The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department (“SLMPD”) endorses the limited use of social media to enhance and support SLMPD goals and objectives by providing the community with information on issues related to public safety within the City of St. Louis. This narrowly tailored disclaimer balances the public’s freedom of speech/expression with the SLMPD’s legitimate governmental interest in hiding, removing and/or deleting certain communications.
There is no endorsement, implied or otherwise, by the SLMPD of any third-party (non-SLMPD) user’s posts, comments, links, photos, videos or any other content (collectively “Content”). Third-party users are fully responsible for the Content that they submit, post, repost, share, or otherwise transmit. Opinions expressed and Content transmitted by third-party users are not the opinions of the SLMPD and/or the St. Louis Board of Police Commissioners and/or the City of St. Louis.
This social media page is intended to serve as a mechanism for the SLMPD to provide information on public safety topics. Every person is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law – any information posted are allegations and used in the course of law enforcement investigations. Any Content submitted to the SLMPD social media site are public records and may be subject to disclosure pursuant to the Missouri Sunshine Law (Mo. Rev. Stat. §§ 610.001 et seq.) and retention pursuant to the applicable records retention schedule.
The SLMPD’s official social media accounts are designated as limited public forums for communicating information on issues related to public safety within the City of St. Louis. The public is welcome to communicate with the Department on topics related to public safety within the City of St. Louis. The SLMPD may remove Content that falls outside the scope of the intended purpose of this forum or that violates the standards set forth below. The SLMPD will not remove posts or comments based on disagreement with their viewpoint or political message. Posts critical of the Department, its policies, or its personnel are welcome and will not be removed on the basis of criticism alone. All removal decisions will be made consistent with the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, the Missouri Constitution, and Missouri law.
Comments are important to us and others who read these pages. To ensure that this page and all posted Content are related to the limited public forum of public safety within the City of St. Louis, the SLMPD reserves the right to hide, remove and/or delete posts that:
- Attempt to incite illegal action;
- Contain true threats wherein the speaker communicates an intent to commit an unlawful act of violence against a particular person, group or entity;
- Are obscene (See RSMo. § 573.010);
- Contain personal identifying information of a third party that is not in the public record;
- Contain threatening or harassing language and/or comments;
- Contain proprietary information, intellectual property, and/or copyrighted or trademarked images or graphics that are posted without the approval of the owner;
- Contain libel or defamation; and/or
- Are a clear violation of local, State, or federal laws.
For questions regarding this policy or to file a complaint regarding the removal of a comment or alleged retaliation, contact the SLMPD’s Director of Public Affairs and Information, Mitch McCoy, via email at [email protected]. Do not use this page to report a crime. To report a crime, call 911 or our non-emergency number, (314) 444-1212, or go to your nearest patrol station.