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A Political Stinkbomb
Here, folks, is the First Amendment in action: After two hours of deliberations, a jury returned last week and acquitted acquitted Kathleen Ensz of one misdemeanor count of using a noxious substance. The act? She left a brochure full of shit on the doorstep of her local congressman, U.S. Rep. Marilyn Musgrave’s Greeley (a story we told about before).
Ensz, a Democratic Party activist, never denied committing the act; she just claimed the act was part of her free speech rights, i.e., that the shit was a symbol of what she thought of Musgrave’s politics. “Her only intention of going over there was to make a political statement that Marilyn Musgrave’s politics stink,” her attorney said after the verdict.
The jury, apparently, agreed. Ensz was the first person in that county to ever be prosecuted for leaving dog poop.
