Octogenarian resolute after arrest for handing out tracts
Lincoln resident Larry Ball hands out scripture tracts at the Pinnacle Bank Arena, which hosts various events with big crowds. He was first arrested for handing out tracts on the plaza in 2014, and that wasn’t the only time he was jailed.
Ball tells OneNewsNow that SMG, the corporation contracted to manage Pinnacle Bank Arena, wrote a policy establishing a no-speech zone in the area where he was arrested – about 20 feet from the front door. But an ordinance passed by the city council listed the area as a public plaza, a public sidewalk.
With the help of the ACLU of Nebraska, Ball sued. But federal courts – including the Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals – have ruled against him. The 80-year-old man says he won’t stop trying to communicate the Word of God to people who need it.
“This country is in moral decay,” he shares. “And God … has to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah if he doesn’t do something to us.”
As for handing out tracts at the arena, Ball says, at his age, he doesn’t want to be arrested again because jail food is lousy, there’s no air conditioning, and the only entertainment is one TV – a device he doesn’t even permit in his own home.
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