Some of you may have heard about, or heard, the music emanating from Atlanta Motor Speedway last evening. From some of us who were a mere 9-12 miles away, it was audible inside the house until after 3am. The event had a permit in Henry County, so their residents only recourse was their county commissioners. But in Fayette county no such permit was issued and the noise was in violation of county ordinance. HCSO says they can't act because of the permit, FayCo says they can't enforce FayCo ordinances against violators in Henry. My question: What recourse does a person have to curtail a remote noise source that is keeping you awake until 3am on a Monday morning?
So, lets do a more common issue - next door neighbor, who just happens to have their house in another county but the line is your property line, violates noise ordinances. Since Sheriff's have statewide authority why can't they serve the neighbor even when they are across the county line? If they can do so, and that has to have come up in 200+ years of GA law enforcement - they why can't they here?
If painting my house baby blue is illegal in GA, but I live across the line in AL, what law is broken and who arrests me when I paint it baby blue? I mean county code is local...why/how would it apply to someone outside of the county?
Your baby blue walls do not penetrate the exterior of my house and deprive me of peaceable enjoyment inside. I'm more apt analogy would be me making scam phone calls from my county to yours. Did the crime take place at the victims residence or the callers residence? Since the ordinance refers to the sound level at the listener's location, it seems to me that the violation took place at the recipient's address. As such, Fayette County should be able to issue citations for violations that occurred here. Somehow I doubt that a projectile landing in Atlanta Motor Speedway would end with both Sheriff's Offices is telling me to call the other one because there is nothing they can do. Maybe if I sell tickets and hire popular bands to play music they'll give me a pass?
Sure, but fraud is expected to be illegal in both places, so that's not the same analogy. Can the free market fix this one or is a larger more oppressive government called for?
I It is a violation in both counties. They had a permit for Henry County, but not for Fayette County. As such they violated the law in Fayette County. As for a fix, the free market wasn't going to respond at 3 a.m. last night. Furthermore comma a private entity profited by depriving me of Peaceable enjoyment of my property. I did not consent to that being taken from me, nor was I compensated for it. As such, I have been damaged.
Winner, winner, chicken dinner. The question now is if you're so damaged that you would spend what could be a long time seeking a remedy? I dug quickly through some caselaw and couldn't find anything specific to your case here in Georgia...so hey, you could be the one to change it!
ATL Philip, I think you're onto something. You are asking if there is a general rule in law that holds that conduct that is done in one place but is known as expected to reach across the county line to cause harm in another place is a crime in the location where the harmful effects were felt . I think the answer is yes, but I would want to look up statutory law and case law before giving you a definite answer . However, as a practical matter, I really doubt that the people in fFayette county government would want to start a feud with their neighbors in Henry County . Not over this kind of situation . Don't expect any judges in Fayette County to be too receptive of this type of action, if you file a lawsuit or ask the offenders in Henry County to be prosecuted for sending their noise across the county line.
One other consideration: does Georgia's home rule Act limit the power of local governments to pass ordinances for conduct that is conducted outside their borders but is felt inside their borders? It could be that the state of Georgia claims this power for itself - if somebody who is physically located a cross the Georgia line in the neighboring state sends a destructive force across the border to cause harm in our state ---but maybe Georgia does not necessarily allow cities and counties to exercise that authority for offenses across county or city borders . I don't know. It's probably something worth researching.
What if the offending object was a vile smelling gas? Bullets? Somehow I doubt it would be treated the same. Or, what if AMS decided to do this every weekend? Am I just SOL? Given the AMS needs the money, this was a first-of-its-kind, and they have already signed a three-year deal with this same event, it's worthy of concern.
I had the same experience over the weekend. Being about 10 miles from AMS and "enjoying" (sarc/) their concert for free until 3am all weekend. We didn't realize where it was coming from until last night around 10pm when I ran into a couple at the store that was headed to AMS from Maryland. I even had neighbors calling me, thinking maybe it was coming from the Clayton County neighborhood behind me. So we get this for at least a couple of more years too??
We are within range. Do you access to Autrey's back room where they sale the mortars? I don't know the password for the mortar room. The couple that I had talked said the festival had been downtown but had to find a new venue because of the noise. They said Centennial Park, but the festival website mentioned the Fourth Ward Park