A Fort Worth police officer reportedly threatened Christian street preacher David Grisham and another member of his evangelical outreach team with an arrest citation after their efforts to engage participants at a local Pride event in Texas. The incident has drawn scrutiny from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, which announced it would investigate the situation.
According to police statements, officers received complaints from business owners about the group’s use of a bullhorn to amplify their voices during the event. When Grisham and his team refused to stop using the device, authorities seized the bullhorn and issued a citation for “unreasonable noise”—a term typically reserved for construction or animal-related sounds but not limited to those sources.
David Grisham’s attorney, C.J. Grisham—who has no known familial relation to the plaintiff—argued that the city’s decibel limit for such citations unlawfully falls below Texas standards and that no officer conducted a required decibel check before issuing the citation. “Mr. Grisham was exercising his right to express his views on matters of significant public concern,” the attorney stated. “The Fort Worth Police Department responded, not by protecting his constitutional rights, but by threatening him with arrest and ultimately issuing a citation.”
Fort Worth Police spokesman Officer Buddy Calzada released a statement Wednesday confirming officers did not prevent individuals from expressing their views. He said the group voluntarily ceased protesting after the bullhorn was seized as evidence and that the viral video of the interaction does not reflect the entire exchange, though he acknowledged one officer made inaccurate remarks during the encounter.
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division labeled the incident “troubling” and confirmed it would conduct an investigation.
