ST. LOUIS _ A proposed St. Louis city ordinance making it illegal to intentionally spit, cough or sneeze on public safety and other essential workers during the coronavirus crisis ran into trouble Tuesday in an aldermanic committee.
The bill's sponsor, Alderman Bret Narayan, said it would give prosecutors a more specific, easier-to-prove alternative to a state anti-terrorist law used to charge people in two such cases in other parts of Missouri. The state law also has more "draconian" penalties, he said.
"If we're going to ask these folks to go out and do their job in the middle of a pandemic, it's appropriate we have ordinances on the books to ensure that we can protect them," Narayan, D-24th Ward, said of his bill.
"This would distinctly and clearly lay out the prohibited activities."
The Public Safety Committee didn't vote on the bill, but all seven members either said they opposed the bill or expressed concern with it.
Aldermen Shameem Clark Hubbard, D-26th Ward, and Carol Howard, D-14th Ward, both said they worried that people who accidentally cough or sneeze could be arrested. "All of a sudden you got a sneeze in you," Howard said.
Narayan said intent would have to be proved. He said it's designed to deal with people who "got in someone's face and expressed ... dissatisfaction with them by engaging in these behaviors."
Howard and committee chairman Joe Vaccaro, D-23rd Ward, said police and prosecutors already have enough of a task dealing with violent crime in the city.
Narayan's measure aims to protect a long list of essential workers defined by the city health director's stay-at-home order, including grocery, hardware store and take-out restaurant employees and members of the news media.
Violators would be subject to a fine of up to $500 and or up to 90 days in jail. The measure would expire in July of next year.
The state anti-terrorist law, a felony, is punishable by up to four years in prison or one year in jail, and a $10,000 fine.
Statutes say someone commits the crime when he or she "recklessly disregards the risk of causing the evacuation, quarantine or closure of any portion of a building" and "causes a false belief or fear that an incident has occurred or that a condition exists involving danger to life."
Two Missouri men were charged in March with making terrorist threats for unhygienic behavior in public.
Cody Lee Pfister, 26, was charged after he posted a video online of himself licking items at a Walmart in Warrenton. John Swaller, 33, was charged after he was accused of intentionally coughing at customers at a Walmart in Cuba, Mo.
At the hearing, Alderman Jeffrey Boyd, D-22nd Ward, said another existing alternative is to charge someone with fourth-degree assault, a state misdemeanor.
Among other things, that covers people who knowingly cause physical contact considered by the other person to be offensive or provocative. In response, Narayan said it could be difficult for a prosecutor to prove a sneeze or a cough made contact.
Meanwhile, Alderman John Collins Muhammad, D-19th Ward, said "turning someone who passes on a disease into a criminal does not keep a community safe."
He also complained that the bill targets anyone, not just those testing positive for COVID-19, who intentionally spits, coughs or sneezes on a person covered by the bill.
Also speaking against the bill was Molly Pearson with Empower Missouri, an organization advocating for low-income Missourians.
She said if there is no verbal or written proof of an intentional act, "there is danger that those who already vulnerable to overpolicing are more apt to be arrested" under the ordinance. Some committee members expressed the same point.
