A 19-year-old Florida man has been arrested after he was caught vandalizing an LGBTQ Pride mural painted at an intersection in Delray Beach, Florida. Dylan Brewer was caught on camera doing burnouts through the intersection multiple times. In addition to the surveillance footage, several bystanders also recorded him and sent the videos to police reports the South Florida Sun Sentinel. Brewer has since been charged with both felony criminal mischief over $1,000 and reckless driving.
In news that will probably surprise no one, he was also reportedly flying a Trump flag off the back of his truck, because of course he was. Such a brazen display of bigotry has “Trump supporter” written all over it. Unfortunately, as the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council pointed out, while such acts should probably be considered hate crimes, under current laws, that is not the case.
This isn’t the first time a homophobic Florida man defaced the mural, either. A day after it was unveiled in 2021, Alexander Jerich vandalized the mural with his truck as part of a birthday rally for (yep, you guessed it!) Donald Trump. Jerich pleaded guilty, but was only given probation and forced to write a 25-page essay about the Pulse nightclub shooting that took place in Orlando back in 2016.
“I think a big problem is with our judiciary who doesn’t understand hate crimes are hate crimes, whether or not they fit the specific definition of the law,” said Rand Hoch, the council’s president and founder told the Sun Sentinel. “There needs to be consequences so people know if they commit crimes like this, they are going to jail, they are going to be fined, they are going to have to suffer from what they did. Right now, we don’t seem to have it.”
The Palm Beach County Human Rights Council and the AIDS Healthcare Foundation paid about $16,000 to have the mural installed. Restoring it after Jerich’s vandalism cost about $8,000, and according to Hoch, repairing the damage Brewer caused will likely cost a similar amount. Anyone who would like to help with the mural’s restoration can donate to the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council here.