Back in September, 31-year old Greenville, Kentucky resident James Evans posted some Exodus lyrics to his Facebook from the song "Class Dismissed {A Hate Primer)." The lyrics were as follows.
“Student bodies lying dead in the halls, a blood splattered treatise of hate. Class dismissed is my hypothesis, gun fire ends in debate.”
Unfortunately officials in Kentucky took his posting seriously, or really hate Exodus for some reason, and Evans was arrested. He then spent eight days in jail because he could not afford bail and was set to be heard in court on the matter. Fortunately the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) caught a whiff of the bullshit and decided to step in so effectively that ACLU attorney Bill Sharp got the whole thing dismissed, according to one news source.
I guess we can chalk this up as a victory? While Evans did get released ultimately and the whole thing got thrown out, there's still the matter of Evans serving eight full days in jail for committing no crime. Then there's the fact that Evans was going to be charged with "terroristic threats," which is pretty much a life-ruiner as far as being on anyone's record goes.
I get it- school violence and gun safety in the country are an extremely sensitive issue and if someone's posting about shooting up a school then it probably deserves a little bit of looking into. That being said, it seems like there was several steps skipped here and Evans hardly had the chance to prove he was completely innocent (assuming he wasn't actually planning something).
What are your thoughts? Did this whole thing go entirely too far or was the arrest warranted?
