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He called California’s billy club ban “a very vague and nebulous law that has been abused for decades in California.”

The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that Mr. Roman in 2008 first publicized “the presence of two members of the New Black Panther Party — one carrying a billy club — outside of a Philadelphia polling site.”

“They told him to get up, unlawful assembly. You have to disperse. And of course he continued to pray. And that wasn’t good enough, so they hit him with that billy club,” she said.

“Faithfulness” has become a watchword for adaptations, sometimes a measure of authenticity, sometimes a billy club to police divergences from a favorite story.

Sheriff Jim Clark points a billy club and, beneath the club, an electric cattle prod at a voting rights demonstrator on the steps of the Dallas County Courthouse.