A teenage Florida college student has been charged with a felony after police say he committed “intentional vandalism” of a gay pride-themed crosswalk at Delray Beach following an intensive investigation that lasted more than a week. 

Delray Beach police announced on Monday that Dylan Brewer, 19, of Clearwater, Florida, was arrested and charged with felony criminal mischief more than $1,000 and reckless driving, after multiple witnesses saw him on February 4 “intentionally performing multiple burnouts with his vehicle” — keeping the vehicle still and spinning the wheels so they heat up and smoke — over a Delray Beach crosswalk painted with rainbow colors to celebrate Gay Pride. 

The crosswalk was previously vandalized in 2021, after which the perpetrator was ordered by a judge to write an essay about the Pulse mass shooting in 2016 which targeted a gay nightclub.

As for Mr. Brewer’s charges, “The reckless action caused significant damage to the streetscape painting, which serves as a symbol of unity and inclusivity for the LGBTQ community,” police said in a statement.  Mr. Brewer turned himself in after law enforcement spent more than a week working on the case. As part of the investigation, multiple citizens submitted cellphone videos of the act of vandalism. A flag can be seen in the back of the truck in video footage, which local reports say could be a Trump flag. 

Gay rights groups have called for the vandalism to be classified as a hate crime, which is a federal offense and would trigger far stiffer penalties, such as a long prison sentence.

Mr. Brewer says on his Facebook page that he is a student at Lynn University at Boca Raton, a few minute’s drive from DelRay Beach. He is a race car enthusiast from a prominent family at Hernando Beach outside Tampa. 

A spokesperson for Lynn University said that Mr. Brewer is not enrolled there.

The LGBTQ street art at Delray Beach that Mr. Brewer is accused of vandalizing includes the six rainbow colors of the well-known, traditional Pride flag as well as the five colors added to the more recent “Progress Pride flag,” which includes black, brown, light blue, pink, and white to represent people of color, transgender people, and people living with HIV/AIDs. 

“The Pride Streetscape is about solidarity, inclusion, and visibility; a proud celebration of our city’s diversity,” Delray Beach’s mayor, Shelly Petrolia, said of the artwork. The groups that sponsored the streetscape said the June 12, 2021 ribbon cutting for the art was meant to remember the five-year anniversary of the Pulse mass shooting in Orlando, where 49 people were killed. 

In 2021, Delray Beach police announced the arrest of Alexander Jerich, then 20, for causing significant damage to the street after “what appeared to be an intentional ‘burnout’ with his vehicle” over the Pride crosswalk. He was charged with criminal mischief more than $1,000, reckless driving, and evidence of prejudice. 

Jerich made headlines in 2022 for an unusual part of his punishment: a judge ordered him to write a 25-page essay about the Pulse nightclub shooting.

At the time of Jerich’s sentencing, the the president and founder of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council, Rand Hoch, complained to the South Florida Sun Sentinel that his punishment was merely “a slap on the wrist” and called for harsher penalties for defacing the street mural.“I think a big problem is with our judiciary who doesn’t understand hate crimes are hate crimes … There needs to be consequences so people know if they commit crimes like this, they are going to jail, they are going to be fined, they are going to have to suffer from what they did,” he said.