Posted on 09/20/2007 8:15:13 AM PDT by DogByte6RER
Student tears Mexican flag; suspect remains at large
9/19/07
by Jeremy Hunt
Daily Lobo
A student took down a Mexican flag from a flagpole outside Scholes Hall Monday, tore it and took it to the Air Force ROTC office, police said.
A summons was issued for Peter Lynch, 30, by the Bernalillo County Metropolitan Court for criminal damage to property, said Lt. Pat Davis, spokesman for UNM Police.
Davis said Lynch is not a member of ROTC, and it is unclear why he took the flag to that office.
Lynch has not been charged because UNMPD cannot find him, Davis said.
UNMPD investigated the vandalism as a potential hate crime, but witnesses from the ROTC office told police it was not a racially motivated crime, Davis said.
"He was frustrated a foreign flag was flown without an American flag nearby," he said. "We're basically investigating it on witness statements."
The Mexican Student Association raised the flag outside Scholes Hall on Friday for Mexican Independence Day, said Cheo Torres, vice president for academic affairs.
Mabel Gonzales, president of the Mexican Student Association, declined to comment.
Torres and interim vice president for institutional diversity Rita Martinez-Purson issued an apology Tuesday from the University for the incident.
"This sort of incident hurts everyone," Torres said. "It's something that you don't expect to see at a place like the University of New Mexico where we celebrate diversity."
Martinez-Purson said the incident caught her off-guard, as well.
"I don't think anything really prepares you for this type of vindictive behavior," she said. "Obviously, we need to have strong dialog across campus about respect for other people and their cultures."
Whether the vandalism was racially motivated or not, it was offensive, especially to the Hispanic community, Martinez-Purson said.
"There's still an impact that has to be dealt with," she said. "He did insult them. His thoughtless behavior had consequences."
The University won't tolerate that kind of behavior, President David Schmidly said.
"It's inexcusable to desecrate a flag," he said. "I'm not going to be very pleasant to deal with on this issue."
What makes the situation worse is that it was a Mexican flag, Schmidly said.
"For God's sake, New Mexico was part of Mexico at one time," he said. "There's tremendous ties, and we have a large population of Hispanics that live in our state and many of them have relatives and connections to Mexico."
Good find, I was looking for that and couldn’t get it.
You are correct. This is a property rights issue.
In 1835 a little known conflict took place between Michigan and Ohio. The question to be settled was where the state boundary should be and to which state the city of Toledo belonged. The following article was published in a Michigan paper.
“We are sorry to be compelled to state that since individuals in the disputed ground have been base enough to erect, in the village of Toledo, a flag on which was ostentatiously displayed the name of Ohio, some patriotic citizens of Michigan, indignant at the disgusting exhibition, tore the disgraceful badge of freedom from its perch, dragging it through the streets over which it had waved, and after arriving with it at Monroe, finally burned it with suitable demonstrations of contempt.”
Back then, before polical correctness, when men were men, they took care of business. Thank God for this young hero in a nation of wimps.
If the American flag usually flies from the flagpole outside Scholes hall, and that Mexican rag was raised in it’s place, then it was being flown “in place of” Old Glory.
That would mean the Mexican Student Association has apparently violated the US Code, while all the student did was take it down and turn it in to the ROTC office. (I know it’s hard to believe: that our good neighbors to the south would intentionally break our laws.)
That rag should have been burned.
Emotions must be running high on this thread. It’s one of the more heavily redacted ones I’ve seen recently.
:^)
“I mean, how can you not like this flag? It practically screams, “Come on over. We have blonde chicks and beer.””
LOL! Just what I think when I see that flag! “Yah, weeve beir!”
Why do I have it in my mind that if it were mexican students ripping down OUR flag the officials would not make a peep?
The U.S. Supreme Court has settled the question, that burning or abusing the U.S. Flag is "freedom of speech" and Constitutionally protected.
But doing the identical thing to the mexican flag is a hate crime.
Do I have that right?
Can someone explain that to me?
Come on stay on subject. Which is FOREIGN FLAGS IN AMERICA. A Southern Flag is part of American History, the MEXICAN OR U.N. FLAG DO NOT BELONG HERE.
Where is the Peter Lynch Suit/Defense Fund located?
That's just a start.
What is the name of the School District?
The School District Board?
That's it!
School Boards must accept the fact that they are responsible for stupid administrators in their schools.
Ignorance and/or stupidity cannot be an excuse for School Boads to allow incompetent administrators to run foreign country protectorates on U.S. soil.
Unacceptable.
Will a large monetary award clarify it for them?
What can you do about it Schmidly, when you're working at Jack-in-the-box?
What are the cash reserves of your School District?
Works for me!
New Mexico was also once part of the Spanish Empire, for more than 200 years for that matter. But no one would mind if they ran the Spanish flag up the pole, because Spain poses no threat to the integrity of American rule.
What a crock ofcrap! Anybody ever mentioned that burning Old Glory, insulting the US citizenry, maybe, maybe...maybe, a hate Crime??
Naaaah, I didn't think so, just a liberal crime.
Let me get this straight.
An American tears down a foreign flag being displayed high on a flagpole within the United States on a government — i.e., taxpayer supported — property and is subject to criminal charges??!!!
He is being treated as a criminal? For what? Because he doesn’t “celebrate diversity?!!”
Don’t get me started.
He’s a Patriot and a Hero!!
The cost of that rag must make it the lowest misdemeanor possible. An over-reaction if it prompts anything beyond a citation and nominal fine.
But then who would explain the U.S. Constitution to folks like you.
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