A Utah woman was charged with a hate crime Friday for stomping on a pro-police sign in front of a cop after he had given her friend a speeding ticket. The woman was consoling her friend in front of a gas station in Garfield County when the sheriff’s deputy, who was sitting in his car after issuing the penalty, saw her look at him as she crushed a “Back the Blue” sign under her foot. He then got out of his car and put her under arrest. She has been charged with disorderly conduct and criminal mischief with a hate crime enhancement, which carries a sentence of up to a year in jail.
The officer wrote in charging documents, “I observed one of the friends… stomping on a ‘Back the Blue’ sign next to where the traffic stop was conducted, crumple it up in a destructive manner and throw it into a trash can all while smirking in an intimidating manner towards me.” The signs, according to the deputy, were made by the sheriff’s department, and the woman said she found it on the ground, leading the officer to say she was “destroying property that did not belong to her.”
Read it at Deseret News
