Birk said he contacted the Butler County Prosecutors Office, Butler County Children Services and Middletown Division of Police juvenile detectives to make sure the activity was legal. He was told that if the dancers didn’t expose their genitalia, didn’t have any physical contact with the spectators and didn’t distribute material, the activity was legal.
“I can’t find any criminal offense at all in reference to the Pride event,” Birk told the Journal-News. “No laws have been violated.”
He said police gave one criminal summons to a man, who despite being warned by police, continued using a megaphone, a violation of a city ordinance.
During the 2019 Pride event, John M. Williams, then 42, was arrested and charged after he allegedly generated unreasonable noise with a megaphone. The charge was a fourth-degree misdemeanor.
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