Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

Post by andrepd » Wed, May 20, 2026, 6:00 PM UTC

okeuro49 wrote: post #77

contubernio wrote: post #28

The sheriff that arrested him should face criminal charges for misuse of authority. That he doesn't reflects a structural weakness in US law. In most European legal systems a law enforcement officer overstepping his legal authority would face criminal charges for it.

In the UK 30 people are arrested a day for social media posts online. Only about 10 percent resulting in convictions. Police don't face criminal charges for this. https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/police-make-30-arr...

Post by ikeboy » Wed, May 20, 2026, 6:02 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #234

ikeboy wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look up the elements of false imprisonment. When there's a warrant, even if wrongly granted, the arrest and imprisonment is considered lawful.

No, it isn't. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habeas_corpus

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 20, 2026, 6:05 PM UTC

jerrac wrote: post #236

ceejayoz wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In one case, the meme was accurate - the photo, the quote, and its attribution were all accurate, and the cops knew that. It never made it to trial, for obvious reasons. In the other, it was false information, a grand jury indicted, and a jury convicted. The appeal rested on the government struggling to demonstrate a) anyone actively fell for the information and b) the conspiracy element. ( https://ww3.ca2.uscourts.g…

In both cases the reason someone was persecuted was they offended someone in power. And the system eventually ruled in their favor. That is the similarity. If you view one of those cases as a bad result, then chances are you are biased. That said, if you downvote because you have looked into the cases enough to think that that similarity is not valid, and then you can articulate it (like the person I'm replying too d…

Post by bearjaws » Wed, May 20, 2026, 6:05 PM UTC

kadushka wrote: post #237

freediddy wrote: post #155

The fact that taxpayers and not the police themselves have to pay the settlement is the worst part of this. Every settlement against the police should be taken from their pension fund. This is something I've been advocating for decades now, because it creates an incentive not to do things like this. Right now, good cops don't patrol bad cops because it won't affect them. By aligning the incentives right, it will mean…

How would this work? Where do the money for their pension fund come from? Would taking money from it result in them receiving smaller pensions?

Post by goodluckchuck » Wed, May 20, 2026, 6:06 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #174

epolanski wrote: post #137

Why's everyone picking (rightfully) on the sheriff alone and ignoring that he got a legal warrant from a judge, and that the defendant was then later kept in prison by a judge?

That'll be because of this bit: > Weems admitted in a later interview that he knew at the time of the arrest that Larry’s Facebook post was a pre-existing meme that referred to an actual shooting that took place in a different state, over 500 miles away. But Weems and Morrow left out that extremely important context from their warrant application.