I Guess He Should Have Just Burned A Flag

This will make for a fascinating prosecution:

Hate-crime arrests in Quran desecrations at Pace University
July 27, 2007, 8:33 PM EDT

   NEW YORK (AP) _ A 23-year-old man was arrested Friday on hate-crime charges after he threw a Quran in a toilet at Pace University on two separate occasions, police said.

Stanislav Shmulevich of Brooklyn was arrested on charges of criminal mischief and aggravated harassment, both hate crimes, police said. It was unclear if he was a student at the school. A message left at the Shmulevich home was not immediately returned.

The Islamic holy book was found in a toilet at Pace's lower Manhattan campus by a teacher on Oct. 13. A student discovered another book in a toilet on Nov. 21, police said.

Muslim activists had called on Pace University to crack down on hate crimes after the incidents. As a result, the university said it would offer sensitivity training to its students.   

Well, if had burned an American flag the issues would be clear.  If he had put a crucifix in a glass of urine, it would have been art.

On the other hand, a book in a toilet, regardless of the book, can damage the toilet and cause property damage, so there may be a fairly simple cause of action on that basis.

Or if the Quran was not his own, well, then, Mr. Shmulevich is on his own.

The good news - with a name like that, tracking this case via Google should not be difficult.

MORE:  Dan Riehl and the Daily News tell us the Quran did not belong to Mr. Shmulevich:

He was busted after cops discovered a surveillance camera that filmed him leaving the meditation room where the Korans had been kept before the vandalism.

Allahpundit at Hot Air tries to sort out the relevant statutes.

Comments

[hit and run]

TM:
The good news - with a name like that, tracking this case via Google should not be difficult.

Oy, Wait til Obama gets ahold of you and that cynicism.

[hit and run]

And don't think for a moment that it will go unnoticed that you are posting on a Saturday.

After I explicitly called for a return of the Mongrel Horde 2/5 line.

The "Time 2006 Man of the Year" is secure for now.

Oh, and well deserved, of course.

[jm]

According to the NY Daily News, the Korans were taken from a meditation roon on the Pace campus, and the perp was caught on camera doing so -- so there's the problem. If the gent had gone out and bought his own Koran and flushed it, that's his business. But it looks like he took someone else's. He shouldn't be charged with a "hate crime" (the sooner those are off the books the better), but it looks like he should be charged with theft and vandalism of someone else's property.

[kim]

The toilet business is particularly poignant. Anal hygiene, classically, in Arabia has been left-handed. That's why they chop off the right hand of thieves, who can no longer eat with fellows. Crappers are symbolically obscene in themselves.
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[Letalis]

What a bunch of crap.

[memomachine]

Hmmm.

If he stole them then charge him with theft.

This "hate crime" nonsense has to end right the hell now. As for Pace University, may I suggest a multi-million dollar Constitutional Rights lawsuit against them.

You know. If this is all that's necessary to get arrested and charged by campus police then I might take a spin up there and dump a couple dozen korans into their toilets.

If "Piss Christ" is art then my dumping dozens of korans into toilets is art.

[kim]

Bhutto's back and bin Laden's off track.
========================

[Not a Yank]

I thought that this human rights hate crime laws only existed in Canuckistan

[Ken]

Someone needs to print the Koran on toilet paper - one page per sheet.

Of course - here's the rub....

Would 2 sheet wipers be charge with 1 hate crime or 2?

What about fastidious 3 sheet wipers?

[Ken]

Someone needs to print the Koran on toilet paper - one page per sheet.

Of course - here's the rub....

Would 2 sheet wipers be charge with 1 hate crime or 2?

What about fastidious 3 sheet wipers?

[Richard R]

http://www.theconservativevoice.com/article/12568.html
February 23, 2006 06:14 PM EST

by Jim Kouri - A German citizen was convicted of insulting the Islamic holy book by printing the word "Koran" repeatedly along toilet paper. The man ended up with a suspended sentence of one year in prison and was ordered to perform 300 hours of community service.

During court proceedings, the judge told the 61-year-old retired businessman that the sentence was one year because of the international political rioting and unrest in the past month over cartoons that Muslims regard as offensive because they depict the Prophet Mohammed.

The man had admitted that he had printed and distributed the paper and asserted that his motivation had been to raise funds for an "artistic" campaign against Islamist terrorism

[Dr. Ellen]

I thought, for the sake of the Environment, that we were supposed to use only one sheet?

[MikeS]

Meditation Room?
When I was in school we used to 'meditate' in the bathroom. Maybe this guy just got confused.

[Carol Herman]

It begs the question: How did the Feds crack this case?

And, were there witnesses?

Does the accused have a receipt?

What if we get to a trend, where you can buy the koran on pre-printed toilet paper?

Did Pace have cameras focussed on the students' toilets? And, if so, will there then be lawsuits for Invasion of Privacy?

I think CAIR just wants the publicity.

[cathyf]

So, was this "meditation room" a chapel which was taken over by the Muslim students for their exclusive use?

[Zoot]

I think way too much of my ass to have the Koran anywhere near it.

[hmmm]

interesing.
anybody know where one can obtain cheap copies of the Koran? :)

[Ogre]

Quran, now available in two-ply.

I wonder how much it would cost to have custom toilet paper made up with verses from the Quran printed on it. I bet it would sell like hotcakes over the internet.

[Elroy Jetson]

The left's answer to everything- retraining.
If you feel it is a waste of time Pace students....boycott the sensitivity training!

[Jodi]

Perhaps the man could claim illiteracy and claim he thought the books were KJV and then he would be ok.

Maybe be given a Scholarship at the University.

[kim]

Off topic except that burning flags releases carbon dioxide.

icecap.us/images/uploads/Falsification_of_CO2.pdf
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[Sam]

Ken said

Someone needs to print the Koran on toilet paper - one page per sheet.

Look here http://www.printedtp.com

[hit and run]

MikeS:
When I was in school we used to 'meditate' in the bathroom.

Me too. Til wireless internet access, if you know what I mean.

Oh and when I was in school, I used to like to sit in my room with it completely quiet, just getting lost in my thoughts. Was it meditating? I don't know. But if you want to really freak out your roommate and friends, sit in a room all by yourself with it completely quiet and you're doing is laying in bed awake -- and when they ask you what you're doing, just say, "thinking".

My second roommate slept with scissors under his pillow, just in case.

[BarbaraS]

You know, I'm sure there are a lot of Christian democrats, and indeed other religions whose members are democrats. My question is, are these people outraged that Islam is the only religion that gets a special pass by the left and Chrisitianity and the others are trashed at every turn?

Also, I really resent it that certain citizens are deemed worthy of more protection than I am. This whole hate crime agenda is is totally out os sinc with the Constitution. This idea of taxing the rich with a higher percentage of their earnings is against the law also.

[BHC]

Here's what I don't get: by what possible interpretation is the putting of a book in a toilet a "hate crime"?

Suppose he put the korans in a toilet in a Yukon truck stop. No muslims anywhere. All he did was show "hatred" for a book, hatred for words, and thus.... free speech.

Now, stealing them to flush: that's different. Still I hate "hate crime" prosecution. It's so piecemeal. As other have written, what about the "Piss Christ" sacrilege, or the dung on the virgin Mary icons, etc.

Here's a question for everyone: the fish symbol is an ancient Christian insignia which was a way for persecuted Christians to identify each other. We see Darwin fish everywhere, an obvious provocation and insult to Christians. Is this "hate speech" or isn't it?

[Thomas Crapper]

This is the worst case of toilet abuse on record.

[Brian]

Where's the ACLU? Of course, I expect they'll be silent on this issue.

[Debra J.M. Smith]

If we do not get a person into office who will defend our rights, we are all looking at jail time for many unconstitutional arrests.

Vote Pete Grasso (www.GrassoForPresident.com)

Debra...
of
InformingChristians [dot com]

[Seerak]

You know, I'm sure there are a lot of Christian democrats, and indeed other religions whose members are democrats. My question is, are these people outraged that Islam is the only religion that gets a special pass by the left and Chrisitianity and the others are trashed at every turn?

Yes, they are -- and don't think for a moment that they don't covet that special privilege for themselves.

[Mike]

Throwing an entire Koran into a toilet is wrong, it will clog and possibly break the toilet. The proper thing to do is to tear out each page crumple it up and then throw each page in the toilet. And please be careful to flush after a few pages. Oh yes and be sure to wash your hands before you leave.

But seriously there is no such thing as a sacred text under the law, not the Koran, not the bible and not the torah. To someone else they might be sacred but to me they might just be books.

[James]

There are things you prosecute and then there are things that you don't. What a waste of time and energy by Pace, CAIR, the police, & yeah even the "Perp".

Of course it does raise the ante on where we are as a country--MindPolice now?, 1984 here yet?, just what is iNtolerance?, Whew I'm getting a MindBlow outta' this...