A man who defaced a Pride mural in Florida has been ordered to write a 25-page essay on the Pulse Orlando nightclub shooting.
Back on June 12, 2016, 29-year-old Omar Mateen shot and killed 49 people and wounded 53 others at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida. After a three-hour standoff, Orlando Police officers fatally shot Mateen.
Last month, Alexander Jerich, 20, pleaded guilty to criminal mischief and reckless driving in relation to an incident that took place on June 2021, where he used his car to leave tire marks on a new Pride flag intersection mural in Delray Beach, NBC news reports. As part of his punishment, Jerich has been ordered to detail the Pulse massacre in a 25-page essay.
At the time of the incident, Jerich was driving a white pickup truck with a Trump flag attached to the back of the vehicle. An arrest warrant says Jerich “stopped at the intersection and then intentionally accelerated the vehicle in an unreasonable unsafe manner in a short amount of time commonly referred to as ‘burnout,’” reports NBC News.
The nearly $17,000 new mural was left with a 15-foot-long streak on it.
In addition to writing the essay, Jerich still awaits his sentencing, which is set to take place in June. Some residents in the community are also looking to have Jerich banned entirely from the Pride intersection.
