Tomcat0403 Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 Felony Vandalism Charges Possible in Obama Joker Poster Case A Florida teenager could find himself in a sticky situation as a state attorney prepares to review possible felony vandalism charges in connection to the posters depicting President Obama as the Joker, FOXNews.com has learned. By Joshua Rhett Miller FOXNews.com Tuesday, August 18, 2009 10 These posters portraying President Obama as The Joker have been spotted all over the country. (FNC) PEOPLE WHO READ THIS ALSO READ Case to Be Made Public Against Man Accused of Internet Porn Model's Murder 27213348 AARP, Losing Members Over Health Care, Faces Challenge From Grassroots Senior Advocacy Group 27215382 Rep. Barney Frank, Critics Face Off at Town Hall Event 27226322 Mom Gets 99 Years for Cutting Off Son's Genitals 27207282 Body in Suitcase Identified as Missing Swimsuit Model 27227174 A Florida teenager could face felony vandalism charges for allegedly gluing posters depicting President Obama as the Joker onto public property, FOXNews.com has learned.Clermont, Fla., Police Capt. Eric Jensen said the state attorney will review evidence to determine whether to charge the unidentified teenager with gluing "dozens" of the posters last week to the city's light poles, public and private buildings, bridge overpasses, road signs and a mailbox.Jensen said damage to city property exceeded $800, and it cost roughly $200 to remove the adhesive that was used to affix the poster to the mailbox."If he hadn't glued them, we wouldn't be having this discussion," Jensen told FOXNews.com. "[The adhesive] didn't come off the road signs."If convicted of felony vandalism, the teenager could face a maximum of five years in jail. No arrests have been made yet in the case.Bill Gladson, of Florida's Fifth Judicial Circuit, which oversees Lake County, confirmed that State Attorney Brad King will receive the case as early as Wednesday."We look at every case that gets dropped off," he said, declining further comment until the case file is received.Gladson said he could not recall a recent case involving potential charges of felony vandalism in regard to posters, including those pertaining to political messages.Jensen said witnesses initially told investigators that a "couple of kids" were responsible for gluing the posters. He saidthe teenage suspect admitted to affixing dozens of the "hundreds" of posters throughout Clermont, a suburb of Orlando.Dozens of the posters first appeared earlier this month throughout Los Angeles. They portray Obama as Batman's nemesis from "The Dark Knight," with the word socialism printed above and below the president's face. Obama is portrayed wearing sloppy red lipstick, a white face and darkened eyes, the same make-up that the late actor Heath Ledger wore throughout the latest Batman movie.U.S. Postal Inspector Ed Moffitt said Clermont Postmaster Willie Montgomery contacted his office to investigate the case following the discovery of the posters on Aug. 11. Defacing federal property, including a mailbox, is a violation of Title 18 of U.S. Code, Moffitt said, but federal authorities decided the case "does not meet their guidelines," since the damage did not exceed $1,000.Moffitt said Montgomery scraped off the "very, very adhesive" substance used to hang the posters with a pen knife or putty knife, which removed the mailbox's blue paint. The mailbox then had to be primed and repainted, adding to labor costs, which totaled roughly $200."It wasn't like a Post-It note where you could easily pull it off," Moffitt said. "Nothing's free anymore."But it could have been a lot closer to free. An employee at Home Depot suggested a $6 bottle of Goo Gone would have done the trick."It does take a little rubbing," the employee said.No motive for the poster display has been determined, but Jensen noted that a contest posted on Infowars.com called on people to download a version of the poster to be hung in "public spaces" in their neighborhood."We're the only ones who have seemed to have gotten it, though," Jensen told FOXNews.com last week. "It was a nationwide event from what I understand."Maria Kayanan, associate legal director of Florida's American Civil Liberties Union chapter, said the case does not appear to be a First Amendment issue, citing the property damage."If it was just a poster that didn't cause any destruction, that'd be an entirely different thing," she told FOXNews.com.Regardless of damage, i think it is bullshit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
V4junkie Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 $200 to remove the adhesive? WTF! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SAMBUSA Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 It may have happened under Bush, just wouldn't have been news worthy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NinjaNick Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 Todd #43 better remove his avatar! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
V4junkie Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 I'll even help him at a discounted rate. One time offer: $100. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zach Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 $200 to remove the adhesive? WTF!2 gov't employees, 8 hours, $12.50 an hour. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
V4junkie Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 2 gov't employees, 8 hours, $12.50 an hour.Per sign. I used to remove graphics from cars, even the most stubborn adhesive only took an hour for the whole side of a car. What were they doing, trying to lick it off? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fusion Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 Wow...i doubt this would have happened under Pres. Bush Because democrats aren't as big of fans of vandalism as republicans? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
buildit Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 2 gov't employees, 8 hours, $12.50 an hour. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Disclaimer Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 Why is this bullshit? Like the article said... if he hadn't used GLUE they probably wouldn't be having this discussion.I'm going to really stir the pot and say that this may be an indication of the level of intellect we're dealing with in the opposing party. I doubt this kid is a member of MENSA if he thinks GLUE was appropriate to use on PUBLIC property Sidebar: Meet the kid behind the Obama Joker posterhttp://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2009/08/obama-joker-artist.html Top of the TicketPolitics, coast to coast, with the L.A. Times « Previous Post | Top of the Ticket Home | Next Post » Obama Joker artist unmasked: A fellow Chicagoan August 17, 2009 | 6:29 pm When cryptic posters portraying President Obama as the Joker from "Batman" began popping up around Los Angeles and other cities, the question many asked was, Who is behind the image? Was it an ultra-conservative grassroots group or a disgruntled street artist going against the grain? Nope, it turns out, just a 20-year-old college student from Chicago. Bored during his winter school break, Firas Alkhateeb, a senior history major at the University of Illinois, crafted the picture of Obama with the recognizable clown makeup using Adobe's Photoshop software. Alkhateeb had been tinkering with the program to improve the looks of photos he had taken on his clunky Kodak camera. The Joker project was his grandest undertaking yet. Using a tutorial he'd found online about how to "Jokerize" portraits, he downloaded the October 23 Time Magazine cover of Obama and began digitally painting over it. Four or five hours later, he happily had his product. On Jan. 18, Alkhateeb uploaded the image to photo-sharing site Flickr (shown at right). Over the next two months, he amassed just a couple thousand hits, he said. Then the counter exploded after a still-anonymous rogue famously found his image, digitally removed the references to Time Magazine, captioned the picture with the word "socialism" and hung printed copies around L.A., making headlines. Alkhateeb's original Flickr page surpassed 20,000 views. The Times found his Flickr site last week thanks to a tip left by a loyal reader of The Ticket. By Friday, the page had been taken down. On Alkhateeb's page, a manipulated image condemning fellow Chicagoan and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel (captioned "epic fail") was mixed in with parodies of the "Guitar Hero" game franchises -- dubbed Quran Hero -- and of Napoleon riding a motorcycle (pictured after the jump). Flickr had removed the Joker image due to copyright-infringement concerns, Alkhateeb says the company told him in an e-mail. A Flickr spokeswoman declined to comment due to a company policy that bars discussing inquiries about individual users. Alkhateeb says he wasn't actively trying to cover his tracks, but he did want to lay low. He initially had concerns about ... ... connecting his name with anything critical of the president -- especially living in Chicago, where people are "very, very liberal," he said. "After Obama was elected, you had all of these people who basically saw him as the second coming of Christ," Alkhateeb said. "From my perspective, there wasn't much substance to him." "I abstained from voting in November," he wrote in an e-mail. "Living in Illinois, my vote means close to nothing as there was no chance Obama would not win the state." If he had to choose a politician to support, Alkhateeb said, it would be Ohio Democratic Rep. Dennis Kucinich. Possibly becoming a villain in his home city wasn't his only worry. Time's cover and the Joker obviously aren't Alkhateeb's copyrights to fool around with. Concerned about a lawsuit, Alkhateeb, an unnamed superstar whose nationally recognized artwork had stunned friends and family, was relieved that the situation had floated for months without any major news organizations discovering that he was the man behind the paint. After we contacted him, he hesitantly agreed to an interview. If it's any consolation, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit organization that defends digital rights, says Alkhateeb has a strong fair-use defense if Time or DC Comics decides to take him to court -- that is if one even does file a lawsuit. "You really want to think twice about going after a political commenter," said Corynne McSherry, a senior staff attorney at the EFF. In Time's case, "a news organization probably doesn't want to be in the situation of pursuing political criticism." Perhaps the strongest case for anyone, McSherry said, is for Alkhateeb to claim money derived from people selling T-shirts with his picture. Is it worth pursuing? "It would be nice, but it's not that big of a deal," Alkhateeb said. Although Alkhateeb claims he was making no political statement with the artwork, he's plugged into the Washington debate. Though born in the United States, his Palestinian family closely follows Middle Eastern politics. "I think he's definitely doing better than Bush was," Alkhateeb said of Obama. Alkhateeb's views on foreign relations align with the Democrats, he said, while he prefers Republican ideals on domestic issues. Alkhateeb's assessment of Obama: "In terms of domestic policy, I don't think he's really doing much good for the country right now," he said. "We don't have to 'hero worship' the guy." Someday, Alkhateeb hopes to be a history teacher and high school football coach. He won't be pursuing a full-time career in art, but he'll continue playing with Photoshop on the side. He's honored by Shepard Fairey's assessment of his Joker picture, but disagrees with some of Fairey's comments criticizing the message of the Socialism poster. "He made a picture of Bush as a vampire," Alkhateeb said about Fairey. "That's kind of speaking with two faces." Regardless, Alkhateeb does agree with the Obama "Hope" artist about "socialism" being the wrong caption for the Joker image. "It really doesn't make any sense to me at all," he said. "To accuse him of being a socialist is really ... immature. First of all, who said being a socialist is evil?" -- Mark Milian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shittygsxr Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 2 gov't employees, 8 hours, $12.50 an hour.Shit it would have taken me two weeks to remove the adhesive, actually it would have washed off before I would have finished removing it. Salary + benefits and overhead, and we are looking at a lot more than a couple hundred bucks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Likwid Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 Because under Bush the people would have been held without bond or public hearing then held under threat of terrorism indefinitely since potential terrorists have no rights.Just saying Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomcat0403 Posted August 19, 2009 Author Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 my point is people would probably been patting his back for doing this if it was against bush...that is my point Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tbone9191 Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 yeah if Bush were in office he would probably say the kid has WMD's and start another war based on lies but who knows Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Likwid Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 yeah if Bush were in office he would probably say the kid has WMD's and start another war based on lies but who knowsDidn't even have to do that, as soon as the kid was declared an enemy/risk to The State he has lost ALL due process and right to a speedy trial.I'd rather you just killed me in a war than to keep me locked up in a terrorist camp for the rest of my life. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Disclaimer Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 Anyone see the reruns of South Park last night on Comedy Central?Where they convinced everyone that heaven was real and Saddam Hussein was up there with WMDs, he was refusing to cooperate and show to the inspectors the weapons, so the US would have to go in and blow up heaven. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tbone9191 Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 my point is people would probably been patting his back for doing this if it was against bush...that is my pointthats a point, not sure its a fair point but lets go with it. People have the right to say or write or create as they wish but if u or I go deface public property and get caught we will end up in trouble just like this kid. Please for a sec take out the person in the photo, its still a crime ... right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomcat0403 Posted August 19, 2009 Author Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 When they are threatening five years in prison for a thousand dollars in damages! What bullshit is that! Especially when drug offenders get off so fucking easy it's not even funny. This is a preemptive :bigfinger:to anyone about to bring in "some drugs aren't bad" or "it's their own choice to do drugs" bullshit, try having a family that was torn apart by drug use and have a friends sister (just turned 18) that just got out of rehab. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tbone9191 Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 Anyone see the reruns of South Park last night on Comedy Central?Where they convinced everyone that heaven was real and Saddam Hussein was up there with WMDs, he was refusing to cooperate and show to the inspectors the weapons, so the US would have to go in and blow up heaven.i did not but now I have to. That sounds to funny.... and ironic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tbone9191 Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 no I agree drug offenders get off easy sometimes. And Im sure this kid wont get 5 years. just giving my opinion on the subject. This is the reason to love our country.... we can have thes convos and still be around tomorrow to talk about it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomcat0403 Posted August 19, 2009 Author Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 true, it's all in good discussion, and i know the kid wont get five years (hopefully) but the law is beyond unfair sometimes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reimbrandt Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 Yeah.. true dat.......... 5 years is way to steep. He is a idiot for using glue, and should get hit with the fine and maybe a couple or so days in jail. HEll, if OJ can walk then this kid should get the key to the city. just sayn..... start playn straight up, but the judicial system is all f'kd up. And I am suprised the person that did the sign isn't gettn hammered........ I'm sure that jesse jackson and sharpton have visited the dudes house by now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tbone9191 Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 agreed Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 Especially when drug offenders get off so fucking easy it's not even funny. where do drug offenders get off easy? prisons are FULL of first time non violent drug offenders... mandatory minimum sentences etc etc.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Likwid Posted August 19, 2009 Report Share Posted August 19, 2009 This is a preemptive :bigfinger:to anyone about to bring in "some drugs aren't bad" or "it's their own choice to do drugs" bullshit, try having a family that was torn apart by drug use and have a friends sister (just turned 18) that just got out of rehab.Just because I like arguing.Drugs don't tear families apartGuns don't kill peoplePencils don't cause misspellingsIt's people's actions that do things, sorry mang, but drugs didn't tear anyone apart, people doing drugs and not having any control did. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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