Obscene gesture no excuse for assault, judge says

Being thrown a bird is no reason to confront the person expressing the obscene gesture, according to General Sessions Judge Larry Ross who bound a woman to the grand jury this week for an incident allegedly triggered by a middle finger waving in the air.

?Some lady throwing you a bird doesn?t give you the right to act like some kind of idiot,? Ross told Dasha Scott before binding her to the grand jury on assault charges Tuesday. ?She isn?t going to explain what problems she has with you if you confront her. Don?t you know what a bird means. It means she doesn?t like you.?

The judge?s statement came after hearing testimony from the alleged victim, Lisa Herriman, who told the court she was waiting to pull out at a stop sign on New Smithville Highway when Scott, who was a passenger in a car which had pulled in behind her, got out of the car, came to her window and started yelling at her. Herriman, Scott and Scott?s husband, who was driving, all knew one another prior to the incident. Herriman noted her 2-year-old child was in the backseat of her car.

While no blows were thrown and Herriman maintained she was suddenly attacked without provocation by Scott, the defendant maintained, during her address to the court, that Herriman flipped her off as they drove by, prompting the driver to pull in behind her and find out why she threw the bird.

However, Ross said Scott and her husband had no business confronting Herriman, even if she did make an obscene gesture. As for Herriman, Judge Ross questioned, if a bird was thrown, what kind of person she was.

?What kind of mother flips a bird in front of her child,? Ross questioned, in binding Scott to the grand jury on misdemeanor assault charges.