A judge has refused to throw out the case against a Little Canada man who was criminally charged after he videotaped the activities of a sheriff’s deputy and ambulance crew outside his apartment.

Ramsey County District Judge Edward Wilson denied Andrew Joseph Henderson’s request to dismiss the misdemeanor charges against him. Henderson, 29, argued that he was exercising his First Amendment rights to record activities of public officials in a public place and that he didn’t break the law.

He was charged with disorderly conduct and interfering with an ambulance crew.

The judge ruled Monday that Henderson’s conduct “cannot be shielded under the cloak of the First Amendment.”

Henderson’s attorneys, Teresa Nelson of the American Civil Liberties Union and Kevin Riach of Minneapolis, said Tuesday that they were disappointed in the judge’s ruling.

“We strongly believe Andrew didn’t do anything wrong, and we will take this to trial,” Riach said.

A new court date has not been set.

Henderson was sitting on a bench outside his apartment building in the 200 block of East County Road B2 shortly before midnight on Oct. 30 when he saw sheriff’s deputies frisk a fellow resident. Paramedics then began to load the man, whose face was injured, into an ambulance.

The man was intoxicated, with a blood-alcohol level of 0.32, Riach said. The man’s sister had called police to ask them to check on him. He said the bruises on his face were from a traffic accident.

Deputy Jacqueline Muellner approached Henderson, telling him to put the camera down. “If I end up on YouTube, I’m gonna be upset,” she said. Her words were recorded on Henderson’s cellphone.

When Henderson refused, saying he wasn’t doing anything illegal, Muellner seized the camera.

Muellner retired from the sheriff’s office in July after 33 years with the office.

The state alleged that Henderson was within 3 to 5 feet of the ambulance. The bench Henderson said he was sitting on was about 30 feet from the driveway where the ambulance would have been parked. He said he should not be charged with interfering with the crew when he did not physically obstruct them.

Wilson, the judge, wrote in his order that “it is not necessary that one engage in a physical act to interfere or obstruct.”

“It is sufficient if the defendant’s actions or conduct had the effect of physically obstructing or interfering with a member of an ambulance crew,” he wrote.

The other charge Henderson faces, disorderly conduct, is defined in the law as “offensive, obscene, abusive, boisterous, or noisy conduct” that the actor knows or has reason to know would “tend to alarm, anger or disturb others or provoke an assault or breach of the peace.”

A jury will decide whether Henderson’s conduct “was so offensive as to alarm, anger, or disturb others,” the judge wrote.

Wilson also ruled that the recording of a medical assessment by paramedics in Henderson’s case is not constitutionally protected speech. That is different, Wilson said, from other cases in which a defendant videotapes police carrying out their duties.

Emily Gurnon can be reached at 651-228-5522. Follow her at twitter.com/emilygurnon.