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[–] 346 points 1 year ago (19 children)

In a written decision, Judge Gregory Carro said that although there is no doubt that the killing was not an ordinary street crime, New York law doesn’t consider something terrorism simply because it was motivated by ideology.

“While the defendant was clearly expressing an animus toward UHC, and the health care industry generally, it does not follow that his goal was to ‘intimidate and coerce a civilian population,’ and indeed, there was no evidence presented of such a goal,” Carro wrote.

Hope the rest of the trial goes with as much sense as this

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  • [–] 174 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    That's huge. That was a big charge and the prosecutors really wanted it.

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  • [–] 87 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    Hell yes. Now the guy just has to keep them from proving he did it. Honestly feels doable

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  • [–] 38 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    The emphasis on "intimidate and coerce a civilian population" is interesting. Seems to imply billionaires are not considered part of the civilian population. As they shouldn't be.

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  • [–] 25 points 1 year ago

    Before we go giving the legal system a pat on the back for that, that's not really what's happening. The law is written with a high level of provable intent in mind, and that's the only way it could possibly pass 1st Amendment muster. It's really, really hard to prove anyone intended to intimidate anyone.

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  • [–] 28 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    That is not how I read it. If he had shot and left a note saying "fuck billionaires" or "fuck CEOs" then it would be terrorism because he would be threatening them. But his problem was just this guy. It was plain murder / revenge.

    The internet made him a champion of "anti billionaires" against his will

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago*

    Yep. Maybe this is irelevant to US law, but I'm in Romania (European Union member) at the moment and here discriminating against someone based on wealth (wealthy/poor) is a hate crime (as is discriminating based on gender, age, orientation, etc). So at the most it'd be a hate crime. The terrorism charges were politically motivated.

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  • [–] 19 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Is it normal for judges to make comments that are worded like the defendant is guilty?

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Right? I thought that was odd, too.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago

    They should have said something like, "The prosecution hasn't established a motive for the crime to justify a terrorism charge," or something similar.

    But I'm not a lawyer, so it's possible (maybe probable) that it's fine to reference the defendant's motives in reference to the prosecution's claims.

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