Stephen Pearcy (born March 4, 1960) is an American

probate In common law jurisdictions, probate is the judicial process whereby a will is "proved" in a court of law and accepted as a valid public document that is the true last testament of the deceased; or whereby, in the absence of a legal will, the e ...

estate planning Estate planning is the process of anticipating and arranging for the management and disposal of a person's Estate (law), estate during the person's life in preparation for future incapacity or death. The planning includes the bequest of assets to ...

income tax An income tax is a tax imposed on individuals or entities (taxpayers) in respect of the income or profits earned by them (commonly called taxable income). Income tax generally is computed as the product of a tax rate times the taxable income. Tax ...

, and business transactions attorney in

Sacramento Sacramento ( or ; ; ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of California and the seat of Sacramento County. Located at the confluence of the Sacramento and American Rivers in Northern California's Sacramento Valley, Sacramento's 2020 p ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

Biography

In 1999 and 2000, during the

dot-com bubble The dot-com bubble (or dot-com boom) was a stock market bubble that ballooned during the late-1990s and peaked on Friday, March 10, 2000. This period of market growth coincided with the widespread adoption of the World Wide Web and the Interne ...

, Pearcy was a corporate attorney at Gray Cary Ware & Freidenrich LLP (now

DLA Piper DLA Piper is a law firm with offices in over 40 countries across the Americas, Asia Pacific, Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. It was founded in 2005 through the merger between three law firms: San Diego–based ''Gray Cary Ware & Freiden ...

) in

Palo Alto Palo Alto ( ; Spanish language, Spanish for ) is a charter city in northwestern Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a Sequoia sempervirens, coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. Th ...

, and focused on venture capital financing and

public offering A public offering is the offering of securities of a company or a similar corporation to the public. Generally, the securities are to be publicly listed. In most jurisdictions, a public offering requires the issuing company to publish a prospectu ...

transactions. In February 2005, Pearcy, who had not been known for being politically outspoken, made national news after displaying a stuffed American soldier's uniform hung with a

noose A noose is a loop at the end of a rope in which the knot tightens under load and can be loosened without untying the knot. The knot can be used to secure a rope to a post, pole, or animal but only where the end is in a position that the loop can ...

, at his home, with the words: "Your Tax Dollars at Work." After someone tore down that display, he replaced it with a similar display with the words: "Bush Lied, I Died." This was also later torn down. Both instances of

vandalism Vandalism is the action involving deliberate destruction of or damage to public or private property. The term includes property damage, such as graffiti and defacement directed towards any property without permission of the owner. The t ...

occurred while TV news crews were present and were captured on film, but the Sacramento District Attorney’s office declined to prosecute the vandals. Pearcy eventually won a US$5,000 judgment against one of the vandals, and he received an out-of-court settlement for $3,500 from another. In August 2005, Pearcy made national news again when he exhibited a painting at the

California Department of Justice The California Department of Justice is a statewide investigative law enforcement agency and legal department of the California executive branch under the elected leadership of the Attorney General of California (AG) which carries out comple ...

in Sacramento showing a star-spangled map of the United States being flushed down a toilet. The painting included the words: "T'anks to Mr. Bush!" The art exhibit was controversial and generated a protest and counterprotest event that once again included supporters of the exhibition facing off with opponents of the exhibition.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pearcy, Stephen 1960 births Living people American anti-war activists