Outrage as Confederate flags placed at MLK’s Atlanta church

Civil rights leaders were outraged after surveillance cameras caught two white males laying Confederate battle flags on the ground near the Atlanta church made famous by Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., but even if the individuals are identified, they are unlikely to face any charges at all.

The Atlanta police is working with federal authorities on the case, but they aren’t sure if any charges can be sought or if any crime had actually been committed. Hate crime charges are possible, but they would have to be federal as Georgia has no hate crimes law, according to an Associated Press report.

Atlanta FBI’s joint terrorism task force was looking into the possibility of whether specific threats were involved and therefore warrant such charges.

It’s the latest in the escalating conflict over the Confederate flag, which roared into the public spotlight after white supremacist Dylann Roof allegedly gunned down people at a historically black church in South Carolina in a apparently racially motivated attack. Roof had posed with the Confederate flag in pictures, and the outrage from the incident prompted South Carolina to eventually remove the flag that flew over state capitol grounds.

Rev. Raphael Warnock, who is the senior pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church where the Atlanta incident took place, said that placing the flags on church grounds amounted to a “terroristic threat,” according to the AP report. He further called it cowardly and provocative, and that it was clearly placed there not to celebrate “heritage” but rather “hate.”

However, authorities have an uphill climb trying to charge the men with a crime if they are identified. Proving that placing the flags there amounted to a specific threat may prove tough to do in court, prosecutors say.

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