when exercising your 1st Amendment gets you charged with 'terroristic threats'

http://rt.com/usa/news/terroristic-felony-bank-easton-203/

A protester belonging to an Occupy Wall Street group in rural Pennsylvania is being charged with felony attempted bank robbery and a terrorism-related charge for holding signs up during a demonstration at a local Wells Fargo branch.

David C. Gorczynski, 22, was charged on Tuesday with attempted bank robbery and terroristic threatening, both felonies, as well as one misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct. Police detained him after he walked into an Easton, PA Wells Fargo branch with a sign that read “You’re being robbed” and another that said “Give a man a gun, he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob a country.”

The Express-Times reports that police were alerted to the branch after a bank teller hit an alarm that alerted the authorities.

"I think our guys did what they had to do in this instance," Easton police Chief Carl Scalzo tells the paper. "At the end of the day, if we get a report of a panic alarm at a bank, we're going to respond accordingly."

Chief Scalzo adds that Gorczynski’s First Amendment right to protest freely can’t trump any allegations that he may have been behind something more sinister.

"We can't allow the perceived idea of protesting to be a defense to criminality," Scalzo says in response to reports that the suspect was simply demonstrating Wall Street corruption. "People have to understand if they want to protest, there's a line."
 
http://rt.com/usa/news/terroristic-felony-bank-easton-203/

A protester belonging to an Occupy Wall Street group in rural Pennsylvania is being charged with felony attempted bank robbery and a terrorism-related charge for holding signs up during a demonstration at a local Wells Fargo branch.

David C. Gorczynski, 22, was charged on Tuesday with attempted bank robbery and terroristic threatening, both felonies, as well as one misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct. Police detained him after he walked into an Easton, PA Wells Fargo branch with a sign that read “You’re being robbed” and another that said “Give a man a gun, he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob a country.”

The Express-Times reports that police were alerted to the branch after a bank teller hit an alarm that alerted the authorities.

"I think our guys did what they had to do in this instance," Easton police Chief Carl Scalzo tells the paper. "At the end of the day, if we get a report of a panic alarm at a bank, we're going to respond accordingly."

Chief Scalzo adds that Gorczynski’s First Amendment right to protest freely can’t trump any allegations that he may have been behind something more sinister.

"We can't allow the perceived idea of protesting to be a defense to criminality," Scalzo says in response to reports that the suspect was simply demonstrating Wall Street corruption. "People have to understand if they want to protest, there's a line."

This is a stretch. He has no 1st Amendment rights inside thier building. Had he confined his actions to outside their building maybe you have a point. But once he walked in the bank? Game over.
 
Chief Scalzo adds that Gorczynski’s First Amendment right to protest freely can’t trump any allegations that he may have been behind something more sinister.


The cop has to have a specific charge! He can't say your right to speech is subject to allegations someone else makes about you. The teller wrongly accused him of attempted robbery. Walking in with signs does not equal a robbery. Anyone defending this is a fucking idiot
 
The attempted robbery and terroristic threatening charges are laughable, but that disorderly charge might stick. I think this likely falls into the gray area between legitimate exercise of 1st Amendment rights and stuff that is punishable under disorderly conduct laws.
 
The attempted robbery and terroristic threatening charges are laughable, but that disorderly charge might stick. I think this likely falls into the gray area between legitimate exercise of 1st Amendment rights and stuff that is punishable under disorderly conduct laws.

I would agree
 
Pentagon Says Protests Are Acts of “Low Level Terrorism”

http://www.zengardner.com/pentagon-says-protests-are-acts-of-low-level-terrorism/

Watch how this works.

First, the government responds to the September 11th attack by passing the Patriot Act, which is purportedly designed to protect us from foreign terrorists. Most of America cheers it on, never realizing that within the act is a broad definition for something categorized as domestic terrorism, or “activities that appear to be intended to intimidate or coerce a civilian population, or to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion.”

Second, they pass the National Defense Authorization Act, which allows them, under the definitions for domestic terrorism set forth by the Patriot Act, to detain someone without trial and forever if they appear to be subverting the newly established status quo.

Third, they declare all federal property, or property being used for political events where Secret Service protection is present, as “events of national significance” through the Federal Restricted Buildings and Grounds Improvement Act. Undesirable demonstrators operating counter to the official narrative in these areas are herded into court approved free speech zones.

Finally, once the new laws are in place, the government security apparatus begins the re-education of its minions by labeling as “terrorists” anyone who dares speak out or disagrees with their new policy initiatives.

This last step is and has been happening for some time.

Even the very act of assembling with other like minded people to influence policy by petitioning the Government for a redress of grievances can land you on the domestic terrorism list:
 
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