Summary
Briana Boston, 42, was charged with threatening a health insurance company after repeating words linked to the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
During a recorded call with Blue Cross Blue Shield about a denied claim, Boston said, “Delay, deny, depose, you people are next,” echoing phrases engraved on bullet casings at Thompson’s murder scene.
Authorities allege she exploited the CEO’s homicide to make the threat.
Boston, a mother of three with no prior criminal record, was arrested and held on $100,000 bail amidst warnings of potential copycat incidents targeting healthcare executives.
Without knowing more, it is the “you people are next” that makes this a threat in particular. You should easily be able to say deny defend or depose or whatever, just don’t use threats
and then when the cops came, she admitted to it, and continued on saying stuff like “they’re evil” and “They deserve karma”
like. Okay. The insurance peeps are fucking evil. she’s not wrong.
but maybe don’t tell the cops that? maybe shut the fuck up and get a lawyer.
It’s a threat. They just have no reason to belive she, in particular, should be believed. It’s not a true threat, by legal standards. I’m not a lawyer, but I’m very confident of this. This is an obvious miscarriage of justice. Throwing a threat out in anger or frustration does not make a true threat.
Right, because anger and frustration aren’t predictors of murderous behavior at all.
They are explicitly given as reasons other cases have been deemed not true threats, yeah. People are likely to throw threats out meaninglessly when angry. It’s not a good predictor of if they’ll actually follow through. There are other factors that are, like the victims history with the person and the persons past behavior. Just a threat in anger is not a true threat, based on existing legal precedence.
Also she never said she would be the one to do it just that they would be next.
Hence why we have an actual standard for this…
True Threat
A random housewife giving a vague threat at the end of an already heated call by referencing a recent event involving the company, really doesn’t come close to the definition.
this isn’t a first amendment issue.
It’s illegal to shout “BOMB!” in an airport even if there is no bomb, and you have no intention of setting one off. further, it’s also illegal to shout “FIRE!” in a crowded theater.
It’s also pretty much illegal everywhere to call in bomb threats or similar, even merely as a prank.
Pointing out that someone’s behaviour matches that which caused something bad to happen to someone else when you are not the one who did that bad thing to someone else is not a fucking threat
Or you know, the person stops being a pussy and answers “yeah yeah sure lady”.
99% of the threats aren’t real. And if you are not scared of a threat because you know it’s BS, you have not really been threatened now have you?
After you reference a killing, and then say “you are next”, that’s a threat.
The blatant implication is that the person they’re talking to is the next to get killed.
It really is quite clear.
It might be an empty threat, but the blue cross person can’t know that.
She’d have to be much more specific. It’s completely ambiguous.
You’re saying it’s simple. It’s really not as simple as you think. The legal requirement is a true threat. (Google it) Just threatening someone in anger or frustration has been ruled to not be a true threat. They need a reason to believe you’ll follow through. This clearly is not that. It’s bullshit. It is purely done as an act of terrorism by the state. They want people to fear even mentioning the killer’s message.
you don’t think they have a reason? I do. and they clearly did, or they’d never have reported it to cops.
Remember, we’re talking about a phone rep for a fucking hated health insurance company. They’re used to dealing with angry people. they deal with them every other phone call.
Like you said, they deal with angry customers all the time. Why would they suspect this person is any different? It’s just about sending a message. They want us to be scared to ever bring it up, so they need to make an example out of some people.
or. just hear me out here. the lady really was scared because there’s something there.
Even if it doesn’t rise to the level of being criminality, it’s still a threat, and that employee felt threatened enough to report it. do you really think anyone is actually scared to talk about it? I’m not. you’re not. Nobody else here isn’t either.
It’s a threat, yeah. True threat is what’s required by the law. You can’t just arrest everyone who makes a threat and hold them on $100,000 bail. That’d be insane.
Yes. The judge just about admitted that was the purpose of setting the bail so high. You don’t get a bail set at $100,000 for a non-violent offender with family and no flight risk generally. It’s purely intimidation. They don’t want people to threaten the ultra-wealthy’s money, but the state is encouraged to threaten the people to make them stop.
Nope, even you say so:
Notice how its not that the person speaking will do it even in your own rewording? That’s how it’s not a threat
They implied the worker on the other end of the line would be the next one to suffer grevious bodily harm or death.
It doesn’t matter if she’s the one doing the killing, doesn’t matter if it was “serious”, they used the threat of violence.
It’s really that simple. You’re arguing a technicality that does not exist. Any reasonable person being on the other end of that line would have interpreted it as a threat. Period. Full stop.
Maybe the lady shouldn’t have been denied. That’s probably true. She still made a threat; and she did so on a line that we all know is being recorded.
I don’t know that it needs more than a “don’t do that”, but saying it wasn’t a threat is factually and legally incorrect.
It literally does matter legally, which is what’s being discussed surrounding her arrest, by law enforcement, and her bail being set by a Justice in a court of law.
Please, before continuing further, do some reading on “true threat,” which is the legal requirement.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/amendment-1/true-threats
https://firstamendment.mtsu.edu/article/true-threats/
Before you continue to bitch about “true threat”…
you should probably go back and read the article again. This isn’t a 1A issue. She was not somehow prevented from her speech (that is the threat,) and was quite successful in delivering that speech.
Boston is being charged under Florida law. specifically statute 836.10.2b which makes it illegal to:
Again, her first amendment rights were never violated.
another statute that may be of significance here is 836.5, which makes it illegal to issue a threat for the purpose of extorting money (or other gains).
Edit to add: the threat doesn’t need to be serious, and not having a firearm doesn’t make it okay to threaten people. Is it dubious she had the physical ability to conduct the threat? absolutely. Was it stated in a moment of frustration and anger? certainly. Do I completely understand and sympathize with that anger? fucking absolutely.
however. She still issued a threat. which, if you don’t want cops showing up at your door, don’t issue a threat to someone whose just doing their job- even if their job is to railroad you and deny medical care; on a recorded phone call. and then don’t admit to it to the cops, and then continue saying shit like “they’re evil” and “They deserve karma”
of fucking course she got arrested.
To any one reading this, here’s the best free legal advice anyone can give you: SHUT THE FUCK UP. When the cops knock on your door. they are INVESTIGATING YOU. shut the fuck up and get a lawyer. Don’t admit to anything. don’t continue blathering on about how “they deserve it”. That’s how you get arrested. Boston literally did their work for them.
That’s called a warning, threats only can come from people who intend to act
“You’re going to be next if you keep acting like this” is t a threat. “I’m going to make you the next one” is
there’s a big distinction between the two, in that warnings generally involve actions that are legal (like defending yourself, or cops arresting people, etc), vs threats that are actions which illegal (“give me your wallet or I"ll kill you”.)
Also, generally speaking, warnings frequently include things that are natural or legal consequences for your actions. “If you continue to harass X, you’ll be arrested”, is a warning, “if you don’t put down the gun, I will shoot” is a warning. “Approve my claim or i’ll kill you” is not a warning. it’s a threat.
I have to agree with you, mostly.
The system gets to make the rules and even if she didn’t say, “you people are next” I think they’d still be doing this. Corpos control our justice system and they will not tolerate us glorifying Luigi Mangione (please jurors look up "nullification”)
That was my thought as well. If she left it at DDD, that’s just showing opposition. “You people are next” is a pretty clear threat.
Fuck the insurance companies, but be smart about how.