from

filing a complaint against law enforcement officers”].) Similarly

problematic, the admonition requirement may well deter

reporting by persons who merely suspect, but cannot be certain,

that they were a victim of more subtle forms of police misconduct

such as racial profiling or an unlawful stop. (See Alvarez, supra,

at p. 736, conc. opn. of Breyer, J. [mens rea element does not

eliminate the risk that “a speaker might . . . be worried about

being prosecuted for a careless false statement, even if he does

not have the intent required to render him liable”], italics

omitted.)

In sum, subdivision (a)(2) requires that: (1) complainants

walk into a police station and locate the appropriate person to

complain to, who will likely be a uniformed police officer; (2)

complainants make known that they want to levy a serious

complaint of misconduct against one of the colleagues of the

person they are complaining to; (3) complainants will then be

told that before the police will even accept a complaint, they

must sign an advisory acknowledging that they can be

criminally charged if law enforcement believes that anything

they say is knowingly false; and (4) the entity that will make a

determination of falsity for purposes of effectuating an arrest is,

in the first instance, likely to be the very entity that the person

is complaining about. It is reasonable to assume that when

presented with such a situation, some citizens — whether

44

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

fearful of retaliation for truthful reports of misconduct or merely

uncertain whether the alleged misconduct can be proven —

might well throw up their hands and ask, “Why bother?”

Raising further concerns, the language of subdivisions

(a)(1) and (a)(2) introduces uncertainty and confusion as to the

specific scope of statements that might fall within the criminal

provision. Subdivision (a)(1) criminalizes any knowingly false

“allegation of misconduct” but includes no definition of what

might constitute “misconduct.” (See, e.g., Giaccio v.

Pennsylvania (1966) 382 U.S. 399, 404 [statute allowing jury to

assess costs based on a finding that party engaged in

“misconduct” deemed impermissibly vague]; Perrine v.

Municipal Court (1971) 5 Cal.3d 656, 663 [statute deemed vague

for failing to “define what constitutes ‘acts of sexual

misconduct’ ”]; Soglin v. Kauffman (7th Cir. 1969) 418 F.2d 163,

168 [the “use of ‘misconduct’ ” as a standard in imposing student

discipline “contains no clues which could assist . . . in

determining whether conduct not transgressing statutes is

susceptible to punishment”].) Nor does subdivision (a)(1)

expressly require that the false statement be material to the

allegations at issue or that the statement actually caused any

harm to the accused. (See Animal Legal Defense Fund v.

Reynolds (8th Cir. 2021) 8 F.4th 781, 787 (Animal Legal Defense

Fund) [applying Alvarez in invalidating a statute prohibiting

falsehoods on an employment application and noting that “the

absence of a materiality requirement” distinguished the statute

from “permissible prohibitions on fraud, perjury, and lying to

government officials”].)

Subdivision (a)(2)’s admonition provision uses entirely

different — and arguably erroneous — language to explain the

45

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

scope of subdivision (a)(1)’s criminal provision. It states, in

relevant part: “You have the right to make a complaint against

a police officer for any improper police conduct. . . . [¶] It is

against the law to make a complaint that you know to be false.

If you make a complaint against an officer knowing that it is

false, you can be prosecuted on a misdemeanor charge.”

(§ 148.6(a)(2), italics added and boldface and all caps omitted.)

The term “improper police conduct” could be reasonably

construed as encompassing a broader category of behavior than

“misconduct.” (Compare Black’s Law Dict. (9th ed. 2009) p. 826,

col. 1 [defining “improper” as “incorrect; unsuitable or

irregular”] with id. at p. 1089, col. 1 [defining “misconduct” as “a

dereliction of duty”].) And whereas subdivision (a)(1) makes

clear that it is a knowingly false “allegation of misconduct” that

triggers the criminal sanction, the admonition in subdivision

(a)(2) simply states it is a misdemeanor to file any “complaint”

that one knows to be false. Given that complainants must also

be asked to sign the admonition attesting they “have read and

understood the above statement” (even though they might not

have), a legitimate complainant might reasonably but

erroneously conclude they are being asked to guarantee the

accuracy of all facts contained in the complaint under threat of

possible prosecution, and not simply those material to the

allegations of misconduct. (See Racial Identity & Profiling

Advisory Board (RIPA) Annual Report 2025, at pp. 170–171

<https://oag.ca.gov/system/files/media/ripa-board-report-

2025.pdf> [as of Nov. 10, 2025]13 (RIPA Annual Report 2025)

13

All Internet citations in this opinion are archived by year,

docket number and case name at <http://www.courts.ca.gov/

opinions/cited-supreme-court-opinions>

46

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

[advisory’s wording may cause citizens to believe that “the

inclusion of a single, inaccurate allegation that is not material

to the claim of misconduct is enough for prosecution”].) Given

the breadth and “different linguistic form[s]” (Reno, supra,

521 U.S. at p. 871) of the language that subdivisions (a)(1) and

(a)(2) employ in defining the scope of potential criminal liability,

the statute raises concerns that persons of common intelligence

will be left to “guess at its meaning and differ as to its

application.” (Connally v. General Construction Co. (1926)

269 U.S. 385, 391; Reno, at p. 871 [statute’s use of “different

linguistic form[s]” to describe scope of potential criminal liability

“will provoke uncertainty among speakers about how the two

standards relate to each other and just what they mean”], fn.

omitted.)

We acknowledge that section 148.6(a) does have certain

narrowing requirements. First, as noted, section 148.6(a)(1)

applies only to knowingly false allegations of misconduct. But

as our high court made clear in Alvarez, the presence of a mens

rea requirement does not invariably shield content-based

statutes regulating falsity from constitutional scrutiny. In this

case, we are unpersuaded that the statute’s limitation to

knowing falsehoods eliminates the substantial chilling risks

presented by the combined effects of the various characteristics

discussed above.

Second, unlike the Stolen Valor Act at issue in Alvarez,

section 148.6(a) does not criminalize knowingly false claims of

police misconduct “made to any person, at any time, in any

context.” (Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 720, plur. opn. of

Kennedy, J.) Instead, section 148.6(a) applies only to persons

who “file[]” a knowingly false allegation of police misconduct.

47

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

We have previously construed this language to limit the

statute’s application to official complaints of misconduct that

trigger the investigation requirements set forth in section

832.5. (See Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 511 [“section

148.6 applies only to formally filed accusations that the agency

must investigate”].) Presumably then, the statute would not

apply to knowing falsehoods delivered through other channels,

such as picketing, social media or the press. The fact remains,

however, that the “context” (Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 720,

plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.) section 148.6(a) does target (official

citizens’ complaints) is a particularly important and utilitarian

form of government criticism in California: complaints that the

government is required to investigate and respond to. The fact

that section 148.6(a) leaves other avenues of criticism

unregulated does little to negate our concerns regarding the

statute’s potential speech-deterring effects on the most

accessible and effective mode of reporting police misconduct

that is available to the citizens of California.

In sum, we do not question whether section 148.6(a) was

intended to address a legitimate problem facing law

enforcement (the filing of knowingly false police complaints), or

that a different law crafted more narrowly and specifically

might pass constitutional muster. Nonetheless, we conclude

that the combined effect of the statutory scheme creates more

than an “inconsequential” risk of driving out certain ideas or

viewpoints that are at the very core of the First Amendment,

namely speech that reveals, and seeks redress for, official

abuses of power. Much like the situation in Free Speech

Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. 461, because section 148.6(a) targets

an unprotected category of speech (knowingly false defamatory

48

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

allegations of misconduct) in a manner that incidentally

burdens protected speech (well-intentioned reports of police

misconduct) further constitutional scrutiny is warranted. 14

c. Stanistreet’s application of R. A. V.

LAPPL’s defense of section 148.6(a) focuses on the

reasoning of Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th 497, which was

issued without the benefit of decisions such as Davenport,

14

Although Free Speech Coalition makes clear that

regulations on unprotected speech are subject to heightened

scrutiny if they incidentally burden protected speech, the

opinion does not examine what qualifies as an “incidental

burden” or how courts should evaluate whether a regulation on

unprotected speech burdens protected speech. In our view,

however, the burden section 148.6(a) places on truthful (or at

least not knowingly false) reports of police misconduct is at least

as great (and arguably greater) than the “modest burden” (Free

Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. at p. 496) that the statute at

issue in Free Speech Coalition places on adults’ ability to access

sexually explicit material. That statute required adult websites

to verify users’ age through various means such as a simple

“credit-card transaction[]” (ibid.) or obtaining proof of age

through “a third-party verification service” (id. at p. 497).

According to the court, similar verification methods were

already in use by “tens of thousands” of adult websites and

numerous other age-restricted online services. (Ibid.)

As enumerated above, the statute here includes a broadly

worded criminal provision that is accompanied by an unusual

admonition requirement. These statutory elements, as

described by the Hamilton II court, create a “potent

disincentive” for citizens to file even well-intentioned complaints

of police misconduct. (Hamilton II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d at

p. 1094; see ante, at pp. 39–49.) We do not believe that section

148.6(a)’s potential chilling impacts can be reasonably

characterized as less obtrusive than submitting proof of age to a

third-party verification service.

49

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Alvarez and Free Speech Coalition (and before multiple federal

courts found section 148.6(a) violative of free speech principles).

As noted, Stanistreet did not directly address whether the

features of section 148.6(a) risk driving certain ideas or

viewpoints from the public sphere by burdening protected

speech. Instead, Stanistreet’s analysis focused on whether

section 148.6(a) fell within any of the three categories of content-

based regulations that R. A. V. had — in the words of

Stanistreet — “identified [as] . . . not threaten[ing] to drive ideas

or viewpoints from the marketplace.” (Stanistreet, supra,

29 Cal.4th at p. 508.) Stanistreet ultimately concluded that

section 148.6(a) fell within each of three R. A. V.-delineated

categories and was therefore constitutionally “permissible.”

(Stanistreet, at p. 508.) Our analysis gave little consideration as

to whether or how the principles of R. A. V. might apply to

content-based regulations within proscribable classes of speech

that have an incidental burden on protected forms of speech,

including true (or well-intentioned) speech. 15 Instead, we

15

To the extent Stanisreet addressed the potential effects

that section 148.6(a) might have on protected speech, it did so

only through the framework of the overbreadth doctrine, a

variant of First Amendment jurisprudence law whereby “a law

may be invalidated as overbroad if ‘a substantial number of its

applications are unconstitutional, judged in relation to the

statute’s plainly legitimate sweep.’ ” (United States v. Stevens

(2010) 559 U.S. 460, 473 (Stevens).) Stanistreet reasoned that

because section 148.6(a) only applies to knowingly false and

officially filed claims of misconduct — a variant of speech it

deemed to be categorically unprotected — the statute could not

be said to be overbroad. (Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at

p. 511.)

50

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

effectively concluded that if a content-based regulation falls

within any one of the R. A. V. categories, it is valid under the

First Amendment.

However, with the benefit of subsequent case law, we

believe that when assessing a content-based regulation within a

proscribable category of speech, consideration should be given

not only to whether the regulation falls within one of the

categories described in R. A. V., but also whether the regulation

may incidentally burden protected speech. (See Free Speech

Coalition, 606 U.S. at pp. 482–483.) In other words, the R. A. V.

categories are best understood as examples of content

discrimination that generally pose a lesser risk of either

suppressing disfavored viewpoints or consequentially burdening

protected speech. (See ante, at pp. 34–39.) As explained above,

in this case we are concerned about section 148.6(a)’s potential

effects on protected speech.

Applying the first R. A. V. category, for example, LAPPL

argues that the reason defamation is proscribable — to protect

As explained above, however, the problem with section

148.6(a) is not that the statute violates the overbreadth doctrine

by criminalizing some forms of protected speech. Indeed, we

agree with Stanistreet that, on its face, the statute only

criminalizes unprotected speech (knowing, defamatory

falsehoods). (See ante, at pp. 32–34.) Rather, the problem is

that under the framework R. A. V. provides for evaluating

content discrimination within a proscribable class of speech, we

cannot say that the risk of official suppression of ideas through

section 148.6(a), including the risk of deterring citizens from

filing truthful complaints of police misconduct is so

“inconsequential” as to uphold the statute with no further

scrutiny. (Davenport, supra, 551 U.S. at p. 188; see also Free

Speech Coalition, supra, 606. U.S. at pp. 482–483, 495.)

51

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

against “injury to reputation” (Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc. (1974)

418 U.S. 323, 348 ) — applies with special force in this context

because section 832.5 requires that all claims of misconduct filed

against law enforcement must be investigated, thereby exposing

accused officers to heightened risks of reputational and

professional harm. But even if we accept the premise that

section 832.5’s investigation requirements transform knowingly

false complaints against police officers into a particularly

injurious form of defamation, that does not mean that the

mechanism the Legislature chose to address those problems is

categorically immune from further scrutiny regardless of its

effect on protected speech. Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. 709, for

example, illustrates that while the government is frequently

justified in regulating false statements that are associated with

legitimate harms (in the case of Alvarez, compromising the

integrity of the Congressional Medal of Honor), courts will

nonetheless apply heightened scrutiny when the government’s

chosen means of deterring such falsity unduly burdens protected

speech. Similarly, as the high court explained in Free Speech

Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. 461, heightened scrutiny is

warranted when the government chooses to regulate an

unprotected form of speech in a manner that incidentally

burdens protected forms of speech. The overarching principle

we draw from these authorities is that even if the reason

defamation is proscribable applies with special force in the

context of false complaints against police officers, that does not

license the Legislature to remedy those harms through a

52

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

mechanism that unnecessarily deters citizens from filing

truthful (or at least well-intentioned) complaints.16

Thus, even assuming section 832.5’s investigation

requirements can be said to create a particularly injurious form

of defamation that would justify some forms of content-based

regulations involving false complaints against police, that does

not alter our conclusion that the means the Legislature chose

here raise constitutional concerns due to their potential to

excessively deter truthful (or at least well-intentioned) criticism

of the government. (See Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 723, plur.

opn. of Kennedy, J.; id. at p. 736, conc. opn. of Breyer, J.; Free

Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. 461.)

Similarly, we do not read R. A. V.’s second category of

regulations — speech-based restrictions “aimed only at the

‘secondary effects’ of the speech” (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at

p. 394) — as creating a bright-line rule that immunizes from

heightened scrutiny any content discrimination within a

proscribable class of speech that targets the secondary effects of

speech. Indeed, Renton, supra, 475 U.S. 41, which R. A. V.

16

Surely the First Amendment must impose some

boundaries on the government’s authority to regulate what it

perceives as a particularly harmful subset of proscribable

speech. Assume, for example, that the Legislature passed a law

requiring the formal investigation of any claim of misconduct

filed against a state representative. Would that justify a law

imposing a mandatory 20-year prison sentence for any

knowingly false complaint of misconduct filed against a state

representative? Would it justify a law that required

complainants, in order to file such a complaint, to travel

personally to Sacramento and take a sworn oath to tell the truth

while standing in front of no less than fifty witnesses on the

Capitol steps?

53

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

repeatedly cites (see R. A. V., at pp. 389, 394), and other First

Amendment cases addressing the secondary effects doctrine

make clear that even regulations aimed at the secondary effects

of speech cannot be designed in a manner that unduly interferes

with speech itself. (See Alameda Books (2002) 535 U.S. 425,

434, plur. opn. of O’Connor, J. [ordinance targeting secondary

effects will be upheld only if government demonstrates that

“reasonable alternative avenues of communication remain[]

available”].) And again Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. 709, and Free

Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. 461, now make clear that even

well-intentioned regulations that target falsity or that target

unprotected categories of speech can trigger heightened scrutiny

when they are structured in a manner that risks unduly

burdening protected forms of speech. We see no reason why a

different rule should apply to well-intentioned content-based

regulations that are meant to target only the secondary effects

of speech. For the reasons discussed above, to the extent section

148.6(a) can be properly characterized as being aimed only at

the secondary effects of false complaints of police misconduct,

the means that the Legislature chose to remedy those secondary

effects still pose a sufficient threat of deterring a core form of

protected speech so as to warrant additional scrutiny.

Finally, R. A. V.’s third category — which Stanistreet

coined as a “catchall” (Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 509) —

applies to content-based regulations that do not present any

“realistic possibility” of “suppressi[ng]” any disfavored

viewpoints (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 390) or burdening any

protected forms of speech (see Free Speech Coalition, supra,

606 U.S. at pp. 482–483, 495; see also Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S.

at pp. 709, 723, plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.; id. at p. 736, conc. opn.

54

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

of Breyer, J.). With the benefit of subsequent case law, we

construe this “general exception” (id. at p. 393) as merely

recognizing that there might be some forms of content

regulation within proscribable classes of speech where the

potential for favoring certain viewpoints or burdening protected

forms of speech are so obviously remote as to warrant no further

scrutiny. As an example, the high court posited that it could

“not think of any First Amendment interest that would stand in

the way of a State’s prohibiting only those obscene motion

pictures with blue-eyed actresses.” (R. A. V., at p. 390.)

Stanistreet concluded that R. A. V.’s “catchall” applied

because section 148.6(a) does “not suppress[] all complaints of

police misconduct, only knowingly false ones.” (Stanistreet,

supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 509.) Thus, the Stanistreet majority

appears to have reasoned that knowingly false complaints of

official misconduct do not contribute to the marketplace of ideas.

While that conclusion may have been sound based on the

precedent that Stanistreet had available to it, subsequent case

law indicates that when evaluating a statute that discriminates

on the basis of content within a proscribable category of speech,

courts should additionally consider whether the statute

incidentally burdens protected speech. (See Free Speech

Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. at pp. 482–483; cf. Alvarez, supra,

567 U.S. at pp. 709, 723, plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.; id. at p. 736,

conc. opn. of Breyer, J.) Thus, contrary to Stanistreet’s

suggestion, the fact that section 148.6(a) only regulates

knowingly false claims of police misconduct does not foreclose

the possibility that it does so in a manner that consequentially

burdens protected speech, thus warranting heightened scrutiny.

55

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

For the reasons explained in detail above, while true that

section 148.6(a) targets “only knowingly false” claims of

misconduct (Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 509), the

elements of the statute nonetheless present a consequential risk

of deterring protected speech (truthful or not knowingly false

complaints against police). (See ante, at pp. 39–49; Stanistreet,

supra, 29 Cal.4th at pp. 513–514, conc. opn. of Werdegar, J.;

Hamilton II, supra, 325 F.Supp.2d at p. 1094.) While we

express no view whether any of these elements might unduly

burden speech when considered in isolation, we think it clear

that, considered together, they “threaten censorship of ideas”

(R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 393) by dissuading individuals

from making truthful (or at least well-intentioned) complaints.

As a result, R. A. V.’s “general exception” (R. A. V., supra,

505 U.S. at p. 393) is inapplicable.17

17

It also bears noting that section 148.6(a)’s restriction on

knowingly false claims against police officers is far afield from

the example that the high court provided to illustrate a form of

regulation that would fall within the catchall — i.e., a statute

that “prohibit[s] only those obscene motion pictures with blue-

eyed actresses.” (R. A. V., supra, 505 U.S. at p. 390.) That

example hypothesizes a category of regulation (no persons with

blue eyes) that cannot conceivably suppress any viewpoints or

ideas associated with the type of speech to which the regulation

applies (obscene motion pictures). Unlike a law that targets

police complaints, eye color cannot possibly be associated with a

specific viewpoint. Section 148.6(a), in contrast, has numerous

features that raise a substantial risk of deterring not only

knowingly false complaints against police, but truthful (or well-

intentioned) ones as well.

56

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

d. The dissent

The dissent concludes that section 148.6(a) should not be

subject to any form of heightened constitutional scrutiny. We

disagree.

i. Alvarez did not establish a new category of

proscribable speech

The dissent argues that heightened scrutiny is

unwarranted because section 148.6(a) constitutes a regulation

on falsity that is intended to “ ‘protect the integrity of

[g]overnment processes.’ ” (Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 3,

quoting Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 709, plur. opn. of

Kennedy, J.) In the dissent’s view, this qualifies as a

“ ‘ “ ‘historic and traditional categor[y] [of expression]’ ” ’ where

‘content-based restrictions on speech have been permitted.’ ”

(Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 3.) We are not aware of any

authority that has categorized falsities that threaten the

“ ‘integrity of government processes’ ” (ibid.) as one of “the few

‘ “historic and traditional categories [of proscribable speech]

long familiar to the bar.” ’ ” (Alvarez, at p. 709, plur. opn. of

Kennedy, J., quoting Stevens, supra, 559 U.S. at p. 468.) The

sole authority the dissent cites in support of that conclusion is

the plurality opinion in Alvarez. (See dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at

p. 3.)

The dissent’s reliance on Alvarez is notable not only

because plurality opinions do not constitute binding precedent

(as they do “not represent the views of a majority of the Court”

(CTS Corp. v. Dynamics Corp. of America (1987) 481 U.S. 69,

81), but also because we find nothing in the Alvarez plurality

indicating that it intended to proclaim a new category of

proscribable speech. While it is true that the plurality signaled

57

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

approval of statutes that “prohibit falsely representing that one

is speaking on behalf of the Government” and described those

statutes as “protect[ing] the integrity of Government processes”

(Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 721, plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.),

we do not view those comments as endorsing an expansion of the

“ ‘well-defined and narrowly limited classes of speech’ ” that

have historically been deemed proscribable. (Stevens, supra,

559 U.S. at pp. 468–469.) As the Alvarez plurality

acknowledged later in its opinion, the Supreme Court has

consistently rejected any “ ‘freewheeling authority to declare

new categories of speech outside the scope of the First

Amendment,’ ” and will do so only when “presented with

‘persuasive evidence that a novel restriction on content is part

of a long (if heretofore unrecognized) tradition of proscription.’ ”

(Alvarez, at p. 722, plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.) Against that

backdrop, we are doubtful that the plurality’s reference to the

purpose of statutes that prohibit falsely representing oneself as

a government actor was meant to endorse a new proscribable

category of speech. Indeed, in the intervening decade since it

was decided, we are not aware of any decision that has read

Alvarez so broadly.18

18

We do not dispute that the Alvarez plurality signaled the

constitutional validity of many existing restrictions on falsity

that can be said to protect government processes, including

sections 1001 and 912 of the United States Code. (See Alvarez,

supra, 567 U.S. at pp. 720–721, plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.; accord

dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at pp. 5–6.) We disagree, however, with

the dissent’s further assertion that the plurality reached that

conclusion by creating a new category of proscribable speech,

i.e., false statements that can be said to threaten “ ‘the integrity

58

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

In our view, the only category of proscribable speech that

section 148.6(a) implicates is defamation. More specifically, as

we have construed it (and as Stanistreet construed it), section

148.6(a) regulates a subset of defamatory speech consisting of

allegations of professional misconduct targeted at law

enforcement agents. As discussed above, R. A. V. makes clear

that heightened scrutiny may apply to content-based

regulations within a proscribable class of speech. (See R. A. V.,

supra, 505 U.S. at p. 387 [“the First Amendment imposes . . . a

‘content discrimination’ limitation upon a State’s prohibition of

proscribable speech”].) And while Stanistreet and the parties’

briefing in this case focus squarely on R. A. V., the dissent

makes no mention of the allowance for the potential application

of heightened scrutiny that R. A. V. established in this context.

Nor does the dissent discuss the high court’s recent decision in

Free Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. 461, which confirms that

heightened scrutiny applies to statutes that regulate

of [g]overnment processes.’ ” (Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 3.)

We are not aware of any authority that has endorsed that novel

proposition.

While it may be that many prohibitions on falsity that

protect the integrity of government processes are valid because

they are sufficiently circumscribed to achieve that purpose (see

Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 721, plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.

[describing 18 U.S.C. §§ 1001 and 912 as “targeted

prohibitions”], italics added), we find nothing in the Alvarez

plurality that suggests such laws are categorically immune from

constitutional scrutiny because they regulate a class of speech

that qualifies as one of “the few ‘ “historic and traditional

categories [of expression] long familiar to the bar.” ’ ” (Alvarez,

at p. 717, plur. opn. of Kennedy, J., quoting Stevens, supra,

559 U.S. at p. 468.)

59

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

proscribable speech in a manner that incidentally burdens

protected speech.

Instead, the dissent grounds its defense of the statute in

the proclamation of a new category of proscribable speech that

no party in this long-running litigation has ever proposed and

that no court has ever endorsed.

ii. The chilling effect of section 148.6(a)

The dissent’s second line of reasoning is that it sees no risk

(or at least no consequential risk) that the features of section

148.6(a) — particularly its admonition requirement — would

deter anyone from making a “good-faith complaint[].” (Dis. opn.

of Liu, J., post, at p. 11.)

In support, the dissent argues that while focusing on the

admonition’s threat of criminal liability, our analysis ignores

additional language in the admonition explaining that while the

agency may ultimately find there is not enough evidence to take

action on the complaint, the complainant still has the right to

“ ‘make the complaint and have it investigated.’ ” (Dis. opn. of

Liu, J., post, at p. 11, quoting § 148.6(a)(2).) According to the

dissent, this additional language “distinguishes between a good-

faith complaint that lacks ‘enough evidence’ and ‘a complaint

that you know to be false.’ ” (Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 11.)

The dissent further reasons that because a well-intentioned

complainant would “know” they are acting in good faith, and not

making “a complaint [they] know[] to be false” (ibid.), there is

no reasonable risk they would be deterred.

In our view, however, telling complainants that they have

a right to make a good-faith allegation of misconduct even if it

is ultimately deemed to be supported by insufficient evidence

60

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

does little to mitigate the deterrent effect of then immediately

telling them, but if we think you are lying, you can be charged

with a crime. The problem with the dissent’s argument is that

it assumes that simply because the complainant believes that

what they are saying is true — and because they have been told

that acting in good faith is not a crime — then they should have

no reason to be deterred from complaining. But as Justice

Werdegar explained, allegations involving police misconduct

will frequently “come down to the word of the citizen against the

word of the police officer” (Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at

p. 513, conc. opn. of Werdegar, J.), and the admonition makes

prospective complainants acutely aware that they could face

“criminal prosecution and the burden and expense of retaining

a defense attorney” if authorities think they are being

knowingly untruthful. (Id. at p. 514.) Under such

circumstances, “some complainants are likely to choose not to go

forward.” (Ibid.)

The dissent disagrees with that line of reasoning. The fact

that it may be a complainant’s word against a police officer’s

does not alter the dissent’s view. Nor does the fact that before

citizens are even allowed to make a complaint, they are told they

may face criminal prosecution if their statements are deemed

knowingly untruthful. The fact that the entity that will make a

determination of falsity for purposes of effectuating an arrest

may, in the first instance, be the very entity that the person is

complaining about? The dissent is unpersuaded. The fact that

there is no materiality requirement in the admonition? This,

too, does not alter the dissent’s view because the average person

will understand that materiality is inherent in its terms. (See

dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at pp. 15–16.) The language of the

61

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

criminal provision does not even match the language of the

admonition? Mere “ ‘worldplay,’ ” says the dissent. (Id. at p. 15.)

Some might construe the scope of the statute to be vague and ill-

defined? That should only “increase the latitude for citizens to

make complaints in good faith” (id. at pp. 14–15) argues the

dissent, turning First Amendment jurisprudence on its head.

(See Grayned v. City of Rockford (1972) 408 U.S. 104, 109

[“where a vague statute ‘abut[s] upon sensitive areas of basic

First Amendment freedoms,’ it ‘operates to inhibit the exercise

of [those] freedoms.’ Uncertain meanings inevitably lead

citizens to ‘ “steer far wider of the unlawful zone” . . . than if the

boundaries of the forbidden areas were clearly marked’ ”], fns.

omitted; see also RIPA Annual Report 2025, supra, at p. 170

[section 148.6(a) “could have a chilling effect on members of the

public . . . especially since there are no statutory limitations on

what types of ‘false’ allegations that could result in

prosecution”].) We take a different view: The question we must

ask is whether the average person might be deterred from

making even a truthful report of wrongdoing (or at least not a

knowingly false one) when they are admonished with the threat

of criminal prosecution — and required to sign a document

attesting to that admonishment — before they are allowed to

complain. We believe the answer to that question is clearly yes.

The dissent contends, however, that a report showing that

thousands of misconduct claims were filed in 2018 and

ultimately determined to be “ ‘unfounded’ ” belies any claim that

citizens are deterred from pursuing complaints. (Dis. opn. of

Liu, J., post, at p. 12.) The dissent appears to reason that

because many citizens were willing to come forward with

complaints in 2018 that could not ultimately be substantiated,

62

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

it is unlikely that section 148.6(a)’s admonition requirement

deters civilian complaints in any meaningful way. But the fact

that thousands of complaints were filed and deemed unfounded

(in a state with a population of 40 million) tells us little about

how many people may have been deterred from filing complaints

in the first instance.19

The dissent next argues that our concerns regarding the

deterring effects of section 148.6(a) are overstated because the

dissent has identified some jurisdictions that allow the signed

admonition to be submitted online. (Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at

p. 13 & appen.) As a preliminary matter, California is

comprised of over 500 law enforcement agencies. (See RIPA

Annual Report 2025, supra, at p. 18.) Thus, while true that

some jurisdictions have voluntarily chosen to allow

complainants to file their allegations online (perhaps

recognizing how intimidating it may be to file in person), there

has been no showing that all jurisdictions do so and the RIPA

Board’s findings imply otherwise.20 (See RIPA Annual Report

19

The dissent appears to limit its argument to statistics

from 2018 because most of the largest law enforcement agencies

in California — indeed 10 of the 15 largest — do not currently

include the admonition language in their complaint forms and

many have not been doing so since at least 2020. (See RIPA

Annual Report 2025, supra, at pp. 171–172 & fn. 650.) Given

that a vast majority of our largest law enforcement agencies are

not employing the admonition, any more recent complaint

statistics are particularly unhelpful.

20

The RIPA Board was established under The Racial and

Identity Profiling Act of 2015 (Stats. 2015, ch. 466, § 4) “for the

purpose of eliminating racial and identity profiling, and

improving diversity and racial and identity sensitivity in law

63

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

2020, at p. 70 <https://oag.ca.gov/sites/all/files/agweb/pdfs/ripa/

ripa-board-report-2020.pdf> [as of Nov. 10, 2025] (RIPA Annual

Report 2020) [indicating that some jurisdictions may have low

numbers of reported complaints because “individuals . . . are

required to . . . bring in complaints in person”].) While laudable

that some law enforcement agencies have elected to implement

the statute in a less speech-deterring manner, that is cold

comfort to residents who live in jurisdictions where that may not

be the case.

More crucially, even if the initial complaint is submitted

online, that would not seem to end the complainant’s

participation in the matter. The language of the admonition and

text of section 832.5 both make clear that the law enforcement

agency has an obligation to conduct a follow-up investigation.

As the dissent expressly acknowledges, some law enforcement

agencies “require an in-person interview for a filed complaint to

go forward.” (Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 13.) And even in

those jurisdictions that do not mandate an in-person interview,

the complainant would presumably (at least in most cases) be

required to speak with an investigating law enforcement agent

in some capacity. And the admonition makes complainants well

enforcement.” (§ 13519.4, subd. (j)(1).) The board is made up of

representatives of law enforcement, appointees from the

legislative and executive branches, attorneys, and community

members, spiritual leaders and academics who specialize in

policing and racial profiling. (See id. at subd. (j)(2).) The RIPA

Board is required to conduct “evidence-based research” (id. at

subd. (j)(3)(D)) on various police practices and issue an annual

report making policy recommendations for eliminating racial

and identity profiling (id. at subd. (j)(3)(E)).

64

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

aware they can be charged with a crime if the investigator

thinks they are being knowingly untruthful.

The dissent similarly argues that any risk of deterrence is

mitigated by the fact that law enforcement “agencies commonly

have structures designed to protect the integrity of

investigations.” (Dis. opn. of Liu J., post, at p. 14.) Again,

however, while some agencies may have such “structures” (ibid.)

in place (the dissent identifies only four such agencies), the

RIPA Board findings suggest that others likely do not. (See

RIPA Annual Report 2020, supra, at pp. 67–70 [law enforcement

agencies throughout California lack “a uniform system to

accept, document, investigate, and report complaints”].) Nor are

we persuaded that the average person would have any reason to

know about those “structures” (e.g., that some counties may

refer the complaint to an independent Internal Affairs Bureau

Office or Inspector General) when deciding whether to move

forward with a complaint. The admonition certainly does not

inform them of any such safeguards.

The dissent also expresses confusion as to how deterring

well-intentioned complaints of police misconduct could possibly

be said to drive certain ideas or viewpoints from the public

sphere given that “complaints alleging misconduct by a peace

officer are generally confidential.” (Dis. opn. of Liu J., post, at

p. 18.) We think it clear, however, that when a regulation

substantially burdens a citizen’s ability to engage in protected

speech that relates to the conduct of government officials —

even speech that the larger public may not be privy too —

heightened scrutiny is required. The fact that allegations

within a complaint are generally confidential does nothing to

alter the speech deterring effects of the statute.

65

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

On a more fundamental level, we simply disagree with the

dissent’s suggestion that there is no reason to believe that

section 148.6(a)’s features — in particular its admonition

requirement — create a risk of deterring well-intentioned

reports of police misconduct. That is particularly true among

residents of communities that have historically experienced

“disproportionately . . . heightened levels of police scrutiny and

racial profiling.” (People v. Flores (2024) 15 Cal.5th 1032, 1054,

conc. opn. of Evans, J.) As the dissent itself acknowledges,

“[M]any people, especially members of minority, immigrant, or

low-income communities” may be reluctant to pursue claims of

police misconduct because “they may lack confidence their

complaints will be taken seriously” or they “may distrust law

enforcement.” (Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 4; cf. Flores, at

pp. 1053–1055, conc. opn. of Evans, J.) The dissent nonetheless

finds no risk — or at least no meaningful risk — that individuals

who already harbor such concerns would be deterred by being

told (in many cases in a police station by a police officer) that

their complaint will not be accepted unless they agree to read

and sign an admonition (written in all capital letters and in

boldface print) warning that they may be charged with a crime

if the law enforcement agency about whom they are complaining

believes they are lying. The dissent is confident that this is “not

a message of deterrence” (dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 11) and

that our concerns amount to nothing more than “speculative

assertions” (id. at p. 4). But the entire point of the admonition

is to deter. While the statute explicitly seeks to deter only

knowingly false allegations of misconduct, we think it entirely

reasonable (and indeed probable) that threatening people with

66

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

prosecution under an ill-defined standard of falsity would also

give pause to those with well-intentioned complaints.

We are not alone in that conclusion. The district court in

Hamilton II, 325 F.Supp.2d 1087, for example, found that there

is a “high likelihood” that subdivision (a)(2)’s admonition

provisions “will cause individuals to refrain from filing a

complaint against law enforcement officers.” (Id. at p. 1094.)

The court further found that, “Overall, [s]ection 148.6 creates a

potent disincentive for citizens to file a complaint.” (Ibid.)

Multiple members of this court have expressed similar views.

(See Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at pp. 513–514, conc. opn. of

Werdegar, J.; Moreno, J., joining [§ 148.6(a)’s criminal provision,

coupled with its “unique” admonition requirement, will

“[r]ealistically, [cause] some complainants . . . to choose not to go

forward — even when they have legitimate complaints”].)

The Attorney General’s RIPA Board (see § 13519.4, subd.

(j); see ante, at p. 64, fn. 20), which includes several

representatives of law enforcement (see id. at subds. (j)(2)(A),

(C)–(F)), has also concluded that section 148.6(a)’s statutory

scheme risks deterring reasonable citizens from coming forward

with truthful complaints about police misconduct. In its most

recent annual report, the RIPA Board recommended (as it has

in every report since its inception) that “the Legislature delete

or amend” section 148.6(a)(2)’s admonition requirement,

explaining that the “the advisory language . . . could have a

chilling effect on members of the public seeking to file a

complaint, especially since there are no statutory limitations on

what types of ‘false’ allegations that could result in

prosecution. . . . [R]equiring a complainant to reveal their

identity [by signing the advisory] even if they wish to remain

67

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

anonymous, could [also] deter members of the public from

submitting valid complaints.”21 (RIPA Annual Report 2025,

supra, at pp. 170–171; see also RIPA Annual Report 2020,

supra, at p. 74 [“requiring complaints to be signed, in writing,

and under penalty of criminal prosecution may create an

unnecessary chilling effect . . . particularly those that allege

racial or identity profiling”].) Those recommendations are

consistent with guidance from the U.S. Department of Justice

(U.S. DOJ). (See Community Oriented Policing Services, U.S.

DOJ, Standards and Guidelines for Internal Affairs, p. 17

<https://portal.cops.usdoj.gov/resourcecenter/RIC/Publications/

cops-p164-pub.pdf> [as of Nov. 10, 2025] [“[u]nless required by

law, no threats or warning of prosecution or potential

prosecution for filing a false complaint should be made orally or

in writing to a complainant or potential complainant”].)

21

Several decisions highlight the potential concerns with

section 148.6(a). In Hamilton I, supra, 107 F.Supp.2d 1239, for

example, the plaintiff brought a civil rights action alleging that

he was repeatedly subjected to police misconduct but elected not

to move forward with a citizen complaint after the watch

commander questioned his story and read him the admonition

required by section 148.6(a)(2). And in Cuadra, supra, 2010 WL

55875, the defendant lodged a citizen’s complaint alleging that

he had been unlawfully stopped and beaten by several officers.

The officers denied the allegations, asserting that the defendant

was intoxicated and had sustained his injuries by “repeatedly

bash[ing] his head against the plastic divider.” (Id. at *1.) The

officers’ supervisor conducted an investigation and ultimately

believed the officers’ story. The defendant was thereafter

charged under section 148.6(a), but the charges were later

dismissed, and the defendant pursued a civil rights action

against the city.

68

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Although the RIPA Board includes numerous experts in

law enforcement, the dissent discounts its findings regarding

the potential deterrent effects of section 148.6(a)(2) (and

apparently the guidance of the U.S. DOJ) because those findings

were unaccompanied by empirical evidence such as “community

surveys.” (Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 17.) The dissent

contends that we should not (and indeed cannot) conclude that

section 148.(6) burdens speech in the absence of “evidence” (dis.

opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 17) — presumably statistical evidence

or the like — confirming that the admonition risks deterring

well-intentioned complaints of police misconduct. That

approach, however, finds no support in the law. In the recently

decided Free Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. 461, for

example — again a case the dissent does not reference — the

high court did not require any statistical proof or other

“evidence” that an age-verification requirement might deter

adults from accessing sexually explicit websites as a

precondition of finding that the regulation warranted

heightened scrutiny. That decision is consistent with other

cases in which our high court has considered the potential

deterring effects of speech regulations without looking to the

type of empirical evidence the dissent appears to call for here.

(See, e.g., Multimedia Holdings Corp. v. Circuit Court of

Florida, St. Johns County (2005) 544 U.S. 1301, 1304 [“A threat

of prosecution . . . raises special First Amendment concerns, for

it may chill protected speech . . . by putting that party at an

added risk of liability”]; Denver Area Educational

Telecommunications Consortium, Inc. v. F.C.C. (1996) 518 U.S.

727, 754 [written notice requirement would “restrict viewing by

subscribers who fear for their reputations should the operator

69

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

. . . inadvertently[] disclose the list of those who wish to watch

[explicit content]”].)

We join the many voices who have previously concluded

that as currently structured, section 148.6(a) presents a

meaningful risk of deterring a core form of protected speech —

well-intentioned reports of police misconduct — thus

warranting heightened scrutiny.

iii. Additional arguments

The dissent additionally argues that section 148.6(a) is no

different than statutes that “make it a crime to commit perjury”

or to “lie to a government official concerning an official matter.”

(Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 3.) Such statutes, however,

merely target — in a neutral manner — the act of lying about

any material issue during a particular form of proceeding. They

do not single out for special treatment lies that target a

particular category of government employment. The more apt

comparison would be a law barring perjury that relates to the

misconduct of a government official. And these laws certainly

do not require that, as a condition of filing a formal complaint

against a government employee, the complainant must sign an

admonition warning that they can be charged with a crime if

their allegations are deemed to be knowingly false.

The dissent also notes that section 148.6(a)(1)’s criminal

provision only applies when a person files a knowingly false

allegation of misconduct that triggers the citizen complaint

procedure and thus leaves unregulated claims of misconduct

conveyed in any number of other mediums, such as a “blog post,

viral email, or TikTok.” (Dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at p. 6.) But

as we have explained above, the fact that section 148.6(a) does

70

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

not regulate all forms of statements concerning police

misconduct does little to negate our concerns regarding the

burdens the statute places on the most accessible and effective

mode of reporting police misconduct that is available to the

citizens of California. (See ante, at p. 48.) While the statute

may not chill what a person chooses to say about police

misconduct in a Tik Tok video, the fact that it risks chilling what

a person might report to the government (who has a duty to

investigate such reports) nonetheless raises constitutional

concerns.

3. Section 148.6 is not narrowly tailored to achieve its

purposes

Because section 148.6(a) constitutes a content-based

regulation within a proscribable category of speech that

presents a consequential risk of suppressing a core form of

protected speech, further constitutional scrutiny is warranted.

The level of scrutiny that applies to a regulation like section

148.6(a), which discriminates on the basis of content within a

proscribable category of falsehood (defamation), is somewhat

uncertain. While R. A. V. applied strict scrutiny to the content-

based regulation before it, that regulation was expressly deemed

to discriminate on the basis of viewpoint — “a ‘more blatant’ and

‘egregious [subclass] of content discrimination.’ ” (Reed, supra,

576 U.S. at p. 168.) In this case, the primary concern with

section 148.6(a) is not that it disfavors any particular viewpoint

(as the statute in R. A. V. did), but rather its incidental burden

on protected forms of speech.

Moreover, section 148.6(a) does not directly regulate any

protectable form of speech. Rather, as we have construed it, the

statute only criminalizes malicious defamatory falsehoods. (See

71

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

ante, at pp. 33–34.) Thus, unlike many forms of content-based

regulations, the constitutional concern here is not that the state

is attempting to regulate a protected form of speech or that the

statute is written in such a manner that it sweeps protected

speech within its actual prohibitions. Rather, the concern is

that the means the state has selected to regulate a proscribable

form of speech risks deterring citizens from engaging in a

protected form of speech. The high court’s recent opinion in Free

Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. 461, suggests that under such

circumstances, intermediate scrutiny is generally the

appropriate standard of review. (Id. at pp. 482–483, 495.)

For purposes of this case, it is ultimately immaterial

whether intermediate or strict scrutiny applies because we

conclude that section 148.6(a) cannot survive even the less

exacting standard of intermediate scrutiny. (See Packingham,

supra, 582 U.S. at p. 105 [“Even making the assumption that

the statute is . . . subject to intermediate scrutiny, the provision

cannot stand”]; McCutcheon v. FEC (2014) 572 U.S. 185, 199,

plur. opn. of Roberts, C. J. [because the statute “fail[s] even

under the [less demanding] test,” the court “need not parse the

differences between the two standards in this case”].) “In order

to survive intermediate scrutiny, a law must be ‘narrowly

tailored to serve a significant governmental interest.’ [Citation.]

In other words, the law must not ‘burden substantially more

speech than is necessary to further the government’s legitimate

interests.’ ” (Packingham, at pp. 105–106; accord Free Speech

Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. at p. 471.) “[T]hese standards ensure

. . . that the [government’s] interests are proportional to the

resulting burdens placed on speech.” (Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc.

(2011) 564 U.S. 552, 572; accord Free Speech Coalition, at p. 471;

72

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 730, conc. opn. of Breyer, J.) [in

the context of falsity, intermediate scrutiny requires the court

“to determine whether the statute works speech-related harm

that is out of proportion to its justifications”].)

Applying those standards here, we find that the

government has a significant interest in deterring knowingly

false complaints of misconduct levied against police officers. As

detailed in the legislative history, section 148.6(a) was passed in

response to a substantial increase in false claims of misconduct

that were causing professional and reputational harm to law

enforcement officers (and resulting in the unnecessary

expenditure of public funds) due to section 832.5’s investigation

requirements. The state has a legitimate interest in curbing

abusive false complaints of police conduct, the negative effects

of which take on added significance because of the statutory

investigation requirements.

We are not persuaded, however, that section 148.6(a) has

been crafted in a manner that “ ‘does not burden substantially

more speech than necessary to further those interests.’ ” (Free

Speech Coalition, supra, 606 U.S. at p. 471.) While the objective

of curbing abusive false claims of police misconduct is sound, the

means the Legislature chose to accomplish those objectives —

an ill-defined criminal provision that is accompanied by an

unusual admonition requirement — unnecessarily risk chilling

substantially more speech than is necessary to further the

government’s interests. Indeed, there would seem to be any

number of other, less speech-deterring ways of addressing the

73

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

reputational and professional harms that may be caused by

section 832.5’s investigation process.22

The Legislature might, for example, provide peace officers

heightened procedural protections that insulate them against

the potentially damaging professional effects of false

complaints. (See Gov. Code, §§ 3300–3313 [the Public Safety

Officers Procedural Bill of Rights Act]; § 832.5, subd. (c) [any

complaints that are found to be frivolous, unfounded, or

exonerated are not maintained in the officer’s personnel file].)

Alternatively, it might “more finely tailor[]” (Alvarez, supra,

567 U.S. at p. 738, conc. opn. of Breyer, J.) the scope of

subdivision (a)(1)’s criminal provision by, among other

possibilities, “insist[ing] upon a showing that the false

statement caused specific harm” (Alvarez, at p. 738, conc. opn.

of Breyer, J.) or including a materiality requirement (see

Animal Legal Defense Fund, supra, 8 F.4th at p. 787). The

statute’s criminal provision and its attendant admonition

requirement might more precisely (and consistently) define

what form of allegations might trigger criminal liability. The

statute might treat knowingly false statements made in the

context of a police misconduct investigation more even-

handedly, which would seem to accord with the state’s claims

that section 148.6(a) is intended (at least in part) to protect the

integrity of the complaint investigation process. And perhaps

most crucially, the Legislature might amend the admonition

22

The parties have not identified any other state statute

that criminalizes knowingly false allegations of police

misconduct while conditioning acceptance of any such complaint

on signing the type of admonition at issue here.

74

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

requirement in a manner that is less speech deterring.23 While

we express no view as to whether any of these alternative

approaches would be sufficient to survive constitutional

scrutiny, we think it clear that the current structure of section

148.6(a) unnecessarily risks chilling substantially more speech

than necessary to deter knowingly false allegations of

misconduct against police officers.

Again, we acknowledge that the state has a legitimate

interest in curbing the deleterious effects of false complaints

against law enforcement. (Accord dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at

p. 6.) And like the dissent, we reaffirm Stanistreet’s conclusion

that the Legislature has the authority “to protect the integrity

of complaint procedures by . . . deterring abuse.” (Dis. opn. of

Liu, J., post, at p. 6; see Stanistreet, supra, 29 Cal.4th at p. 510.)

Unlike the dissent (and Stanistreet), however, we conclude that

as presently drafted section 148.6(a) “works disproportionate

constitutional harm” (Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 739, conc.

opn. of Breyer, J.) by attempting to achieve those objectives in a

manner that unduly chills a core form of protected speech —

truthful or well-intentioned complaints of government

misconduct. It consequently fails intermediate scrutiny and

thus violates the First Amendment.

23

The RIPA Board’s most recent annual report shows that

since at least 2020, many of the largest law enforcement

agencies in California have omitted the advisory language set

forth in section 148.6(a)(2) from their citizen complaint forms.

(See RIPA Annual Report 2025, supra, at pp. 171–172.) LAPPL

has made no showing that these omissions have had any

material effect on the number of abusive police complaints filed

against agencies that have chosen not to include the admonition.

75

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Opinion of the Court by Groban, J.

III. DISPOSITION

The Court of Appeal’s judgment is reversed and the matter

is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this

opinion.

GROBAN, J.

We Concur:

GUERRERO, C. J.

CORRIGAN, J.

KRUGER, J.

EVANS, J.

JENKINS, J.*

*

Retired Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, assigned

by the Chief Justice pursuant to article VI, section 6 of the

California Constitution.

76

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

S275272

Dissenting Opinion by Justice Liu

At least since the beating of Rodney King by officers of the

Los Angeles Police Department in 1991, police misconduct has

been a high-profile issue in California and throughout the

nation. The concern has remained salient in light of many

fraught and sometimes deadly police interactions with minority

communities over the years. (See People v Flores (2024)

15 Cal.5th 1032, 1049; id. at pp. 1053–1054 (conc. opn. of Evans,

J.); People v. McWilliams (2023) 14 Cal.5th 429, 451–452 (conc.

opn. of Liu, J.); B.B. v. County of Los Angeles (2020) 10 Cal.5th

1, 30–31 (conc. opn. of Liu, J.).)

As one recourse, our Legislature requires every law

enforcement agency to “establish a procedure to investigate

complaints by members of the public against the personnel of

these departments . . . , and . . . [to] make a written description

of the procedure available to the public.” (Pen. Code, § 832.5,

subd. (a)(1); all undesignated statutory references are to the

Penal Code.) Such procedures enable everyday citizens to report

misconduct and hold officials accountable.

As important as these procedures are, they are also

susceptible to abuse. Section 148.6 makes it a misdemeanor to

“file[] any allegation of misconduct against any peace officer . . .

knowing the allegation to be false.” (§ 148.6, subd. (a)(1).) In

addition, the statute requires any complainant to read and sign

1

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Liu, J., dissenting

an advisory that says in capital letters and boldface: “YOU

HAVE THE RIGHT TO MAKE A COMPLAINT AGAINST A

POLICE OFFICER FOR ANY IMPROPER POLICE

CONDUCT. CALIFORNIA LAW REQUIRES THIS AGENCY

TO HAVE A PROCEDURE TO INVESTIGATE CIVILIANS’

COMPLAINTS. YOU HAVE A RIGHT TO A WRITTEN

DESCRIPTION OF THIS PROCEDURE. THIS AGENCY MAY

FIND AFTER INVESTIGATION THAT THERE IS NOT

ENOUGH EVIDENCE TO WARRANT ACTION ON YOUR

COMPLAINT; EVEN IF THAT IS THE CASE, YOU HAVE

THE RIGHT TO MAKE THE COMPLAINT AND HAVE IT

INVESTIGATED IF YOU BELIEVE AN OFFICER BEHAVED

IMPROPERLY. CIVILIAN COMPLAINTS AND ANY

REPORTS OR FINDINGS RELATING TO COMPLAINTS

MUST BE RETAINED BY THIS AGENCY FOR AT LEAST

FIVE YEARS. [¶] IT IS AGAINST THE LAW TO MAKE A

COMPLAINT THAT YOU KNOW TO BE FALSE. IF YOU

MAKE A COMPLAINT AGAINST AN OFFICER KNOWING

THAT IT IS FALSE, YOU CAN BE PROSECUTED ON A

MISDEMEANOR CHARGE.” (Id., subd. (a)(2).)

In enacting section 148.6, the Legislature observed that a

“glaringly negative side-effect which has resulted [from the

availability of complaint procedures] has been the willingness

on the part of many of our less ethical citizens to maliciously file

false allegations of misconduct against officers in an effort to

punish them for simply doing their jobs. [¶] Unfortunately for

the officers, these complaints usually become a permanent part

of their personnel jackets . . . . Additionally, most of the officers

find they have very little recourse against the complainants.”

(Assem. Com. on Public Safety, Analysis of Assem. Bill No. 1732

2

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Liu, J., dissenting

(1995–1996 Reg. Sess.) April 18, 1995, at p. 1.) The statute

“addresses the issue of knowingly making false allegations of

misconduct against any peace officer. These false accusations

can adversely affect the officer’s position within the

Department, and this legislation will discourage such false

reports. [¶] . . . [¶] . . . For example, a Deputy Sheriff on a list

for promotion to Sergeant receives a false report of misconduct,

after which his promotion is deferred until the matter is

resolved. After which, the complaint being found ungrounded,

the Deputy has no recourse for any financial loss due to the

delay.” (Id. at p. 2.) Further, by deterring knowingly false

complaints, the statute enables law enforcement agencies to

focus on good-faith complaints, thereby saving time and

resources. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 12.)

The question is whether section 148.6 is an

unconstitutional restriction on freedom of speech. The answer

is simple: Section 148.6 is no more unconstitutional than laws

that make it a crime to commit perjury, file a false police report,

submit a false document to a public agency, or lie to a

government official concerning an official matter. Such laws

“protect the integrity of [g]overnment processes, quite apart

from merely restricting false speech.” (United States. v. Alvarez

(2012) 567 U.S. 709, 721 (plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.) (Alvarez).)

They belong to one of the “ ‘ “historic and traditional categories

[of expression]” ’ ” where “content-based restrictions on speech

have been permitted.” (Id. at p. 717.) Today’s opinion

invalidates section 148.6 on the ground that it “deter[s] citizens

from filing truthful (or at least not knowingly false) complaints

of police misconduct.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 6.) But that

3

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Liu, J., dissenting

rationale rests on speculative assertions and does not withstand

scrutiny.

To be sure, many people, especially members of minority,

immigrant, or low-income communities, may be reluctant to file

complaints. They may feel it is not their place to question

authority; they may lack confidence their complaints will be

taken seriously; they may distrust law enforcement; they may

not know the process or have time to figure it out. These issues

have long histories and many complexities quite apart from

section 148.6, and for police agencies, there is perhaps no task

more important than gaining the trust of the communities they

serve. But trust is a two-way street, and our men and women

in uniform have a hard enough job without having to deal with

knowingly false allegations of misconduct. Because section

148.6 targets unprotected speech and has not been shown to

pose a substantial risk of suppressing protected speech, I cannot

agree that it violates the First Amendment.

I.

As the high court has made clear, there is no “general

exception to the First Amendment for false statements.”

(Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S. at p. 718 (plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.);

see id. at pp. 733–734 (conc. opn. of Breyer, J.).) But our

statutes and common law have long recognized categories of

“knowing or reckless falsehood[s]” that may be proscribed

without running afoul of the First Amendment. (Alvarez, at

p. 719 (plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.).) These include defamation,

fraud, perjury, and false statements made to a government

official. (Id. at pp. 719–721; see id. at pp. 734–735 (conc. opn. of

Breyer, J.).) The common denominator of such laws is not

merely that they proscribe false speech, but that they protect

4

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Liu, J., dissenting

against “legally cognizable harm associated with a false

statement.” (Id. at p. 719 (plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.); see id. at

p. 734 (conc. opn. of Breyer, J.) [such laws narrow the range of

proscribed falsehoods “by specifying that the lies be made in

contexts in which a tangible harm to others is especially likely

to occur” or “by limiting the prohibited lies to those that are

particularly likely to produce harm”].)

One subset consists of longstanding laws that protect the

integrity of government processes. Perjury lacks First

Amendment protection “not simply because perjured statements

are false,” but because “[p]erjury undermines the function and

province of the law and threatens the integrity of judgments

that are the basis of the legal system.” (Alvarez, supra, 567 U.S.

at pp. 720–721 (plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.); see United States v.

Dunnigan (1993) 507 U.S. 87, 97 [“the constitutionality of

perjury statutes is unquestioned”].) The federal law prohibiting

false statements to government officials, 18 U.S.C. § 1001,

likewise “protect[s] the integrity of [g]overnment processes,

quite apart from merely restricting false speech.” (Alvarez, at

p. 721 (plur. opn. of Kennedy, J.); see ibid. [same for “[s]tatutes

that prohibit falsely representing that one is speaking on behalf

of the Government, or that prohibit impersonating a

Government officer,” such as 18 U.S.C. §§ 709, 712, 912].) The

same is true of state laws making it a crime to submit a false

document to a public agency (§ 115), file a false police report

(§ 118.1), or offer false evidence in a trial or official investigation

(§ 132). This is not “a new category of proscribable speech.”

(Maj. opn., ante, at p. 60.) In “our law and tradition,” such

prohibitions have not been viewed as “somehow vulnerable”

5

LOS ANGELES POLICE PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES

Liu, J., dissenting

under the First Amendment. (Alvarez, at p. 721 (plur. opn. of

Kennedy, J.); see id. at pp. 734–735 (conc. opn. of Breyer, J.).)

Section 148.6 falls squarely within this category. It

prohibits an individual from filing an allegation of peace officer

misconduct “knowing the allegation to be false.” (§ 148.6,

subd. (a)(1).) The “knowing” limitation is significant; the statute

does not punish the filing of a good-faith allegation that turns

out to be false or unsubstantiated. Further, the statute targets

a knowingly false “allegation of misconduct” (ibid.); it does not

apply to a false statement that is immaterial to a misconduct

allegation. And critically, the statute is only triggered when a

person “files” (ibid.) a knowingly false allegation of misconduct

pu

This text is long and has been trimmed here. Open the source document for the complete record.