Man arrested for smashing Ten Commandments monument at Arkansas Capitol
A newly installed Ten Commandments monument on Arkansas state Capitol grounds
was toppled on Wednesday, with police saying they have arrested a man they
suspect of driving his vehicle into the granite slab.
"It was shattered into a lot of pieces," Chris Powell, a spokesman for the
Secretary of State and Capitol Police, said in an interview.
No motive has been released for destroying the monument installed on Tuesday,
Powell said. The suspect, identified as Michael Reed, faces three charges,
including felony defacing an object of public interest.
An officer patrolling nearby arrested Reed, 32, shortly after the incident
occurred, Powell said. No lawyer was listed for the suspect in online jail
records.
The 6-foot (1.8-meter) monument was funded with $26,000 in private donations.
Legislation permitting it on the Capitol grounds was enacted in 2015, and
whether that was appropriate has been debated ever since.
Courts have ordered the removal of similar religious monuments erected in
Oklahoma and Alabama.
A civil liberties group pledged a court challenge in Arkansas, saying the
monument showed an unconstitutional government preference for a certain
religion.
At the installation ceremony in Little Rock on Tuesday, Republican state
Senator Jason Rapert noted that the Ten Commandments were chiseled into the
portals of the U.S. Supreme Court.
"If it’s good enough for the U.S. Capitol, it’s good enough for the state of
Arkansas,” said Rapert, an evangelist who sponsored the legislation permitting
the new monument.
But Rita Sklar, executive director of the Arkansas chapter of the American
Civil Liberties Union, has said the group is preparing to file a lawsuit over
the placement of the monument, which she called a visible symbol of government
endorsement of one particular religious belief.
Since Arkansas' Ten Commandments monument act was proposed about two years
ago, satanists and other groups have also sought state permission to place
markers on Capitol grounds, but their requests were rejected.
Source: Reuters
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