ST. LOUIS (AP) — A federal judge in St. Louis has ordered Ferguson police to stop forcing peaceful protesters to “keep moving” or face arrest.
Police have used what some call the “five-second” rule to enforce a nighttime curfew during protests over the Aug. 9 fatal shooting of an unarmed black 18-year-old, Michael Brown, by a white Ferguson officer. The practice prompted a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports U.S. District Judge Catherine Perry issued a preliminary injunction Monday halting the tactic. Perry said the practice violates protesters’ constitutional rights to free speech and due process.

But the judge also said Ferguson police may enforce Missouri’s refusal-to-disperse law, which makes it a misdemeanor to refuse an officer’s command to leave the scene of an illegal assembly or riot.