Man arrested for appearing near school in a Star Wars stormtrooper costume
When George Cross of Lynn, Massachusetts, bought a stormtrooper costume from the Star Wars franchise, he decided to wander around the neighborhood showing friends. But when he got too close to a local elementary school about to let out for the day, Cross found himself arrested and charged with disturbing and loitering near a school.
While Cross meant no harm, parents at the school found the costume, which included a toy gun, disconcerting.
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"I honestly opened my screen window, stuck my head out the window, and I was just like, 'Wow,'" said parent Jami Kelly. The local police agreed, saying, "We just can't have things like that taking place in front of the school."
As the local news report noted, parents could at least take comfort in the fact that stormtroopers are notorious for having terrible aim.
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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