Douglas County Democrats have man arrested because they didn't like his sign, local media tries to justify incident

On Wednesday, Dr. Justin Spiehs, a resident who has regularly criticized the all Democrat commission of Douglas County, Kansas and has a federal lawsuit against the commission for allegedly violating his right to freedom of speech, went to a County Commissioner meeting, holding a sign that read, “Women have bigger balls than Patrick Kelly too”. Kelly is the county commissioner for the first district. Dr. Spiehs had ran against Kelly for the commissioner position in 2022 as a Republican, however, the deep blue area largely favored the Democrat incumbent.

Assumably taking offense to the sign, Chair of the Douglas County Commission Karen Willey, a Democrat representing the third district, along with the other two commissioners had the Douglas County sheriff arrest Dr. Spiehs. Douglas County Administrator Sarah Plinsky and four deputies from the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office also took part in the arresting process.

Reporting from the local media outlet, Lawrence Journal-World (LJW), covered the incident. However, their reporting of the event was far different than what was seen in video taken at the commission meeting.

In their article, ‘Frequent commenter arrested at County Commission meeting’, LJW states that Dr. Spiehs was “holding an obscene sign insulting a county commissioner”. What they never say is that the sign said, “Women have bigger balls than Patrick Kelly too” and that Michael Eravi, who was taking video for his YouTube channel Lawrence Accountability, was standing next to Dr. Spiehs holding a sign that said, “Patrick Kelly is a pussy”. However, Eravi and his sign was apparently not obscene enough to warrant an arrest or even be mentioned in LJW’s article.

LJW starts talking about the arrest, stating in their article:

“Meanwhile, some of the dozens of people in the room shouted in disapproval that the meeting was being delayed, a few saying they weren’t bothered by Spiehs.

“When Spiehs didn’t comply with either request, a group of four deputies warned him that he would be arrested for the disruption, and he was placed in handcuffs and escorted to a law enforcement vehicle outside the building.”

What actually happened, as seen in Eravi’s video, is that, while Dr. Spiehs was being arrested, a woman off camera says, “This is free speech. It’s protected,” defending Dr. Spiehs’ right to hold the sign.

Also, it is heard in the video that Dr. Spiehs says to the arresting officer, “Why did you bother to ask me?” suggesting that he was not “requested” to leave as LJW reported, but was rather asked to leave which he simply declined to do, and that is an important thing to note. “Please leave,” is different from “Will you please leave?” One is a demand, while the other is a question that can be met with either a “yes” or “no” and does not implicate that one must do anything else.

After Dr. Spiehs is escorted out of the room, Willey says in the video to the crowd of people, “I’m really sorry for anything that’s disruptive because this is your meeting.”

She is met with a roar of people shouting at her that she is the one who disrupted the meeting, not Dr. Spiehs.

According to LJW, Dr. Spiehs was arrested for “interfering with the conduct of public business” which the crowd, in large part, seemed to disagree with, and “preventing entrance or exit” despite the fact that Dr. Spiehs was standing right next to Eravi who did not get arrested.

Dr. Spiehs was bailed out with a $750 cash bond and returned to the meeting later that night. The last two paragraphs of LJW’s article has nothing to do with the meeting, but rather were written to paint Dr. Spiehs in a bad light.

The entire article is about the local government having a man arrested for standing silently with a sign, and seeming to try and justify taking away this individual’s freedom by having him locked up by armed government officials. This is important, because in the very paper that wrote this biased article, they state, as they do in every paper, “what the Lawrence Journal-World stands for”. This includes the following:

• Accurate and fair news reporting.
• No mixing of editorial opinion with reporting of the news.
• Safeguarding the rights of all citizens regardless of race, creed or economic stature.
• Sympathy and understanding for all who are disadvantaged or oppressed.
• Exposure of any dishonesty in public affairs.
• Supporting of projects that make our community a better place to live.