Mike Fox
Mike Fox

As the world rang in the new year, a terrorist attack shook New Orleans to its core, taking the lives of fourteen innocent people and wounding at least thirty-five more. Revelers on Bourbon Street, known for its laid-back, party-like atmosphere, encountered an individual “hell-bent on causing mass carnage,” in the words of Mayor LaToya Cantrell. Later that same morning, a man detonated a Tesla Cybertruck outside the Trump Hotel in Las Vegas. Both perpetrators crossed state lines in the process of committing their crimes, both used explosives, and both served in the US Army. Both were heinous crimes that left a wake of destruction in their paths.
Juxtapose that with an ongoing federal case in Florida. Those familiar with soccer know that pyrotechnics—including flares and smoke bombs—have long been a prominent feature of the sport and are used by fans to express support for their team and drum up enthusiasm from the crowd. In February 2024, Giovanni Isai Ramirez Reyes lit two flares at an Orlando stadium while attending an Orlando City soccer game. Both flares were extinguished within a minute, and although a child reportedly suffered superficial burns that did not require medical attention, the fire department was never even called. And the match continued uninterrupted. 
But the US Department of Justice nevertheless decided to charge Reyes with arson for leaving scorch marks on aluminum bleachers—a federal “crime” for which he now faces a seven-year mandatory minimum prison sentence.
Relentless overcriminalization has allowed prosecutors to bring the full weight of the government to bear on people whose conduct is just barely, if at all wrongful, in the sense that it presents genuine harm to other people. As Justice Gorsuch notes in his recent book, “[c]riminal laws and longer sentences are not the solution to every problem.” Also, some “crimes” are so inconsequential that they are unworthy of a court’s consideration and merit some other societal response than a full-blown prosecution.  » Read More
https://www.cato.org/blog/how-doj-turned-flares-joy-cry-help