My friend who lives in Asheville sent me both the initial article about this episode:
http://www.mountainx.com/...
and the follow up article:
http://www.mountainx.com/...
Mark and Deborah Kuhn had hung an American flag upside down on their front porch as an act of protest and had several statements pinned to it, including a picture of President Bush with the words "Out Now" on it and one explaining the meaning of the upside down flag, a sign of distress.
It started when a man in fatigues driving a car with government license plates knocked on their door one day and told them to take it down. After that he drove by several times, sometimes with other people, taking pictures. Finally, Sheriff's Deputy Brian Scarborough shows up because of a complaint from his patriotic friend, National Guardsman Staff Sgt. Mark Radford (could it be the same fatigued gentlemen who had been stalking them for days?!?). Scarborough went to the Kuhn's residence determined to enforce a 1917 statue banning desecration of the U.S. flag...that has since been overturned...oops. He gets into a fight with the Kuhn's and by eyewitness acounts breaks down their door and busts out their window.
In the aftermath the Sheriff issues an apology and the friendship of Brian Scarborough and Mark Radford comes to light. Oh, and also the paper reported that, "in addition to U.S. Supreme Court decisions ruling that political uses of the flag are protected speech, North Carolina’s statute was declared unconstitutional in a 1971 ruling by the District Court of Western North Carolina."
"Enacted during a period of national chauvinistic fervor, it [the flag-desecration law] is an uncommonly bad statute," Circuit Judge James Craven Jr. wrote in the ruling. "Despite our respect, and indeed love, for these symbols of state and nation, we are compelled to hold the statute unconstitutional.
I'm wondering about the damage control for the Sheriff's office who seems to have a vigilante problem on their hands. Obviously this deputy was acting alone as normally a complaint taken would have been shuffled to the Asheville Police Department (who had already seen the flag and not taken any action). Not to mention Staff Sgt. Mark Radford who was using government time and money to go patrolling for non-patriots...and in uniform no less.