Dwain Northey (Gen X)

So this is America — land of the free, home of the brave, and apparently the battleground for deadly deli warfare. In a world where mass shootings, political corruption, and corporate crimes barely raise an eyebrow, our ever-vigilant ICE enforcers have found a new menace to public safety: sandwiches. Because nothing screams “domestic threat” quite like a rogue BLT flying through the air.

The story practically writes itself. Some poor soul gets accused of assault — not with a gun, not with a knife, not even with a rolling pin — but with a sandwich. And not just a quick, laugh-it-off moment of bad judgment. No, our nation’s “tough and ready” ICE-inspired justice crusaders wanted it treated as a felony. Because, you know, bread and turkey slices are basically weapons of mass destruction. Somewhere in a secret government bunker, there’s probably a PowerPoint slide titled “Lunchmeat Lethality: The Hidden Danger.”

Luckily, someone in the system must have realized how absurd this was, because it was ultimately reduced to a misdemeanor. But then — because apparently common sense is too boring — they took it to a jury trial. A jury. Over a sandwich. Twelve citizens of the United States, summoned from their daily lives, forced to sit there and listen to arguments about the physics of ham-based aggression and whether lettuce counts as “intent to harm.”

By the end, even the jury couldn’t take it seriously. The whole courtroom must’ve felt like an SNL skit that forgot to end. You can almost hear the foreman saying, “We find the defendant… guilty of poor aim, maybe, but otherwise not guilty.”

In the grand theater of American justice, this was a masterclass in misplaced priorities. We live in a country where corporate polluters get slaps on the wrist and political grifters walk free, but heaven forbid someone weaponize Wonder Bread. The whole episode proves one thing: when bureaucracy loses perspective, even lunch can be treated like a crime scene.

So next time you make yourself a sandwich, beware. Somewhere out there, an overzealous officer might be watching — ready to declare your lunch a lethal weapon.