ABC News Site on the Yale Flag-Burning:
From an online survey at the ABC News site:
Three Yale students have been arrested on charges of arson, reckless endangerment and other crimes for allegedly burning a flag on the porch of their apartment. One of the students translated for U.S. troops in Afghanistan. None have criminal records.The only trouble: They have apparently been arrested not for burning a flag on their own porch, but for burning a flag belonging to someone else, while it was still attached to his home; on top of that, the "flames [had] reached the building's awning." So, yes, that sort of flag burning should be a crime -- the crime of arson and reckless endangerment. And ABC News should be a little more careful in its reports.Should flag burning be a crime?
Yes. The flag is one of our most important symbols and desecrating it should be illegal.
No. What the students did is unfortunate, but they are protected by the First Amendment.
I'm not sure. I need more information.
Thanks to Greg Pollowitz (National Review Online's Media Blog) for catching this, and to InstaPundit for the pointer.
Related Posts (on one page):
- ABC News Site on the Yale Flag-Burning:
- Three Yale Students Arrested For Burning U.S. Flag:
"Three Yale students have been arrested on charges of arson, reckless endangerment and other crimes for allegedly burning the carpet of the president's office as a political statement. Two of the students are not U.S. citizens. None seem remorseful for their actions."
Should carpet burning be a crime?
Yes. Carpets are extremely important sources of comfort and deserve protection.
No. What the students did is unfortunate, but they are protected by the First Amendment.
I'm not sure. I need more information.
Yeah, because house-endangering criminal vandalism is just hilarious.
So what if instead of burning someone’s flag that was attached to their home, these “[c]ollege kids with no records” decided to burn a cross on someone’s front yard?
If anything what these three a**holes did (one of them has already reported confessed to the crime) was even more serious because it was not only arson but arson attached to someone’s home. Throw the book at them and ship the two foreign students back to their country of origin at their own expense.
Your comment presupposes that "the book" is being "thrown" at them because the prosecutor disagrees with their politics. My impression is that the police and prosecutor are honestly outraged that these hooligans destroyed someone else's property and imperiled his house and possibly his safety simply to make a cheap political statement of their own. Any adult willing to commit such an act deserves to have a conviction on his c.v., preferably for a felony.
Joe Jackson how many arson/recklessness endangerment charges have you seen filed in response to flaming bags of poop on someone's doorstep?
Joe Jackson how many arson/recklessness endangerment charges have you seen filed in response to flaming bags of poop on someone's doorstep?
Interestingly enough, that very thing (well, at least the arson charge) happened just yesterday. As for your claim that it's "become" a political story, I think it was a political story before the flames went to the flag - but that's beside the point. Why, exactly, should these "three college kids" be charged with something other than the crime they committed by burning the flag attached to another person's house? It's not as if these are trumped-up, unsupportable charges.
Did they commit the elements of the crimes? It appears so. Should they be charged? Yes. Does the fact that they were making an anti-American political statement shield them from responsibility for their otherwise criminal (and dangerous) actions? Not a chance.
While both are crimes, burning another's house is obviously worse than burning another's flag. I think we would have to know the specifics of how the flag was positioned, etc. to judge how great of a risk there was to the house, to understand how serious this crime was. In making that judgment, I also think it matters that the house did not, in fact, catch on fire.
I wouldn't consider a "polling pop-up" to be a "report". I searched the ABC News site and the only report they have about this incident is an AP story. I suspect that someone in the "stir-up-some-ad-generating-controversy" department asked one of the tech folks to put up a quick "polling" question and that person just glanced at the story before writing the intro.
P.S. As far as stirring-up-controversy skills go on this story, Fox has ABC down cold.
Based on the facts, the appropriate charge is reckless burning, not second degree arson. Clearly, the intent of the students was to burn the flag, not the house. Perhaps the students recklessly put the house at risk, but there is no evidence that they intentionally burned the house. For some reason, the prosecutor has decided to go forward with a charge that cannot be supported by the evidence.
Would this be just an unremarkable example of applied game theory or selective prosecution on political grounds?
I'll only agree that it will be difficult to prove intent, but the fact that they lit a flag that was attached to a house and left the scene could be argued as a level of reckless indifference tantamount to intent. Reckless burning is a given, but not the only charge supportable by the evidence.
How about we attach a flag to the front of your residence and set it on fire?
I find it interesting that no one has commented on the fact that the "youths" were interfering in someone else's political speech. Aren't there federal statutes about that? Or, do they only apply when political speech by the correct people is obstructed?
What you are describing is recklessness (which, in contrast to negligence, is already extreme), not intent, which exists when the act has "consequences that the actor desires and believes or knows will occur." Intent, as it is typically defined, is not merely creating an unreasonable risk of certain consequences occuring, but requires either (1) desire and belief or (2) knowledge that consequences will occur.
If the prosecutor is going off of your theory (that recklessness can become intent) he better have some support in Connecticut case law that suggest such an unusual definition of intent is used in that state. Otherwise, he is behaving unethically.
This is an assholish response. Do you think all crimes should be treated the same, regardless of the dangers they pose? That the specifics of the incident are unimportant? If that is your a position, then your a moron in addition to being an asshole.
It is not typical for every criminal incident to become a federal case. Imagine that a heated political discussion becomes a bar fight. Likely, there has been some interference with political speech by someone. Should all such bar fights become federal cases?
Remember the Rodney King incident? That didn't become a federal case until after the locals acquitted the police officers on state charges.
It probably is good policy to allow local communities to handle routine criminal incidents. Here, the students in question are charged with a felony (either inappropriately Second Degree arson or appriopriately Reckless burning -- both of which are felonies) along with three misdemeanors (reckless endangerment, criminal mischief and breach of peace).
No, there aren't any federal statutes about that, other than perhaps a regulations that pertain to the government rather than private parties. I would think that such a law would be unconstitutionally overbroad, to the extent that it would inevitably conflict with an individual's own right to political expression under the First Amendment. Private parties are free to "interfere" with political speech so long as they don't break any laws in doing so.
Best to know what you're talking about before playing the Evil Liberal Conspiracy card.
Good point.
"(a) A person is guilty of arson in the second degree when, with intent to destroy or damage a building, as defined in section 53a-100, (1) he starts a fire or causes an explosion and ... (C) such fire or explosion was intended to subject another person to a deprivation of a right, privilege or immunity secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of this state or of the United States"
The two foreigners should be declared undesirable and deported and the naturalized citizen should be immediately suspended by Yale for at least one semester for bringing disrepute upon the university and its student body by acting like a common hooligan. After all, if Yale seniors can't be (and aren't) expected to know better than to act like delinquent teen-agers then why would anyone put a premium on hiring one of their grads? Getting a sheepskin and moving a tassel isn't going to magically give someone maturity and responsibility.
Besides confusing reckless indifference and intent, as has already been pointed out by Viscus, you also got the flaming bag of poop story wrong.
The article you linked to says;
Police are investigating and have listed the case as arson.
So contrary to what you claimed, they have not filed arson charges (and I'd bet money they won't). They are investigating it as Arson. But they'll wind up charging it as a misdo, or at most something akin to the reckless burning charge listed above.
The poster suggested that the incident was no big deal. If that's actually true, then it's not a big deal if it happens to the poster.
Is there some relevant difference between the poster and the victim?
> Do you think all crimes should be treated the same, regardless of the dangers they pose?
Not at all; that's why I'm suggesting a means by which we can determine how much danger this crime posed.
> That the specifics of the incident are unimportant?
I agree that the specifics are important - that's why I suggested the same specifics.
A cross-burning would seem to qualify. How about burning someone else's flag?
Likewise, if an old BBQ grill caught on fire on the front porch because the kids poured 151 on it, there would be no issue charging them with the reckless endangerment. (Content-neutral regulation and all that.)
I'm actually pro-flag burning in the sense of thinking it Constitutionally protected speech, albeit that of a nature I abhor.
I never said the crime was "no big deal." I said the seriousness of the crime depends, in part, on the risk that burning the flag caused for the house. That is just common sense. If, for example, one steals someone's flag and burns it in an area where it will cause no damage to anything other than the flag, that is a lesser offense than burning the flag, and, oh, just incidentally, burning a large chunk of a national forest or someone's house. That doesn't imply that stealing someone's flag and burning it is "no big deal." It just means that one offense is more serious than another.
Torturing and murdering an innocent person is more serious than shooting them in the foot, but that doesn't mean that shooting them in the foot is "no big deal."
Maybe, you should actually read and respond to what is actually said, instead of reading absurd meanings not even close to reasonably implied from what was explicitly said.
But you know, I like this idea of testing out the "seriousness" of a crime by replicating it. So, I think we should "test" out the seriousness of First Degree murder using you as a subject. That makes sense, right?
No? Then your response, was, as I said, assholish.
I had never heard of 18 U.S.C. 241, but it looks like your interpretation is right. The Tenth Circuit, at least, has held that it "prohibit[s] conspiracies to interfere with exercise of a federal right, including the right to free speech." Wells v. City and County of Denver
257 F.3d 1132, 1149 (10th Cir. 2001). My apologies for my slightly snappish response above; that's what I get for assuming.
Can anyone explain, though, how this statute doesn't make the entire Bill of Rights applicable to private individuals? For example, are private universities compelled to adopt content-neutral policies regarding student demonstrations? Does a Catholic school have to permit pro-choice rallies?
Your probably right. But then, when someone suggests a flag should be burned on my lawn, I can get a little annoyed.
Viscus is arguing that since the house didn't catch on fire that it's no big deal. It's just a piece of cloth on the front lawn. Except that it wasn't in the front lawn - it was attached to the house.
How about some specifics supporting the theory that the burning itself, ignoring any political/civil rights angle, wasn't a crime? Why wasn't it vandalism, if not reckless burning.
> Best to know what you're talking about before playing the Evil Liberal Conspiracy card.
Good people demanded that the feds get involved in cross-burning, and the cross in question was rarely owned by the folks being terrorized and often wasn't attached to their house. Do those two differences make this less of an issue?
Or is it the presumed sentiments of the flag owner that make the difference?
Suppose that the burners thought that the flyers were of the "take back the flag from the right-wing" persuasion and burned the flag to teach them a lesson. (In other words, the burned now are good people and the burners are bad.) Would this incident then rise to the required level?
I wasn't suggesting that the burning itself wasn't a crime. You asked whether "interfering with political speech" is an independent crime. I didn't think it was, but as you'll see from my 10:49 pm comment, I've apologized and admitted that you were right about that.
I'm not sure that the cross burning analogy works, though, in the absence of some evidence that the students' action was intended to send a message of intimidation. Cross burning sends a very specific message that isn't likely to be confused or misunderstood. I don't think the students' actions here carry quite the same unequivocal political overtones-- it seems equally plausible to me that this was a stupid drunken frat-boy prank as that it was an instance of deliberate political intimidation. Did the students intend to send an anti-American message by burning the flag, or were they just drunk and bored and it seemed like a good idea at the time? There's also the fact that cross-burning was adopted as a widespread method of intimidation and terrorism, which does not seem to be the case with flag-burning. If any group were to adopt a common practice of burning other people's American flags for the purpose of making some political statement, then it might seem appropriate for the feds to get involved. Until that happens, and in the absence of evidence that this incident was politically motivated, I don't see a strong case for such intervention here.
Apparently, you can't read. I don't suppose there is anything to be done about that.
If the house actually caught on fire, the crime would have been worse. In the sense that it had worse results. I also think that whether it actually catches on fire helps us judge how dangerous burning the flag was vis a vis the house (was burning the flag, given its position and the situation, reckless given the chance that the house would catch fire).
If there had been no risk at all to the house, then not even a charge of Reckless burning, much less Second Degree arson would be warranted. Reckless burning requires danger to the building of another, not just their chattel.
Even without a charge of Reckless burning, a class D felony or even arson, the act of burning someone else's flag on their property is a serious crime. Just not as serious.
But I suppose this all goes over your head. I suppose you are going to willfully insist that it is my position that burning someone elses personal property is "no big deal." Or that this was ever even a reasonable intepretation of anything I said.
Q1: Did the students commit a crime? Should they be punished or disciplined for it?
Yes, and Yes.
Q2: Should the students be treated any differently then they would have been had if they had lit a fraternity flag or an old towel left handing from the front of the building on fire?
I think the answer here is clearly no. Even if it isn't well established constitutional law it seems that increasing the punishment for these kids because you don't like the political/unpatriotic message their crime sent isn't much different than simply punishing them for the views they espouse. If one wouldn't punish the outraged patriot unsafely burning his neighbors disgracefully torn flag on the neighbor's porch (equally unsafely) to the same degree this is a clear cut failure of content neutrality. Yet surely we shouldn't punish the outraged patriot more than the college kids burning their neighbors frat flag.
Q3: In fact are these kids being treated more harshly because it was a flag that was burned.
This is the least important of the questions so far and the one we have the least evidence about but it seems to be where the debate has hung up. If I had to guess I would say yes. Both the politicization and the flag burning aspect certainly encourage the prosecutor to file stronger charges and I very much doubt arson charges are usually filled for burning a frat flag. If so I would argue, and anyone who has been convinced by Eugene's arguments for the legality of flag burning should agree, that the prosecutors are behaving badly.
Note that nothing above depends at all on what you think the punishment for burning things on a neighbor's porch should be. The whole discussion about whether this sort of behavior is a serious offense or if people would like things burned on their porches simply doesn't matter. The question is whether these kids are being treated like anyone else who burned something on a neighbor's porch not whether you agree with how such offenders are usually treated.
--
As an aside I'm still generally worried that punishments for criminal offenses are often increased or decreased based on the defendant's beliefs and expressions. It seems clear that finding Satan (even in a peaceful Anton LeVay style) is less likely to get you parole than finding Jesus. I would like to know why this isn't a constitutional violation (pragmatics?). Either way it bothers me.
I suspect it would, but that the federal government looks on it as a law they get to enforce and so far they haven't chosen to enforce it that way.
It would appear, if there were any intimidation, it would be the implicit message that this is what happens when you hang an American flag on your porch. Other flags are common, Mexican and Irish around here, university flags on the homes of alums, fraternity flags in college towns. But they chose to burn an American flag. Come to think of it, you could probably get away with burning an Irish flag, too, but a Mexican flag torched would bring the hate-crimes crowd down on you.
The result would have been worse, but results aren't the only basis for determining seriousness. As someone wrote
> Does anyone have any what the probability of the house catching fire from this sort of behavior is? Before I am able to judge the seriousness of this crime, I would need to have some sort of sense of that question.
There is a difference between acts that have a 1 in a million chance of causing grave bodily harm and acts that have a 10% chance; we treat the lucky 99.999% differently than the lucky 90%.
I've no objection to subjecting myself to a 1 in a million situation however I do object to a 1 in 10. I suspect that I'm not alone in that, which is why "would you take that risk yourself?" is a useful way in determining how serious someone thinks that a risk actually is.
Viscus got mad when I suggested that he take that test so I'll take it. A flag burning in my front yard is no big deal, at least as far as the risk of burning my house. Distance matters and there's little chance that it would do anything more than leave a burned spot on my lawn. A flag burning on my porch, next to my house, or on a short flagpole attached to my house is a very different thing, even if nothing much happens in a specific instance. (90% of the time, the 1 in 10 result doesn't happen.)
Legally, that would not make much difference, but if I were to have a conversation with these clowns, I'd want to know why that flag and not another.
I can think of them as buttheads, or anti-American buttheads, by their actions, whether or not their action is covered by law.
Sure, I was only discussing the applicability of 18 USC 241. I have no problem charging these guys with some form of arson (probably Reckless Burning, unless intent to destroy the house can be shown). Politics aside, I'm not keen on vandalism, and I'm even less keen on potentially burning down someone's house.
Bill
18 USC 241 criminalizes any act to "injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate" a person in the exercise of his or her constitutional rights. I haven't done a lot of research into case law on this, but I would think that any act that effectively interferes with an individual's ability to exercise a First Amendment right could reasonably be found to "oppress" that individual, even if burning a flag at night when the owner is not present might not be deemed a "threat" (though then again, it might-- certainly burning a cross in someone's lawn at night is reasonably deemed a threatening act).