Remembering The 2021 “Peace Vigil”

Back in May 2021, Pennsbury School Board members allowed their Solicitor to shut down three Pennsbury citizens at Public Comment. At the next Board Meeting in June 2021, the Fallsington Gym was packed standing room only as Simon Campbell delivered a speech that went viral nationally, receiving over 50 million views and led to interviews conducted by Fox News and NewsMax during primetime television airtime windows.

In early October 2021, Pennsbury School Board members, multiple Administrators and their Solicitors were sued in Federal Court in the case Marshall v. Amuso, brought by the Institute For Free Speech. Shortly after the lawsuit was filed, news of a rally surfaced on Social Media to be staged at the sacred Gardens of Reflections to support those Pennsbury School Board members that were the targets of hateful emails received after Simon Campbell’s interview appearances as citizens around the nation learned of the federal civil right violations that occurred at Pennsbury.

Interestingly, these emails were received in June 2021 and July 2021. Yet no major concerns were ever raised about these email until AFTER the lawsuit was filed against Pennsbury. The following is a video from NBC 10 Philadelphia featuring some Pennsbury School Board Members and Senator Steve Santarsiero:.

Two days prior to the “Peace Vigil”, the Philadelphia Inquirer did a Sunday Cover Story on Pennsbury and discussed the contents of the emails they had received months prior. In the article, Simon Campbell stated in an email to the newspaper that “any insinuation that I encourage harassment is false and meant to distract from the district’s appalling censorship and violation of the First Amendment at public meetings.” Despite Campbell’s statement, this didn’t stop such allegations continuing to be made in the NBC 10 video just two days later.

Two weeks after the “Peace Vigil”, Federal Judge Gene Pratter issued an injunction against Pennsbury and the Defendants in the case forbidding them from censoring public comment. Later on in the case, Judge Pratter additionally ruled that the actions of the Defendants were not taken in their official capacities and that they were to held personally liable for their actions in the case. As part of the discovery during the mini-trial that preceded the injunction being handed down, all copies of the emails that were sent to the FBI months after receipt were turned over for review.

To date, there is no confirmation as to whether or not the FBI has brought charges on anyone that sent these emails. Via RTK, it was confirmed at appeal with the Bucks County DA’s office that Pennsbury did in fact contact the FBI, but made no reference of the date in which they did so.

Note in the masthead one of the members of the law firm that facilitated the FBI filling…State Senator Steve Santarsiero.