Criminality and Re-Tweeting

Almost every criminal says, at some point, "It wasn't me."  Hackers always say it when arrested to shift the burden of proof to the state arresting them - prove it was me.  

Now along comes the case of Safya Roe Yassin, a 39-year-old U.S. citizen, 
[see http://www.wsj.com/articles/isis-retweet-arrest-raises-free-speech-issues-1471033391 ] where it really wasn't her, but she communicated an ISIS threat listing the names and phone numbers of law enforcement officials and their addresses indicating "Wanted to Kill".   She was arrested and indicted.  

There is one obvious thing that this article shows is that ISIS is trying to incite US citizens to kill law enforcement officers, and at least of few of those reading this stuff on Twitter, are sympathetic to the cause.  A few of those Black Lives Matter demonstrators chanting the same thing in New York should have been arrested for the same reasons Yassin was.  Those are other matters for Twitter  and the Justice Department, both of which seem unable to stop people in ISIS from using their networks to foster the kind of killing we saw elsewhere in the US.  They do it in many countries and not just here.  Try being a police officer in Iraq or Afghanistan.  

Yassin's public defender has entered the not so novel defense that she merely replayed something that someone else wrote.  Her defense is "free speech", something that was tried a number of times in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Washington D.C. in different contexts.  There were fewer liberals in the Justice Department in those days, but it will not likely be considered in her defense.  You can imagine that the Internet allows ISIS to communicate these ideas to any number of people - some who are not those people but pretend to be - and all of those retransmitting them would have a defense.  If she were to win her case, they don't even have to work hard to get these ideas out.  

You cannot say anything you want anywhere in the world.  You cannot incite to riot, then pass along where to go to start one, suggest murdering your neighbors to other neighbors, propose children have their pictures taken naked so you can see them.  There are reasons why free speech is not free all the time.  Defense lawyers get paid for defending people like this, even though they are frequently conflicted by doing it.  This person is accused, and will get a trial in a country where she was said to have proposed the killing of officers who keep us safe.  

More than any of these things,  ISIS is one of the least tolerant organizations to ever raise their collective heads.  For those in ISIS territory, the penalty Miss Yassin spreading anti-ISIS messaging that includes killing their police and leadership is not jail time.