This May Be Alarming But It Is Not Terrorism

A Utah mother, Linda Morford, was charged with a domestic terrorism type charge ("terroristic threatening") because, in anger after being told her family's dentist appointment was being changed, she told a dental office assistant over the telephone that "I’ll be there next Tuesday at 2, and if we are five minutes late and you guys make us reschedule, then I will come in and kill everybody." She mentioned shootings as part of her threat.

      Her venting (or threat) wasn't terrorism (it wasn't even common law assault), and her being charged trivializes actual terrorism and marks a dangerous overreach of prosecutorial and law enforcement power. Particularly because the woman doesn't even appear to have committed the elements of the crime with which she was charged.

       The article specifically mentions that the charge is a second class felony under Utah law, which is helpful in narrowing down what statutory provisions are being asserted by the prosecutor. Utah Code Ann. § 76-5-107.3 ("Threat of Terrorism") requires both a threat "to commit any offense involving bodily injury, death, or substantial property damage, and," to be a second class felony, must either involve a threat to use a "weapon of mass destruction," or acting with the intent to "intimidate or coerce a civilian population or to influence or affect the conduct of a government or a unit of government." Per Utah Code Ann. § 76-10-401, however, "weapon of mass destruction" specifically excludes firearms. So, unless the dentist office was "a civilian population" or "unit of government," the prosecutor has wrongly charged her.

     This provides a good example of how terrorism laws will increasingly be twisted and misused by government.