Lawyer: Audience provoked man who disrupted ‘Hamilton’

CHICAGO – The lawyer for a man charged with disrupting a Chicago performance of the musical “Hamilton” blamed the incident on a “hostile” and “partisan” audience.

Attorney Jonathan Feldman says 56-year-old John Palmer was not intoxicated Saturday night as witnesses described him. Witnesses also said Palmer yelled obscenities at the people around him and at the actors on stage after they sang the line, “Immigrants / We get the job done.”

Chicago police say Palmer of Chicago is charged with one misdemeanour count of criminal trespass in the incident.

Feldman said Monday that Palmer was incited by an audience that was clearly against President-elect Donald Trump, whom Palmer supports. He said the “biased audience” seemed whipped up by comments made by the cast of the Broadway production last week to Vice-President-elect Mike Pence.

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