Citing inherently innocent conduct being punished from the vague wording of the ordinance, Larkin’s ruling ultimately threw out the case against two MSU students arrested in October of 2015 and charged for being within 300 feet a mattress fire.

“The city of East Lansing is embarrassed by all the fires,” Nick Bostic attorney for the two girls arrested told the Lansing State Journal. "And this (ordinance) was an overreaction because they keep getting embarrassed on the national news.”

The approximately 17 year old ordinance was put in place following a national attention getting riot which engulfed parts of East Lansing surrounding MSU’s campus in a swarm of 10,000 people who set fire to any and everything they could after MSU basketball’s loss to Duke in the 1999 Final Four.

Riots following MSU football and basketball victories or losses have continued to garner national and local attention despite lacking the size and destruction that occurred in 1999. And even to call the recent skirmishes riots now makes the 1999 riot seem like a small scale war.

But despite the tapered down revelry over the years the riot mentality stereotype continues to persist in the minds of many outside of the East Lansing area. The need for the ordinance followed any rational path taken after an incident the city wanted to forget — make sure it never happened again.

Current East Lansing Mayor Mark Meadows served at the same post during the riots and was a part of the decision making that led to the ordinance.

“We passed that ordinance in ‘99 to deal with what we hoped to be a preventive measure,” Meadows said. “Even though (Larkin’s decision) doesn’t mention it, there’s a definition of a riot in state legislation and local ordinances and we used this to move people away from the fires but maybe to issue tickets so that when people would not move.”

Meadows further explained a harsher punishment which was brought to the table as well that would have punished students much harsher.

“The option was to write under the riot legislation, which (if a student was convicted) would ban the student from a public university in Michigan for a year which essentially ruins their lives,” Meadows said. “So the ordinance also had a value in that it made for a lesser issue than writing under the riot ordinance.”

Meadows however did think the ordinance had value in being a preventative measure to future riots and helped ensure safety of fire officials trying to quell the flames.

Mayor Pro Tem, Ruth Beier raised concerns with the constitutionality of the ordinance saying she wasn’t surprised it was ruled unconstitutional.

“Basically what they were saying is you can’t arrest somebody for watching something that they didn’t cause,” Beier said.

Further she added council would have to look at alternate routes to keep riots from happening.

“I think we need to find something to keep those things (riots) from getting out of control but we’re going to have to go back and find something else,” Beier said. “It was a strong reaction and it may have served it’s purpose and we might not need something so drastic anymore, that could be.”