LEE COUNTY — A Lee County Man said his rights were violated by his state representative.
Randy Scott says State Rep. Spencer Roach, who represents District 79, blocked him on his Facebook page, and deleted his comments. So Scott filed a lawsuit to get himself unblocked, and paid a visit to Roach's office.
When he arrived, staff were understandably a little defensive.
"You guys obviously set this up as an ambush," said the legislative staffer.
But Scott insisted that this lawsuit, and him showing up at Roach's office, is an honest attempt to protect his first amendment rights.
"I think that there’s enough case law to support that, if that is his main source of communication through Facebook, that it isn’t going to be a private page," said Scott.
But Roach's staff had a different view.
“His Facebook, that’s personal. That’s treated, that’s not treated as a legislative thing. Our office does not have his password, we don’t control it," said the legislative staffer.
We asked Scott what the original post was that got him banned. He said he was responding to pictures of a tour that Roach took through the everglades.
"After I seen him posting the word ‘the swamp’, that they were traveling in it, I just used my creative Facebook prowess and I said well it’s perfect that the swamp went to the swamp," said Scott.
Scott argues he didn't use profanity and didn't threaten anyone, so the posts should have been left up.
