California Diversified Promotions, Inc. v. James A. Musick

Before WRIGHT and CHOY, Circuit Judges, and BURNS, District Judge.

Appellants appeal the dismissal of their claim for injunctive relief and damages, brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 , 28 U.S.C. § 1343 , and 28 U.S.C. § 1331 (1970). Appellants are a California corporation doing business as the Frontier Room and its employee dancers. They allege that the defendants-appel-lees, Sheriff of the County of Orange, California, and four of his deputies, engaged in an “intentional program of harassment and bad-faith law enforcement” to chill their right to present nude dancing at the Frontier Room.

Appellants alleged that, in bad faith and without probable cause, the defendants arrested and cited the plaintiff dancers for violation of California Penal Code § 311.6, which prohibits obscene live conduct in a public place. They introduced affidavits from several of the dancers reporting alleged statements of the arresting officers which might be interpreted as supporting their claims that the arrests were made without probable cause.

The trial court denied appellants’ motion for a preliminary injunction on grounds of abstention, citing Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37 , 91 S.Ct. 746 ,…