Dallas, USA - A justice of the peace was sued Friday for allegedly ordering a man from his courtroom for refusing to remove his turban while defending himself in a traffic citation case.
The lawsuit charges that Judge Albert B. Cercone violated Amardeep Singh's religious rights because the turban is a religious article for Sikh men.
The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit on Singh's behalf in state district court in Dallas. It asked that Cercone and other judges be prohibited from forcing people to remove clothing required by their religion.
Singh said he tried to enter Cercone's courtroom in June 2006 to contest a speeding ticket, but a guard barred him under a policy barring hats, and court personnel told him to speak to the judge.
Singh said he tried to explain that his faith requires wearing a turban but that the judge ordered him to leave the courtroom or face arrest.
According to the lawsuit, Singh consulted his uncle, a high priest, before removing the turban and putting his uncut hair in a pony tail to return to the courtroom in a "personally compromising and humiliating position."
The judge did not respond immediately to a request for comment left with his staff.
Navdeep Singh, a spokesman for the Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund, said the group tried to contact the judge and the Dallas district attorney's office before approaching the ACLU about filing a lawsuit. He said the judge declined to respond and that an assistant district attorney said no prosecutors could recall the incident.
Sikh organizations claim there are about 500,000 adherents in the United States, and they compare the turban to yarmulkes worn by many Orthodox Jews and hijabs worn by many Muslim women.
This week, the New York-based Sikh Coalition protested a new federal policy that calls for more thorough security screening of airline passengers wearing head coverings. The screenings could include a pat-down search of the head.
The Sikh Coalition was joined by more than 25 ethnic and religious groups in saying that the policy singles out people who wear religious head coverings.
Last year, a judge in Georgia apologized to a Sikh American man who was barred from her court for a no-hat policy similar to the one in Dallas.