The Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) has launched a statewide grassroots lobbying campaign to oppose Assembly Bill 1151. This bill would amend the California Education Code to provide for a daytime loitering/truancy law which is effectively a daytime curfew during the hours when a minor’s school is in session.

     This is the latest step in the ongoing battle between advocates of daytime curfews and parents whose children do not attend public school.

     On April 28, 1997, four families filed a lawsuit in Los Angeles County against the Monrovia Chief of Police and the City of Monrovia, challenging the constitutionality of a daytime curfew ordinance. Under this curfew, any school age person found anywhere other than in a school building or with their parents from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on days when school is in session is subject to being stopped, detained, and questioned.

     President Clinton praised daytime curfews for school aged children last year as “the most effective anti-crime measure yet” and a model for the nation.

     Michael P. Farris, President of HSLDA called the Monrovia ordinance “a tool of martial law.” “We don’t believe that the City of Monrovia is a war zone,” said Farris. “Americans live in a free country, and people are supposed to be able to walk on the street.”

     Two of the plaintiffs, Jesse and Benedict Harrahill, ages 15 and 13, have been stopped, interrogated and temporarily detained on at least 20 occasions. Sixteen-year-old Gabriel Chavez was stopped and interrogated five times by five different officers during a 20-minute period in the fall of 1996. Melinda Isenberger is a 15-year-old who was walking to a store with a classmate when two plain-clothed officers in an unmarked car began to follow them. Fearing for their safety, began to run. The officers pursued them and stopped the girls. Though they never identified themselves as police, the officials warned the girls that a permission slip from school was inadequate and that next time, “more identification” would be needed.