Dan Casey is The Roanoke Times' metro columnist.

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Dan Casey

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One of the greatest things about this journalism business is there's no shortage of opinions out there. And, dear readers, you have proved that once again.

Sunday's column about Katherine Gwaltney's arrest downtown Thursday by Roanoke police Officer Reinhold "Bill" Lucas during a performance art project elicited a blizzard of e-mails, phone calls and posts to my blog.

If there's one conclusion you can draw from those, it's that almost nobody feels ambivalent -- about the incident or the column.

Some correspondents said Lucas' action was an example of Keystone Cops on steroids. Other blamed Gwaltney, 27, for what they said was her evident disrespect for police. A few thought your humble columnist did a "shameful" job in putting a bit of light and (I hope) levity on the subject.

First up is Debi Kelly Van Cleave of Penhook. Although she believes Gwaltney should have listened to the officer, "what he did was above and beyond the call of duty. And not in a good way. I was embarrassed for him."

She continued: "I keep trying to lure my daughter into moving down here by assuring her there is plenty of culture and exciting things for young people to do. Isn't that what Roanoke is always saying? But if she ever sees this Barney Fife type of behavior, I'll never get her down!"

Sports fan Richard Sprinkle of Buchanan scores it quite differently. In his view, the outcome was "Cops 1. Artist (debatable) 0."

"She was impeding traffic and she chose to ignore him and remain staring at a blank TV," he writes. "She made the choice to disobey! She IS NOT a martyr so let's not treat her as one."

But Fleda Ring, a Roanoke artist who attended the event as an observer, defended Gwaltney.

She "was not blocking the sidewalk. She was no further in the sidewalk than the folks standing against the Market Building waiting on the trolley."

George Hunter, a retired Roanoke schoolteacher, questioned whether Gwaltney's social status (she is a student at Hollins) made the incident more of a news story than it should have been.

"This incident would not have drawn any attention if the victims were poor kids in Northwest Roanoke or even in Southeast," he wrote.

And some readers focused their wrath directly on yours truly.

"That was a shameful article. Your sense of what's right and fair is terribly distorted," wrote Jeff Glenn, who described himself as "a moderate to liberal Roanoker."

"If you should ever need to call someone for help, call a reporter, who can interpret the law according to personal beliefs," wrote Carl Rosen of Roanoke.

We'll close with Scott Craig, also of Roanoke. He says that his girlfriend wonders whether the officer was "in on this from the get-go and caused the stink in cahoots with the artists?"

Craig doubts that was the case. But he has an idea to help Lucas develop an appreciation for the arts.

"Maybe the best thing we could do for the poor guy is take up a collection and buy him a membership to the Taubman Museum," he wrote.

Thanks for the great response, folks. Keep it coming!