'Do you regret what you've done here?': Man who vandalized Florida pride intersection pleads guilty, apologizes in court

Shira Moolten, South Florida Sun-Sentinel on Jan 8, 2025

Published in News & Features

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — A Clearwater man who vandalized the Delray Beach LGBT pride intersection pleaded guilty in court Wednesday morning before apologizing at the request of a Palm Beach County judge.

“Do you understand what I mean when I use the word ‘remorse’?” Judge Daliah Weiss asked Dylan Reese Brewer, 19, before granting the plea deal, which critics have called a “sweetheart deal” because it allows Brewer to plead guilty to a misdemeanor instead of a felony.

“Yes ma’am,” he said.

“And you have stated that you are remorseful. Do you regret what you’ve done here?”

“Absolutely,” Brewer replied. “Yes ma’am.”

Last February, Brewer performed three burnouts over the rainbow flag painted in the street with his friends in tow and a “President Trump” flag flying from his dark pickup truck, the second time someone has defaced the mural with burnouts in three years. Alexander Jerich, 20, did so in 2021, one day after the streetscape was unveiled, while driving in a birthday rally for Trump.

Brewer’s plea deal required him to plead guilty to one misdemeanor count of criminal mischief under $1,000, unlike the felony count Jerich faced, and one count of reckless driving with injury to person or property. The formal conviction will remain on his record, unlike in Jerich’s case. He will have to pay the city of Delray Beach over $5,000 to repair the mural and complete 12 months of probation and 75 community service hours for each charge, as well as an anger management course.

In the months after Brewer’s arrest, his case went viral within right-wing circles of social media, with some accounts calling him a “hero.” A fundraiser for his legal expenses on Give Send Go, a Christian crowdfunding website, raised $36,535, over seven times the $5,000 restitution portion of the plea deal.

Rand Hoch, a retired judge and founder of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council, which helped pay for the streetscape, has repeatedly expressed frustration over what he sees as lenient punishments in both vandalism cases, and submitted a 14-page victim impact statement objecting to the plea deal. In court Wednesday, Brewer’s defense attorney, Richard Ozelie, asked that his victim impact statement not be heard because Hoch is not technically a victim under Marsy’s Law. But Weiss allowed Hoch to “address any concerns he has as a member of the community” apart from the statement.

“We object to this, what we call a sweetheart plea deal,” Hoch said. “He committed a crime against our community, the LGBTQ community. He went through the intersection not once, not twice, but three times in a retrofitted vehicle to cause damage to our community, and he did. We now feel a threat when we are in Delray Beach … a misdemeanor for doing that damage to our community would be a disgrace.”

An apology letter was not required in Brewer’s case, Weiss pointed out Wednesday. In the previous case, Judge Scott Suskauer had ordered Jerich to write a 25-page essay on the Pulse massacre.

Instead, Weiss pressed Brewer in court to explain why he regretted doing the burnouts.

“I want to know specifically why you are remorseful, Mr. Brewer,” she said.

“Obviously the consequences I’m gonna have to serve,” he replied. “That obviously sucks. I’m remorseful for putting everyone through this, my attorneys, the state, you guys, as well as the group through all this.”

Weiss then asked Brewer to explain the harm caused to “the group” specifically.

“I understand the harm that I caused in Delray Beach and the entire Palm Beach County, to the group that has worked hard on bringing rights to the county, and me going over it multiple times has brought a lot of setback, if you would say, towards their community,” Brewer said. “And I am deeply sorry for any harm that causes.”

Before she accepted the deal, Weiss also addressed Hoch’s objection, asking Assistant State Attorney Clausi to respond to it.

Clausi acknowledged Hoch’s “hurt” over the multiple vandalisms but disagreed with the assertion that the deal is a “slap on the wrist,” pointing out the formal conviction going on Brewer’s record, which was otherwise clear, and his willingness to pay the full repair cost and accept fault.

“We believe this is the appropriate sentence for him, that this will teach him a lesson,” Clausi said, “and hopefully it will teach anybody else out there that sees this sentence, that if you seek to destroy what is built at that intersection, you will pay to bring it back.”

_____