Jeremy Bentham once said that “lawyers are the only persons in whom ignorance of the law is not punished.” We will see, apparently, in a case in Mississippi. At age 70, Lisa White is looking at a possible stint in prison after allegedly threatening to shoot Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents.
According to new reports, Lisa White drew attention at a Mississippi store when she went to buy a gun and asked about body armor in September. According to an employee, she allegedly identified herself as a protester and an activist opposed to ICE who were “becoming crazy and wild and that she needed a gun because she was a protester and activist.”
She allegedly told the employee that she was interested in knowing about body armor because if the agents were wearing body armor, she would have to shoot them in the head, shoulder, or leg. When the employee suggested that she was likely to get herself shot, she allegedly replied, “If I have to die, I have to die.”
According to ICE, White is currently being held on federal criminal charges for influencing, impeding, or retaliating against a federal official by threat.
This can be a tough case to prosecute. White can claim that this is protected speech in spouting off against ICE and was not intended as a true threat.
The Supreme Court handed down an opinion in Counterman v. Colorado that addressed an analogous claim under state law where a defendant claimed that postings were not intended as a true threat. The Court held that, in such a case, the State has to prove that the defendant had some subjective understanding of his statements’ threatening nature. However, it allowed for a conviction based on a showing of recklessness.
The majority held that a recklessness standard (showing that a person “consciously disregard[ed] a substantial [and unjustifiable] risk that [his] conduct will cause harm to another), was sufficient for a showing of state of mind, or mens rea.
On the specific federal crime, courts require a showing of specific intent that the defendant acted knowingly and with a specific intent to retaliate against the official for actions connected to federal duties. It is not enough to speak out of anger or passion.
In this case, the threat was not conveyed to the alleged targets but to a third person. As such, White could argue it was a political or sensational statement that was not intended as a true threat. She is due in court in mid-November.
When I started to read this, I was thinking this is going to be a hard case to prosecute. She definitely has defenses if she rolls the dice. I think true threats cases are often filed when the speech is protected. And there can be a VERY fine line between threat speech and free speech. But threat charges are often, in my opinion, abused by prosecutors and complaint judges.
Seems like the smartest person in the room was the gun store employee.
Democrats are fascists who hate America!
welcome to 1930’s German Fascism!
Seems to me she has already established intent with buying a weapon, asking about body armor and talking about shooting someone in the leg or head if they are in body armor and she gets “wild” and hates and protests ICE.
Most sane people would not take a weapon to a protest because in the fervor of the moment
This new system cut me off in mid sentence. What I was saying is that in the fervor of the moment a person might be overly tempted to use a weapon they bought, to a protest. I would specifically leave all weapons at home. I’m already 3/4 of the way to a conviction of this “attorney”.
I’m already 3/4 of the way to a conviction of this “attorney”. Um… but you’re not an attorney GEB.
In a gun store, buying a gun for a specifically stated purpose, and researching body armor and the vulnerabilities therein, seems like a pretty specific ‘state of mind,’ and ‘intent.’
In a gun store, buying a gun for a specifically stated purpose, and researching body armor and the vulnerabilities therein, seems like a pretty specific ‘state of mind,’ and ‘intent.’
I am the writer of the comment about an analogy to conspiracy. The exception in the federal criminal code is conspiracy to violate the Controlled Substances Act.
In general, to prove a conspiracy under the federal criminal code, the government must show that at least one charged co-conspirator committed an “overt act.” That means taking.a concrete step towards committing the intended offense. For bank robbery, it might be as simple as buying a mask. This, of course, is not a conspiracy case; one person cannot conspire with himself. Yet here, the lawyer, Lisa White, did commit an overt act: one could reasonably that she took a step to effectuate her words, namely, buying a gun and body armor. That’s different from a mere. stated velleity spoken at the weekly meeting of her book club. Though I’m a lawyer and do criminal defense, I’m not familiar with the nuances and intricacies of the law on threats. But this was the first thing that came to mind when I read Prof. Turley’s post.
Oh come off it turley! Not everyone speech is protected. You cannot claim that it’s free speech to say in going to have to shoot them in the head. Get real.