A legal defense fund has raised more than $24,000 and counting for a Florida teenager who was charged with a felony after committing what police say was  “intentional vandalism” of a Gay Pride-themed crosswalk at Delray Beach.

Delray Beach police announced last week that Dylan Brewer, 19, of Clearwater, was arrested and charged with felony criminal mischief of more than $1,000 and reckless driving, after multiple witnesses saw him on February 4 “intentionally performing multiple burnouts” with his truck — spinning the wheels of a vehicle so they smoke — over a Pride mural painted on city streets. 

The LGBTQ crosswalk includes all of the colors of the “Pride Progress” flag: the six rainbow colors of the traditional Pride flag as well as five more colors – black, brown, light blue, pink and white to represent people of color, transgender people and people living with HIV – and was unveiled on the five-year anniversary of the shooting at the Pulse gay nightclub at Orlando, which killed nearly 50 people. 

The fund for Mr. Brewer on GiveSendGo, a Christian crowdfunding website established as an alternative to GoFundMe, says its goal is to raise $100,000 in total to help cover his legal costs. A prominent conservative podcast host, Tim Pool, wrote on X that he donated $10,000 to the cause. “He was charged with a felony for burning out as he turned while driving over a cultist flag painting,” Mr. Pool says.

“This fund not only supports Brewer’s legal defense but also champions the fundamental American values of freedom of expression and the right to a fair trial,” reads the GiveSendGo page, which says it was set up by a Tony Lackey, who could not otherwise be identified. “By contributing, you stand for the principles that underpin our democracy, advocating for a balanced and just examination of the case.”

The president and founder of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council, Rand Hoch, noted in an email to the Sun that the New York Times has described Mr. Pool as “right wing” and a “provocateur.” 

It’s not the first time that Delray Beach’s Gay Pride crosswalk has been vandalized since its 2021 unveiling. Soon after it was unveiled, Alexander Jerich, 20, was arrested for doing burnouts on the crosswalk in a truck flying an “All Aboard the Trump Train” flag. The South Florida Sun Sentinel editorial board, which referred to Mr. Jerich as a “20 year-old child,” called in an editorial for him to serve jail time, saying the victim was not Delray Beach but the LGBTQ community and those who “believe in tolerance.” Mr. Hoch had also demanded a year of jail time. 

Ultimately Mr. Jerich, whose lawyers compared him in court to the mentally disabled man in the John Steinbeck novel, “Of Mice and Men,” was sentenced to community service and probation and ordered to write a 25-page letter about the Pulse massacre.

 Now, the focus is on Mr. Brewer and whether he will face incarceration and the stigma of a felony conviction.

The Sun contacted the Delray Beach Police Department, which said it has no further information beyond its press release. Representatives of the city did not return requests for comment. 

Some observers on social media are expressing support for Mr. Brewer, criticizing the Pride mural as divisive and denouncing what they see as a two-tiered justice system that seeks to punish young men like Mr. Brewer, yet went easy on the perpetrators of the looting, arson and riots that followed the death of George Floyd in 2020.  On X, one post that had 4.4 million views was flooded with comments arguing that the felony charges were too harsh. Some said Mr. Brewer had the right to express himself, adding that burning an American flag was ruled a legal form of protest in Texas v. Johnson.

While some conservative Floridians have been calling Mr. Brewer a “political prisoner” and are asking for him to be pardoned, the office of Governor DeSantis, who has taken a hard line against so-called “woke” policies,  did not respond to a request for comment on the issue. 

Some online commenters questioned the amount of police resources put into the investigation of the vandalism of the Gay Pride crosswalk. Police in Delray Beach, which has a major violent crime problem, spent more than a week working on the investigation, after multiple people submitted videos of the truck driving over the Pride mural. 

NeighborhoodScout, a database tracking neighborhood crime across the country, reports that with a “crime rate of 36 per one thousand residents, Delray Beach has one of the highest crime rates in America compared to all communities of all sizes — from the smallest towns to the very largest cities.”

The chance of being a victim of crime is 1 in 28, the database notes, and in Florida, 94 percent of communities are safer than Delray Beach. 

The Sun made several attempts to reach Brewer’s family.