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The court's General Order re: Expressive Activity (Order No. 2016-4), a notice to all persons entering courthouses in Riverside County: definitions of prohibited activity, walkway, curtilage and courthouse; prohibitions on prohibited activity within a courthouse or its curtilage, on obstructing or harassing persons entering, leaving or waiting in line, on approaching a person in line within 8 feet, on activity intended to interfere with the administration of justice or to influence a judge, juror, witness or officer of the court, and on amplification equipment; exclusions for court personnel, law enforcement and authorized stationary commercial sales; severability; delegation to supervising judges; compliance with law enforcement; notice and service of the order; fines of up to $1,000 per violation under Code of Civil Procedure section 1209(a)(5); and the supersession, effective July 20, 2016, of the January 15, 2014 general order.
California > Fourth Appellate District > Riverside County > Superior Court of California, County of Riverside
[File stamp: FILED, SUPERIOR COURT OF CALIFORNIA, COUNTY OF RIVERSIDE, JUL 26 2016, with a deputy clerk's handwritten signature] SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA COUNTY OF RIVERSIDE ORDER NO. 2016-4 GENERAL ORDER RE: EXPRESSIVE ACTIVITY NOTICE TO ALL PERSONS ENTERING COUTHOUSES IN RIVERSIDE COUNTY The purpose this General Order is to ensure the safe and orderly use of court facilities; to minimize activities which unreasonably disrupt, interrupt, or interfere with the orderly and peaceable conduct of court business in a neutral forum free of actual or perceived partiality, bias, prejudice, or favoritism; to provide for the fair and orderly conduct of hearings and trials; to promote the free flow of pedestrian and vehicular traffic on sidewalks and streets around court facilities; and to maintain proper judicial decorum. The further purpose of this General Order is to facilitate safe, peaceful, and orderly public access to courthouses unhindered by threats, confrontation, interference, noise pollution or harassment that may be directed at court users including but not limited to those court users waiting in line outside a courthouse. This General Order regulates only conduct occurring in and around court facilities without regard to the content of any particular message, idea or form of speech. The Court does not intend to ban all expressive activities from the environs surrounding court facilities and intends that this General Order be construed so as to provide for ample alternative channels for communication of information near but not within court facilities nor on courthouse grounds. (See Comfort v. McLaughlin (C.D. Cal. 2006) 473 F.Supp.2d 1026.) THE COURT HEREBY ORDERS: I. DEFINITIONS A. The following definitions apply for purposes of this General Order: 1. “Prohibited Activity” shall mean the acts of demonstrating, picketing, parading, proselytizing or preaching, distributing literature or other materials to the general public, soliciting sales or donations, conducting sales, including trustee foreclosure sales, engaging in commercial activity unless otherwise authorized by this Order of the Court, or engaging in oral or demonstrative protest, education or counseling. 2. “Walkway” shall mean (a) the area of any corridor or sidewalk, or other path of pedestrian movement, directly from the edge of the public sidewalk nearest an entrance to any building containing a courtroom to the entrance; (b) the area of any corridor or sidewalk leading directly from any parking lot within a curtilage to an entrance to any building containing a courtroom; or (c) a corridor or passageway within a multi-purpose, commercial, or private building that leads directly to the part of the building containing a courtroom. 3. “Curtilage” shall mean the area between any building containing a courtroom and the nearest edge of the public sidewalk surrounding the building. It shall not include the area adjacent to the portion of a multi-purpose, commercial or private building that does not contain a courtroom. 4. “Courthouse” shall mean any building containing at least one courtroom. It shall also include that portion of a multi-purpose, commercial or private building that contains at least one courtroom. II. PROHIBITIONS A. No person shall engage in any prohibited activity within a courthouse. B. No person shall engage in any prohibited activity within the curtilage of a courthouse. C. No person shall obstruct, harass, impede or interfere with persons entering or leaving a courthouse, or with persons waiting in line to enter a courthouse. D. No person shall approach another person waiting in line to enter a courthouse, within 8 feet of such person, for the purpose of engaging in any prohibited activity, unless such other person consents. E. No person shall engage in any prohibited activity in or near a courthouse with the intent to interfere with, obstruct, or impede the administration or justice or with the intent to influence any judge, juror, witness, or officer of the court in the discharge of his or her duty. F. No person shall use amplification equipment to engage in prohibited activity in a manner that harasses or interferes with persons entering or leaving a courthouse, or with persons waiting in line to enter a courthouse. III. EXCLUSIONS This Order shall not apply to authorized court personnel or law enforcement officers in the performance of their official duties. Section II(A), and (B) shall not apply to individuals engaged in the stationary solicitation of sales as part of any commercial, primarily non-expressive activity (including but not limited to the sale of newspapers, reading materials, sundries or food stuffs) in a specific space not dedicated to court functions and expressly authorized by a written space permit, license, agreement, or lease from the Court, the County of Riverside, the Judicial Council of California, or other owner of a building containing a courtroom. IV. SEVERABILITY If any provision of this General Order be held invalid, the validity of the other provisions of this General Order shall not be affected. V. DELEGATION The purpose of this General Order is stated in its preamble: to ensure the safe and orderly use of court facilities; to minimize activities which unreasonably disrupt, interrupt, or interfere with the orderly and peaceable conduct of court business in a neutral forum free of actual or perceived partiality, bias, prejudice, or favoritism; to provide for the fair and orderly conduct of hearing and trials; to promote the free flow of pedestrian and vehicular traffic on sidewalks and streets around court facilities; to maintain proper judicial decorum; and to facilitate safe, peaceful, and orderly public access to courthouses unhindered by threats, confrontations, noise pollution or harassment directed at court users. To the extent the terms of this General Order do not accomplish this stated purpose at a courthouse, on written delegation by the Presiding Judge, the Supervising Judge responsible for that courthouse is hereby authorized to issue an Order to accomplish the stated purpose of this General Order. VI. COMPLIANCE WITH LAW ENFORCEMENT While on or in the premises of any courthouse, all persons are ordered to comply with the lawful requests, directions and orders of any law enforcement officers and their agents in the performance of their duties. VII. NOTICE This Order shall be posted on the court’s website at www.riverside.courts.ca.gov. The Sheriff of Riverside County and his or her deputies and their agents are directed to serve a copy of this General Order on any person who appears to be in violation thereof, to advise the person of the apparent violation, and, if the apparent violation continues after such notice, to immediately notify the Presiding Judge or Supervising Judge responsible for that courthouse so that the Court can determine whether proceedings should be initiated to insure compliance with this General Order. This Order shall not preclude any law enforcement officer from taking appropriate steps to ensure the orderly and peaceable conduct of court business at a courthouse. VIII. PENALTIES Violation of this Order may result in the imposition of a fine of up to $1,000 per violation pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 1209(a)(5), and/or prosecution for criminal violations. IX. EFFECT OF PRIOR ORDERS Effective July 20, 2016 this Order shall replace and supersede this Court’s January 15, 2014 General Order Re: Expressive Activity. IT IS SO ORDERED, on July 26, 2016. Presiding Judge GENERAL ORDER RE: EXPRESSIVE ACTIVITY ORDER NO. 2016-4 [The caption's left cell is blank; the order number and title stand in its right cell. In "IT IS SO ORDERED, on July 26, 2016." the printed date reads "July 20, 2016"; its "0" is struck through by hand and "6" is written above it (the file stamp reads JUL 26 2016). The order is signed by hand above the line; no name is printed beneath the signature, only "Presiding Judge". The notice heading is bold and underlined; the section headings, the case name and the web address are underlined. The print's "COUTHOUSES", "The purpose this General Order", "the administration or justice" and "hearing and trials" (Section V) are transcribed as printed. The running footer "GENERAL ORDER RE: EXPRESSIVE ACTIVITY / ORDER NO. 2016-4 p. n" is transcribed once, without its page numbers; line numbers are omitted.]
[File stamp: FILED, SUPERIOR COURT OF CALIFORNIA, COUNTY OF RIVERSIDE, JUL 26 2016, with a deputy clerk's handwritten signature] SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA COUNTY OF RIVERSIDE ORDER NO. 2016-4 GENERAL ORDER RE: EXPRESSIVE ACTIVITY NOTICE TO ALL PERSONS ENTERING COUTHOUSES IN RIVERSIDE COUNTY The purpose this General Order is to ensure the safe and orderly use of court facilities; to
Reviewer note: Transcribed 2026-10-02 (California T3 Riverside build 2026-10-02) from BenchPath custody ca/t3/ca-riverside/docs/admin/adminorder_expressiveactivity.pdf (387308 bytes, sha256 a09bdf90d8497441053e84b066da7f93862630d55f0a99e39c047ce42e02303c; 5 pages) - transcribed by eye from the rendered page images (200 dpi), every page read against its image; RapidOCR's reading of each page, and the file's own text layer where it has one, served only as second readers - every six-word window of the transcription was looked up in them and every miss checked on the page image (custody vision/check-log.md); the clerk's file stamp in one bracketed line, handwritten fills in place with a closing bracketed note, running footers transcribed once, pleading line numbers omitted; a signature itself is not transcribed.
9 verbatim requirements from 4th Circuit Administrative Order 1997-10.
6 verbatim requirements from 4th Circuit Administrative Order 1997-13.