Sentences meted out for anti-Semitic vandalism

[oberliner]

Two Hinsdale teens were sentenced Wednesday to a year's probation and 30 hours of community service each for spray-painting anti-Semitic messages, including swastikas, on a fence at the Hinsdale Central High School football field earlier this year.

The boys, both 15, were convicted in August of criminal damage to property but were acquitted of hate-crime charges. DuPage Judge Patrick Leston attributed the crime to "the youths' stupidity," saying what they wrote was insufficient to convict them of a hate crime.

A third teen pleaded guilty in August to criminal damage and a hate crime and was sentenced to a year's probation and 20 hours of community service.

All three were Hinsdale Central freshmen at the time and were suspended from school for 10 days.

Two of the three now are sophomores at the school with the third a sophomore at a Wisconsin military academy. Their parents were in court with the boys, whom the Tribune is not naming because they are minors.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/west/chi-0610190204oct19,1,3414651.story?coll=chi-newslocalwest-hed

[geek tragedy]

1. The Hitler Youth still going strong. eom

[Behind the Aegis]

2. Good!

[DavidDvorkin]

3. But maybe the graffiti were simply mistranslated or misunderstood!

Maybe the kids were really trying to protest Israel's policies in Lebanon and the West Bank.

(Do I really need the sarcasm glyph?)

[TechBear_Seattle]

4. They were expressing deeply held religious beliefs

Proof that America hates religious people.

(I would add the sarcasm tag, but you know that if they had targeted gay people, such an excuse would have been used and very likely would have succeeded.)

[Jim Sagle]

5. Remember, folks...it's not antisemitism, it's anti-Zionism.

;)

[eagler]

6. That's an easy way to rationalize being anti semetic

nt

[greccogirl]

7. not a hate crime?

Sureeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[NaturalHigh]

8. The little shitheads got off easy.

Unfortunately, anti-Semitic acts aren't treated as seriously as they should be by our legal system.

[hogwyld]

9. Ahh, another coffin nail

on free speech. :sarcasm: :sarcasm: