Driver levels Ten Commandments marker in Ark.
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — A driver yelled “Freedom!” as he crashed his vehicle into Arkansas’ new Ten Commandments monument early Wednesday, nearly three years after he was arrested in the destruction of Oklahoma’s monument at its state Capitol, authorities said.
The privately funded Arkansas monument had been in place outside the state Capitol in Little Rock for less than 24 hours before it was knocked from its plinth and smashed to pieces.
Michael Reed, 32, of Van Buren, Ark., was booked in the Pulaski County jail on preliminary charges of defacing objects of public interest, criminal trespass and first-degree criminal mischief. An arrest report lists his occupation as “unemployed/disabled.”
Authorities did not know whether he had an attorney who could speak on his behalf, and a video arraignment was set for Thursday, a Pulaski County sheriff’s spokesman said.
In a Facebook Live video posted on the account of someone named Michael Reed, music is heard followed by a female voice, likely on the radio, saying, “Where do you go when you’re faced with adversity and trials and challenges?” The driver is then heard growling, “Oh my goodness. Freedom!” before accelerating into the monument.
Oklahoma County Sheriff’s spokesman Mark Opgrande said Wednesday that Reed was arrested in October 2014 in the destruction of Oklahoma’s Ten Commandments monument at the state Capitol.
Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson tweeted that “resorting to property destruction is never the answer to a policy disagreement.”