The Ten Commandments monument outside the state Capitol on Wednesday.
Capitol police arrested a man after Arkansas’ new Ten Commandments monument was smashed to pieces when someone rammed a vehicle into it early Wednesday, less than 24 hours after the 6-foot granite statue was placed on state Capitol grounds.
Secretary of State’s Office spokesman Chris Powell said capitol police arrested the male suspect early Wednesday.
The driver is identified in an arrest report as Michael Tate Reed of Van Buren, Arkansas. A Facebook Live video shot early Wednesday and posted on an account belonging to a Michael Reed appears to show the destruction of the monument. (See video at the end of this story.)
In the video, the sky is dark and the Arkansas Capitol’s dome is visible. Music is heard followed by a female voice, likely on the radio, saying, “Where do you go when you’re faced with adversity and trials and challenges?” The driver is then heard growling, “Oh my goodness. Freedom!” before accelerating into the monument. The vehicle’s speedometer is last shown at 21 mph (33 kph) and then a collision can be heard.
Pulaski County jail records show that Reed was booked into the jail shortly after 7:30 a.m. Wednesday on preliminary charges of defacing objects of public interest, criminal trespass and first-degree criminal mischief, with Capitol Police listed as the arrest agency.
Arkansas’ monument fell from its plinth and broke into multiple pieces as it hit the ground.
“As far as what happens to the monument, it’s unclear at this time,” Powell said. “The first thing will be to clean up the debris.”
Oklahoma 2014
A sheriff’s department spokesman in Oklahoma says Reed is the same man who crashed his vehicle into Oklahoma’s monument in 2014.
Oklahoma County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Mark Opgrande tells The Associated Press that Reed was arrested in October 2014 in the destruction of Oklahoma’s Ten Commandments monument at the state Capitol.
Reed was taken to hospital in Oklahoma for mental health treatment and never formally charged in that case.
A 2015 Tulsa World story explored Reed’s mental health problems based on a letter Reed sent to the newspaper’s circulation department.
“In the letter, Reed describes how voices in his head became his reality, how his family tried to get him treatment and how recovery is helping him. At the end, he apologizes,” the newspaper reported.
“I am so sorry that this all happening [sic] and wished I could take it all back,” Reed said, according to the paper.
The privately funded, granite monument in Little Rock weighed 6,000 pounds. It was installed Tuesday morning on the southwest lawn of the Capitol with little fanfare and no advance notice. A 2015 law required the state to allow the display near the Capitol, and a state panel last month gave final approval to its design and location.
Plans for Arkansas’ monument sparked a push by the Satanic Temple for a competing statue of Baphomet, a goat-headed, angel-winged creature accompanied by two children smiling at it. Efforts to install that display, however, were blocked by a law enacted this year requiring legislative approval before the commission could consider a monument proposal. The Satanic Temple has vowed a lawsuit over the measure, and said it didn’t believe the law should be applied retroactively to its proposal.
(All contents © copyright 2017 Associated Press. All rights reserved.)
THV 11 Video
More Video of What Appears to Be the Crash
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