Some aspects of the law may be considered thorny, but anything to do with First Amendment rights is a legal briar patch. The Livingston Manor Central School District in New York is about to find out how thick and painful the brambles can be.
On October 30, 2025, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals reversed and remanded a district court decision that issued a summary judgment dismissing a student’s freedom of off-campus speech lawsuit. The public school system now must face allegations of free speech suppression over the punishment meted out to then-student Case Leroy over a questionable social media post during the trial over the death of George Floyd.
Despite the 2021 incident taking place off school grounds and after school hours, the school district considered the incident a Code of Conduct violation, along with the ensuing substantial disruptions over the next few school days, enough to suspend high school senior Leroy for five days. He was also banned from all extracurricular activities. A lower court judge sided with the district, but the Second Circuit saw the instance as a clear-cut example of school officials transgressing against Leroy’s First Amendment protections.
As often occurs when a court rules on a free speech case, advocates for the First Amendment flooded the court with amicus briefs in support of freedom of expression and speech. The Second Circuit panel used the U.S. Supreme Court decisions on Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District and Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L. as precedent to support its ruling. Leroy’s lawsuit against the district, which seeks $1 million in damages, returns to the district court.
In Comedy, Timing Is Everything
On April 19, 2021, Leroy and his friends were hanging out after football practice. According to Leroy, they were in the parking lot of a dance studio when one of his friends said he saw something under one of the cars. When Leroy got on his stomach to check, one of the others knelt on his neck and gave a thumbs-up while a picture was taken. The members of the group each then posted the picture on their personal Snapchat accounts, with Leroy adding the caption, “Cops got another.”
The trial for the death of George Floyd, who was asphyxiated by Police Officer Derek Chauvin’s knee on his neck, was ongoing at the time, a day away from the jury returning a guilty verdict. Leroy claimed he only saw it “as a joke” and didn’t make the connection between the image he’d posted and how Floyd had died. After quickly receiving a flurry of comments condemning his post, Leroy took it down after seven minutes and allegedly urged his friends to do the same. However, a screenshot version was shared by others and spread through the community.
The school district claimed it received an outpouring of concern and fear over the perceived racist and threatening overtones of the image. It responded with assemblies, demonstrations, and support for students and staff. Despite the incident taking place off campus and not during school hours, the district ruled that the disruptions to the learning environment caused by Leroy’s Code of Conduct violations warranted disciplinary action. Leroy received a five-day suspension and was enjoined from participating in school-sponsored extracurricular activities, including sports, the Senior Breakfast, the Senior Prom, and the graduation ceremony.
After failing in an appeal with the school board, Leroy sued for violation of his First Amendment rights in New York State court. The judge granted a temporary injunction allowing him to attend his graduation. The district then took the case to federal court, winning a summary judgment dismissing Leroy’s lawsuit in the Southern District of New York. Buoyed by support from free speech organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Tully Center for Free Speech at Syracuse University, found success before the United States Court of Appeals.
The (Too) Long Arm of the Law, Err, School
While many considered Leroy’s post to be tasteless, racist, or both, the question of whether it was protected under the First Amendment was measured against Tinker v. Des Moines and Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L. The former addressed not whether Leroy’s post was disruptive to the school environment, but whether the extent to which it affected school activities outweighed his free speech rights as a student. The panel found that no true threats were expressed in Leroy’s post.
The judges also found it compelling that the incident involved off-campus student speech. It ruled that the school administrators had overstepped their authority regarding Leroy’s right to free expression of his beliefs while outside the figurative schoolhouse gate. If Leroy had posted an intention of bombing the school to his Snapchat friends, the school’s interest in his off-campus speech would be justified. That wasn’t the case, and so the lower court’s order was overturned. Were Leroy’s free speech rights truly violated? That is literally the million-dollar question back before the district court.
Related Resources
- Understanding the Legal Issues for Social Networking Sites and their Users (FindLaw’s Legal Technology)
- Not-So-Free Speech: 5 Limits on First Amendment Rights (FindLaw’s Law and Daily Life)
- Student Rights at School: Free Speech (Law and Daily Life)
