On 28 May 2016, 27-year-old Anthony Burrus was arrested after he drove a vehicle through a Memorial Day display in Kentucky, damaging hundreds of crosses:
A man suspected of driving through a military display and destroying crosses that had been placed for a Memorial Day ceremony in a Kentucky park was arrested this weekend, police announced.
Anthony Burrus, 27, was taken into custody Saturday on suspicion of first-degree criminal mischief and leaving the scene of an accident, the Henderson Police Department said in Facebook post. The arrest came hours after the incident.
Shortly after Burrus' arrest, a meme appeared on social media stating that "Burress" had destroyed the memorial after deciding that "vets' lives don't matter":
The information in the meme displayed above did not come from official sources. Henderson Police Department spokesperson Jennifer Richmond said at the time that it wasn't clear whether the Memorial Day display was intentionally destroyed, and that Burrus had no recollection of the event: “He said he didn’t do it. He admitted to driving the vehicle in the morning but would not state that he drove through the park,” Richmond added. “But the evidence is in his car tires.”
Burrus was later sentenced to three years in jail over the incident:
A Henderson man who drove a vehicle through Central Park's Memorial Day display was sentenced to three years in jail.
Anthony L. Burrus, 28, of Henderson was sentenced on one count of first-degree criminal mischief and one count of leaving the scene of an accident. Paying court costs was also a condition of his sentence.
Burrus was arrested on the same charges on May 28 after allegedly knocking down about 150 memorial crosses and destroying another 20 crosses with his vehicle. Police testified that 55 crosses needed to be replaced following the incident.
[Burrus] said he was intoxicated at the time of the incident. The officer testified he could still smell alcohol on Burrus later in the day when he was arrested.