Supreme Court of Delaware

Defendant's convictions for terroristic threatening and committing a hate crime are affirmed where: 1) Delaware's terrorist threatening statute, applies only to speech made with a subjective intent to threaten; 2) on the facts at hand, the First Amendment did not protect defendant's speech, because he directed a "true threat" to an individual with the intent to place him in fear of bodily harm or death; 3) the statutory term "select" in the hate crime statute means that the speaker must both select the words, and select the person to whom the speaker directs those words; 4) in this case, it was apparent that defendant chose hate filled and racially charged words and directed them towards his special education behavior manager, who was African American; and 5) consequently, sufficient evidence supported the hate crime adjudication.

Appellate Information

• Decided 07/02/2007
• Published 07/06/2007

Judges

Court

• Supreme Court of Delaware

Counsel