Class Action Claims San Diego Is Using ‘Vague’ Law to Criminalize Homelessness

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San Diego, its mayor, its nine-member city council and its police department and police chief are the defendants in a proposed class action lawsuit alleging the parties’ alleged criminalization of homelessness is a violation of proposed class members’ rights.

The case takes issue with San Diego’s “Unauthorized Encroachments Prohibited” statute, a “vague” law that ostensibly makes it illegal for “any person to place any object on public property.” The 10 homeless plaintiffs behind the suit claim individuals living on the streets cannot possibly comply with this law because “nobody can perpetually carry their belongings,” and at some point an individual must set him/herself and his or her belongings down. Rather than providing shelters, food or social services programs to aid the homeless, the plaintiffs allege the defendants have instead chosen “an unconstitutional barrage of jailings, tickets, fines, and stay-away orders to move people and their things ‘away.’”