First Amendment to the United States Constitution

Michigan Minister Sent to Prison for putting the fear of God in a Judge
The American Civil Liberties Union is taking up the case of a southwestern Michigan minister who was sent to prison for warning that a judge could be tortured by God.
The ACLU said it asked the state appeals court Wednesday to release the Rev. Edward Pinkney on bail while he appeals a probation violation. Lawyers claim his free-speech rights were trampled in Berrien County.
In 2007, Pinkney, 60, was convicted of paying people to vote in a Benton Harbor election.
Months later, he wrote an article in a Chicago newspaper, People's Tribune, saying the judge who handled his case, Alfred Butzbaugh, could be punished by God with curses, fever and "extreme burning" unless he changed his ways.
In June 2008, another Berrien County judge, Dennis Wiley, sent Pinkney to prison for three to 10 years after finding that he had violated his probation by making a threat against the judge.
"Those are words that would ... put the fear of God into anybody.
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First Amendment