Someone makes a threat to kill someone, and they shouldn’t be surprised if the authorities try to determine if the threat is credible or if it is just a pasty faced internet cowboy hiding in his mother’s basement spouting off from behind an anonymous screen name.
Based on the threats posted at your link, the subpoenas appear to be justified.
No.
“True Threats” are those threats that are outside the protection of the First Amendment; they are not mere political hyperbole or bluster. For instance, in 1967, when Mr. Watts said that if he were drafted the first man he’d want in his rifle sights was President Lyndon B. Johnson, that wasn’t a true threat: it was conditional political hyperbole. In other words, it was mere angry bluster of the sort no reasonable person would take to be a serious threat.3
https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/394/705/case.html
Watts v. United States
394 U.S. 705
Petitioner’s remark during political debate at small public gathering that, if inducted into Army (which he vowed would never occur) and made to carry a rifle “the first man I want to get in my sights is L.B.J.,” held to be crude political hyperbole which, in light of its context and conditional nature, did not constitute a knowing and willful threat against the President within the coverage of 18 U.S.C. § 871(a).
Certiorari granted; 131 U.S.App.D.C. 125, 402 F.2d 676, reversed and remanded.
Based on the threats posted at your link, the subpoenas appear to be justified.
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I knew it, I just knew it. And then the Libertarians come over here to stir up trouble on FR without telling the whole truth.
What you say makes sense.
However, if it were applied EQUALLY OR JUSTLY, I would have no problem.
The fact is that the 'law' is not being applied equally.
One can get on public TV and call for the murder of innocent American citizens, and that is declared LEGAL USE OF FREE SPEECH.
For *all* the comments posted at that link? Some maybe, but not all.
Saying a judge should be harmed in a specific way in front of a courthouse -- yeah, I think that should be taken seriously. Especially given the country we live in today.
Saying one hopes there's a special place in hell for a judge (or any individual for that matter) is far from a threat.
By the way -- in order for a threat to be "real" ..... doesn't there have to be a demonstrated means/capability on the part of a poster to carry out that threat?
Not a lawyer here, just asking the question ....