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a 1st amendment issue to sink your teeth into

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
Prof. defends right to send feces

hell yeah:
January 18, 2007

GREELEY, Colo. --A retired French professor sent dog feces to her congresswoman's office after becoming angry with receiving too many mailings -- and her lawyer says she had a constitutional right to do it.

Kathleen Ensz faces a misdemeanor charge of "use of a noxious substance" after taking dog feces from her backyard, wrapping it in a political mailer from Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, and leaving the putrid package at the Republican's office, according to court documents.

Ensz, a Democrat, was angered by repeatedly receiving mailings from Musgrave. Her lawyer calls the poo delivery a form of free expression, protected by the First Amendment.

Patricia Bangert, one of Ensz's attorneys, admitted the act was "probably crude and boorish" but all the same likened it to a form of political protest such as Thomas Jefferson's criticism of the King of England. At a hearing Tuesday, she also cited Mr. Hankey, an animated, talking piece of human excrement depicted on "South Park," as evidence that it is commonplace to use feces to express disdain.

"Etiquette and propriety aside, it is commonplace in today's society to equate a distasteful or disliked person, situation or thing, to feces," Bangert said.

At the time of the incident last May, Musgrave's camp claimed the gesture was a political dirty trick and demanded an apology from Musgrave's likely Democratic opponent, state Rep. Angela Paccione of Fort Collins, who went on to lose the election to the incumbent. Paccione's campaign denied any involvement.

Ensz, 63, a retired French professor from the University of Northern Colorado, is scheduled for trial in Weld County on May 15. Musgrave's spokesman Aaron Johnson said, "Right now, this issue is between Ms. Ensz and law enforcement officials."
 

Silver

find me a tampon
Jul 20, 2002
10,840
1
Orange County, CA
Free expression means that you can send a photo of dog **** to her, not actual dog ****.

No first amendment issue here. There is a possible issue of slander from Musgrave's people, but I doubt that will come to anything.
 

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
update:

A former Democratic Party activist who left dog feces on the doorstep of U.S. Rep. Marilyn Musgrave's Greeley office during last year's 4th Congressional District campaign was found not guilty Wednesday of criminal use of a noxious substance.

A Weld County jury deliberated about two hours before acquitting Kathleen Ensz of the misdemeanor count. Her trial began Tuesday.

Ensz's lawyers never denied that their client left a Musgrave campaign brochure full of feces at the front door of the congresswoman's office. But they argued that Ensz was making a statement protected by free speech - the poop was a symbol of what she thought of Musgrave's politics.
 

LordOpie

MOTHER HEN
Oct 17, 2002
21,022
3
Denver
Heard that on the radio today.

Heck, if a guy can submerge a cruicifix in a fishtank of urine and call that art, then you can give poop to congress.
 

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
soooo...what if someone thought that musgrave's politics were "the bomb." would leaving a ticking explosive at the office be protected by free speech as well? ;)
only if that free speech included olaf performing berzerker.