Category Archives: First Amendment

Team Kimberlin Post of the Day

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This was my first post about Brett Kimberlin. It went up one year ago today. It was entitled

No Thugs Zone

Fellow blogger and Maryland resident Stacy McCain has had to move his family out of the state because of threats related to blogging about Brett Kimberlin. He is not the only blogger suffering abuse from Kimberlin.

Mr. Kimberlin was unwise in choosing to pick a fight with the blogosphere. He is likely to find that, while we don’t always agree with one another, we have each other’s backs when the freedom of the Internet is threatened. Mr. Kimberlin and those who have supported him (I’m looking at you, Ms. Streisand) have bitten off more than they can chew. The pushback is just beginning.

UPDATE–The McCain family is having a ton of unforeseen expenses because of their sudden move. I just hit his tip jar. Why don’t you?

UPDATE 2–Expect more, a lot more, about this on Friday.

And, of course, that Friday was Everybody Blog About Brett Kimberlin Day. It’s been an interesting year.

Team Kimberlin Post of the Day

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[T]he potential for a pro se litigant to force them into expensive, long distance, lengthy, discovery laden litigation doesn’t seem to cross their minds. The reality of travel, or frightful expenses, or summary judgments needs to be made real. We probably need to make a very visible example of at least one of them before the rest understand.

—Neal Rauhauser

I wonder how the various members of Team Kimberlin feel that strategy is working for them.

Sometimes I Wonder Why I Bother

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Since Sunday, I’ve had several posts related to Team Kimberlin. Some seem to have struck a nerve over at Cabin Boy Bill’s reemerging Patriot-Ombudsman site. (No, I won’t link to it.) As of 3 pm ET today, those Team Kimberlin posts of mine have generated 21 comments, 138 likes, and 9 dislikes.

Here’s how his responses are doing:
P-O_OCD P-O_Bitter

There’s always some ramp up in traffic when a site gets rebooted, but … no comments? Not even one? Can’t he even get Texas Tim to stop by to insult me?

Bitter … lonely … useless …

Yep.

Team Kimberlin Post of the Day

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Here’s a status update on some of the members of Team Kimberlin.

Dread Pirate Brett Kimberlin is considering what happens when the consequences of one’s old lies catch up with one.

First Mate Neal Rauhauser is being kept away from any navigation duties until he can tell the difference between Norway and Sweden on a map.

Crew Member Ron Brynaert is keeping a low profile.

Cabin Boy Bill Schmalfeldt is still trying to achieve journeyman status as a Twitter troll with his new handle @KUeatsboogers.

Imaginary Friend Occupy Rebellion admits to being a troll but not to being a real person.

And a new person has joined the crew—

Ship’s Troubadour Craig Gillette has been working photo recon and searching for CPAC maggots to snap pictures of.

Breitbart Unmasked Unmasked

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OK, Gentle Reader, here’s the first installment in my side of the story. I know you tuned in looking for information on the Hoge v. Kimberlin peace order case, but in order for things to make sense, I need to begin with something about the editor of the Breitbart Unmasked website—

As those of you who have been following the Saga of The Dread Pirate Kimberlin and Team Kimberlin will remember, Bill Schmalfeldt has spent months harassing Lee Stranahan and his family with disgustingly crude filth, including incessant and impertinent questions regarding the death of a child during childbirth. On Monday, 11 February, Lee came to Maryland from Texas to file a harassment charge against Schmalfeldt. I picked Lee up at BWI airport, took him to dinner, took him to the District Court Commissioner’s Office, put him up for the night at my house, and dropped him back at the airport on Tuesday morning. BWI is just off of one of the routes I take to work.

On 14 February, I received 40 tweets in less than one hour from @BreitbartUnmask ranting about Lee Stanahan, Aaron Walker, and me. Just after midnight on 15 February, I posted a notice on this blog and on Twitter addressed to @OldUncleBastard, @BreitbartUnmask, and @OccupyRebellion demanding that they stop communicating directly with me. Note: The date/time stamps on the tweets in this post are in GMT; I’ll convert important ones to Eastern Time for clarity.cease tweet

Later that day, Schmalfeldt sent a tweet via his @OldUncleBastard identity referencing my demand. He was clearly on notice.

OldUncleBastard @Xcitizen10 @BreitbartUnmask A commentator on @wjjhoge’s blog post http://t.co/uZkIc4lA explains what the right wing mafia cabal wants.
6:37 PM Feb 15th from web

Click on that link yourself and see.

He continued to send tweets to my @wjjhoge account. As a result, I filed a harassment charge against Schmalfeldt on 18 February. I also filed charges against Brett Kimberlin, Neal Rauhauser, and Bill Schmalfeldt related to another matter at the same time. This is not the place to deal with those issues.

Even though he was on notice and had had a criminal harassment charge filed, Schmalfeldt kept sending me tweets and addressed a blog post to me—not a post about me, one addressed to me. He also broadcast a threat against me on his Internet talk show as well as three other individuals. Because of that activity, I filed for a peace order against Schmalfeldt.

This the last tweet, time stamped at 8:17 am ET, Schmalfeldt sent out prior to being served with the peace order:

LiberalGrouch I wonder what @wjjhoge got by way of payment. Something to comb out the poop flakes from his beard? Hah. I kid. I’m a kidder. I kid that way.
1:17 PM Feb 17th from web

Aside from the juvenile attempt at potty humor, this tweet implies that I have been lying about being paid to blog or making money off donations or that I’ve been helping my friends Lee Stranahan and Aaron Walker from any motivation other than friendship. Let me state this very clearly: I have never been paid to write anything on this or any other blog. I have never received any donation or benefit from any of the bloggers or organizations I have promoted on this or any other blog. This blog is a hobby and an expensive one. I have personally borne all of the expense associated with it, including legal costs. I’m able to do this because I have an above average income working in a very senior engineering position. I’m getting old and may retire some day. When I do, I may put out a tip jar. But for now, my income is adequate to support this blog as a hobby.

At this point, Gentle Reader, you may be wondering what this has to do with Brett Kimberlin. Be patient. I need to lay the foundation for the story.

Schmalfeldt seemed quite agitated by the peace order. A few hours after being served, he rebroadcast the same threat he made earlier that week. @BreitbartUnmask tweeted for him to chill and “let legal handle it.”

BreitbartUnmask @LiberalGrouch @OccupyRebellion @Stranahan @AaronWorthing then don’t email him or anyone else. Let legal handle that from now on.
1:50 AM Feb 24th from Tweetbot for iOS

BreitbartUnmask @LiberalGrouch @OccupyRebellion @ Stranahan @AaronWorthing That would be a better course of action Bill. Let legal handle that.
1:51 AM Feb 24th from Tweetbot for iOS

BreitbartUnmask @LiberalGrouch @OccupyRebellion @Stranahan @AaronWorthing Understood Bill. Legal will deal with them ;)
1:53 AM Feb 24th from Tweetbot for iOS

The final hearing for that peace order was held on 28 February. The judge didn’t pick up on the fact that Schmalfeldt had had proper notice, so, relying on Schmalfeldt’s false statement that he had not, the judge let him off. But with a warning. He placed Schmalfeldt on notice to leave me alone, telling him that his activity would be harassment given notice and that he now had it.

Brett Kimberlin showed up at the courthouse to attend the hearing. He was excluded from the courtroom as a potential witness. Since he wasn’t called, he did not see any of the hearing, but he was present in the hall outside when the hearing ended. As some supporters and I were exiting the courtroom, we saw and heard Schmalfeldt’s lawyer loudly lecturing his client and Kimberlin. The gist of his warning was that they had been lucky that day, but if they kept it up, they’d go to jail. Note: I have appealed this case and won’t have any more to say about it until the appeal is heard.

Schmalfeldt kept it up, and, as we’ll see below, Kimberlin joined in.

But first a bit more Schmalfeldt.

One of those supporters exiting the courtroom with me was Aaron Walker. Aaron had come up to view the hearing so that he could blog about it. (OK, I need to do another aside: At that point in these peace order cases I was proceeding without a lawyer. I am now represented by Zoa Barnes. Aaron Walker does not now and never has represented me in any legal matter in Maryland.) Because it’s a two hour drive from Manassas, Virginia, to Westminster, Maryland, Aaron and his wife stayed at my house the night before and the night following the hearing. The next day, 1 March, Aaron stopped by the Howard County District Courthouse to file an harassment charge and a peace order against Schmalfeldt. Shortly after the peace order appeared online in the Maryland Judiciary Case Search database, Brett Kimberlin appeared at the courthouse trying to intervene. When he was unsuccessful at that, he took to stalking Mrs. Walker in the courthouse parking lot. Details here. Mrs. Walker was very shaken by the experience. I went to the courthouse and escorted the Walkers back to my house to rest.

While he was stalking Mrs. Walker, Kimberlin was photographed using a iPhone to take pictures of the Walkers. Some of his photos were subsequently published on the Breitbart Unmasked website. (No, I won’t link to it.)

Normally, the final peace order hearing comes a week after the temporary order is issued. In the Walker v. Schmalfeldt case, that hearing was put off for two additional weeks because of the death of Schmalfeldt’s mother. There were some interesting Kimberlin shenanigans related to the continuance, but they’re outside the scope of this post.

Beginning on 3 March, @BreitbartUnmask sent the following:

BreitbartUnmask @LiberalGrouch @DallasDumbass At anyrate , I think I will say @aaronworthing and @stranahan and @wjjhoge about as much as I want.
7:30 PM Mar 3rd from web

BreitbartUnmask Mr. W.J.J. Hoge Has Either Been Hoaxed, Or Is Very Stupid: http://t.co/bHA1eVIjfw #p2 #tlot
8:51 PM Mar 3rd from WP Twítter

BreitbartUnmask Mr. W.J.J. Hoge Has Either Been Hoaxed, Or Is Very Stupid: http://t.co/bHA1eVIjfw #p2 #tlot
6:50 PM Mar 4th from WP Twítter

BreitbartUnmask @OsborneInk @SwitRead @NealRauhauser @OccupyRebellion none. All charges brought by bi-polar Mike Stack and Wjj Hoge who is insane.
4:41 PM Mar 10th from Tweetbot for iOS

BlogBash is a blogger party/awards ceremony that is loosely associated with other events, one of which is the Conservative Political Action Conference. This year’s BlogBash at CPAC was held at a night club a couple of blocks from the convention center. On 7 March, one week before BlogBash, the venue received a call from someone who said he was Brett Kimberlin and who told the club that if they did not “cancel this event, I’m reaching out to the over 1000 organizations I am in contact with to put you guys out of business.” The club’s representative asked, “Are you threatening us, sir?” The caller replied, “No, I’m not threatening you I’m just pissed off. The guy who owns BlogBash has threatened me and my family and I am appalled that you would host his event.” The rant continued with a warning to expect a demonstration led by a fiery imam. Those threats, combined with the threat broadcast by Schmalfeldt, were taken seriously enough by the PG County Police that they beefed up security along the block where the event was held. You can see plenty of police cars in the pictures published about the event at Breitbart Unmasked. More about those pictures in a bit.

On 14 March, the date of BlogBash, @BreitbartUmask retweeted this from @OsborneInk:

OsborneInk .@ali @AaronWalker @wjjhoge Look out, it’s the Ides of March ! Obviously that means someone will explode Blog Bash w/their mind
1:25 PM Mar 14th from SocialOomph retweeted by BreitbartUnmask

Beginning at 6:21 pm that evening, he tweeted the following:

BreitbartUnmask @wjjhoge @Kimberlinunmask Zieg Heil Hoggy, Get your Nazi uniform on for zeee cameras you dumb piece of shit. Wait, you live in shit.
10:21 PM Mar 14th from web

BreitbartUnmask @Xcitizen10 @AkbartheFraud @ LiberalGrouch @yidwithlid Then it will be FILM AT 11..
10:22 PM Mar 14th from web

blogbashdemonstation

At around 9 pm, the threatened “demonstration” happened—a single guy with a camera who began accosting people coming and going from BlogBash. The photographer, who is believed to be Craig R. Gillette of Washington, DC, did not seem to be fully aware of everything that has been going on with Team Kimberlin’s harassment of bloggers. This is somewhat surprising given that Mr. Gillette has been associated with Justice Through Music Project for over seven years.

Gillette was not the only person there in support of the “demonstration.” @BreitbartUnmask was there as shown by this tweet which was sent around 10:28 pm that evening:

BreitbartUnmask @catsrimportant @LiberalGrouch Seriously, the music sucks. Sorry for those who prefer piano bars, but my ears are hurting at off key music.
2:48 AM Mar 15th from web

Gillette was not the only one taking pictures either, and several pictures from across the street were published on the Breitbart Unmasked website. I won’t go into any detail here, but forensic evidence links pictures taken at the Howard County District Courthouse and at BlogBash. I believe that evidence shows that Brett Kimberlin is @BreitbartUnmask.

Meanwhile, back with Schmalfeldt, because of his continued tweeting to me in spite of being put on warning by a judge, I filed for a second peace order, and when he kept at it after that, a petition for contempt.

On 22 March, the Walker v. Schmalfeldt peace order case came up in Howard County. The final order was denied when the judge bought the theory advanced by Schmalfeldt’s lawyer that since Schmalfeldt was a journalist and Aaron Walker was a public figure, Walker had to put up with the harassment. Hold on to that idea that Schmalfeldt is a journalist, at least in the eyes of his lawyer.

On 25 March, my second peace order case with Schmalfeldt came up. This time the defense offered by Schmalfeldt’s lawyer was that neither Schmalfeldt nor I are journalists; we’re just a couple cranky old men having a shouting match on the Internet, and, in any case, the peace order statute doesn’t cover electronic harassment any way. The judge bought the electronic-harassment-isn’t-covered argument and denied the peace order.

Note: On Friday, Schmalfeldt’s a journalist worthy of protection. On Monday, he isn’t.

Moving back to Kimberlin, between 1:32 pm on the afternoon of 21 March and 9:42 pm that night, he sent these tweets:

BreitbartUnmask @Xcitizen10 @Stranahan @wjjhoge @AaronWorthing Hoge has things. Walker=garnishment Stranahan =default judgment he will skip out on.
1:40 AM Mar 22nd from Tweetbot for iOS

BreitbartUnmask @Xcitizen10 @Stranahan @wjjhoge @AaronWorthing All pretty close ;)
1:40 AM Mar 22nd from Tweetbot for iOS

BreitbartUnmask @Xcitizen10 @wjjhoge Could it be that Hoge is on mental disability? Either way he will soon be feeling a hot poker up his wallet.
1:42 AM Mar 22nd from Tweetbot for iOS

The next day, I filed for a peace order and a second criminal harassment charge against Kimberlin. The criminal charging document only listed the harassing tweets. However, he was charged under the general harassment statute. At the beginning of the hearing on 29 March, Kimberlin’s lawyer, the same lawyer who defended Schmalfeldt, offered a motion to dismiss citing the previous Monday’s ruling in the Schmalfeldt case. The judge agreed and dismissed the case without a hearing on the merits.

I believe that the judge erred as a matter of law, so I appealed the case to the Circuit Court. The case was set for today.

On 23 April, I received a copy of a motion filed by Brett Kimberlin seeking to have his case consolidated with Bill Schmalfeldt’s. He filed that motion without bothering to tell his own lawyer. Now, it’s OK to write your own motions, but if you are represented by a lawyer, all communication with the court and the opposing party is supposed to go through your counsel. I immediately contacted Kimberlin’s lawyer and asked what was going on, but I received no reply.

I responded to Kimberlin’s motion on 25 April. The net of my response was that I see the two trials as dealing with separate acts by different individuals at different times and that I believe they should be tried separately. However, I had no objection to trying the case on the same day, so long as that date is no sooner that the 14 June date of the Schmalfeldt trial. At the same time, I also submitted a Motion to Reinstate Peace Order Pending Appeal citing the error I believe that the District Court had made and seeking to have the temporary peace order reinstated if the Kimberlin trial is delayed a month or more.

The normal flow of motions in the Circuit Court would bring Kimberlin’s motion, my response, my motion, and any response he filed before a judge on last Monday, 13 May. The judge found technical deficiencies in both of our filings and left the case scheduled for today.

Since filing those papers on my own, I have hired Zoa Barnes to represent me in both of the Kimberlin and Schmalfeldt peace order appeals. A couple of days ago, I received service on a Motion to Strike from Tae Kim, the lawyer who had handled the cases for Schmalfeldt and Kimberlin in the District Court, saying that he had been let go as Kimberlin’s lawyer and asking to be removed from the case. Kimberlin had decided to proceed pro se. Kimberlin filed a Motion to Dismiss based on the same theory that Kim had used to get him off in District Court.

A subpoena duces tecum was served on Bill Schmalfeldt ordering him to attend the hearing as a witness and to produce certain documents related to the case against Kimberlin. Kimberlin was served with a subpoena duces tecum for related documents as well. The hearing was scheduled for the Historic Courthouse in Westminster, Maryland, which is an old (1838) building with lots of stairs and no elevators. At my lawyer request, the case was moved from the main courtroom upstairs to a small courtroom on the main floor in order to accommodate Schmalfeldt’s disability. He didn’t bother to show up.

The hearing was before Judge Stansfield. He announced that he was deferring a ruling on the Motion to Dismiss until after he heard the evidence. I was the only witness. On direct examination, I testified to my qualifications to do forensic analysis, on the tweets that I had received from BreitbartUnmask and their annoying and alarming nature, and on results of the forensic analysis of data contained in the tweets and a certain blog post that tied the BreitbartUnmask identity to Brett Kimberlin.

On cross examination, Kimberlin asked a series of mostly non-germane questions. (For example, he wanted me to identify the person who blogs as Kimberlin Unmasked. For the record, I don’t know who that is.) He asked why I believed he was BreitbartUnmask and I explained a bit of the process.

And the Petitioner rested.

Before Kimberlin could offer any testimony, my lawyer pointed out that he was a convicted perjurer. She reminded the judge of MD Courts & Judicial Proc. §9-104:

A person convicted of perjury may not testify.

The look on Brett Kimberlin’s face when he realized that the judge wasn’t going let him testify and that there were no other witnesses he could question to get evidence into the record … priceless!

Kimberlin ranted for a while about how this was a clear violation of his First Amendment rights, yada, yada, yada, … (Ah, no. The Fifth Amendment is the one about due process.) Then the judge asked if he had any other witnesses. Since there were none, the case proceeded to closing arguments.

My lawyer did an effective summation of the facts and the law. We asked for a show-cause order against Schmalfeldt for his noncompliance with our subpoena. Kimberlin delivered another rant about his First Amendment rights and how he’s not the harasser. He’s the one being dragged into court by people like Aaron Walker and Walker’s surrogates like me.

The judge took the case under advisement. He will deliver a written ruling. I look forward to it.

So that, Gentle Reader, is a bit of my side of this story, but only a bit. It’s as much as I can tell you for now.

Stay tuned.

Convicted Perjurers Can’t Testify in Maryland

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That was one of several surprises for Brett Kimberlin during the Hoge v. Kimberlin hearing this morning.

The bottom line is this—Judge Stansfield took the case under advisement and will issue a written ruling.

The matter isn’t settled, but the case is far enough along that I can begin publicly to tell my side of it. Look for a longer post over the next 24 hours. Until then …

Stay tuned.

Early News Wrap Up

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BS_Bleg20130515And finally in the news for Wednesday, the 15th of May … Generalissimo Franco and Lt. Col. Chavez are still dead, and Bill Schmalfeldt’s Lawsuit Bleg appears to be headed to hospice. He’s trying to raise money to sue the right wing nut jobs who he imagines are harassing him when it seems he’s the harasser in reality. BTW, taking him at his word (risky), I’m one of targets for his suit.

Team Kimberlin Post of the Day

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I’ve been blessed to have a great deal of forensic help in reviewing physical and other evidence for my upcoming court cases. One of the analysts noticed the following claim in a comment to a post about the recent BlogBash made by someone calling himself “Texas Tim”:

First, thanks to the terrific staff at the Prince George’s Police Department who worked closely with me and my wife regarding security and protests. We came to an agreement on Wednesday not to protest in exchange for a promise of a large police presence at the scene.

Now, let me see if I have this straight. Some guy from Texas was organizing the protest for an event in Maryland. And he worked out a deal about protest vs. police presence. Really? I haven’t found anyone with the PG County Police who was aware of such an arrangement. Perhaps Tim can provide a name and/or badge number.

Tim says that he’s from Texas. Originally? Or did he just live there for a while—say, in the Corpus Christi area for a year or so in the 1979/80 time frame?

Reckless Disregard

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Suppose a Journalist knew that a particular person was well off economically. Not rich but doing OK. Suppose that Journalist had even published information to that effect.

Now, suppose that, knowing all this, the Journalist published a statement that grossly misrepresented the person’s financial condition, describing him as “not having a pot to piss in.”

That would be an example of reckless disregard for the truth.

On Libel

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Libel is the publication in print (including pictures); writing; or broadcast through radio, television, or film; of an untruth about someone which will do harm to that person or his reputation by tending to bring the target into ridicule, hatred, scorn, or contempt from others.

Just as there are persons whose reputation is so bad that they can’t be defamed (Charles Manson, for example), there are people whose credibility is so poor that no one in his right mind really believes what they say (a real world Joe Isuzu); such people can’t actually defame anyone.

It’s really quite sad to be dealing with someone who reputation and credibility are so poor that he fits both categories.

Team Kimberlin Post of the Day

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bot_logoThose Gentle Readers who haven’t been following the Saga of The Dread Pirate Kimberlin since last summer may not understand the piracy references. One of the organizations that raised money to help defray the legal expenses for the Virginia and federal Walker v. Kimberlin, et al. lawsuits last year was the Bloggers Defense Team. Team Kimberlin responded with a piracy themed website called the Bloggers Offense Team. I found Kimberlin’s choice of the pirate-related logo at left is interesting. Pirates aren’t semi-sympathetic, comedic characters from a Johnny Depp movie. They are criminals. Was the mask slipping?

That got me to thinking … While Brett Kimberlin’s unconstitutional peace order prohibiting Aaron Walker from blogging about him was in place, I had taken to referring to Kimberlin as Lord Voldemort (“He who must not be named”). Why not a piracy themed nickname? The Dread Pirate Kimberlin. I used it, and it stuck—not only with my readers, but other bloggers began using it occasionally too.

As fans of The Princess Bride know, The Dread Pirate Roberts is a pirate of near-mythical reputation, someone feared across the seven seas for his ruthlessness and swordfighting prowess, and who is well known for taking no prisoners. Ships immediately surrender and give up their cargos rather than be captured, a fate they imagine to be certain death.

The Dread Pirate Kimberlin is more like a legend in his own mind, a pretender who wishes to be feared for his ruthlessness and legal ability and to be known for vanquishing all comers in court. Critics, he thinks, should immediately stop telling the truth about him and give up their First Amendment rights at his command.

It turns out that The Dread Pirate Kimberlin’s legal acumen seems to be as fictional as The Dread Pirate Roberts’ existence. And no one is willing to surrender to The Dread Pirate Kimberlin.

UPDATE—From Bill Buckler’s The Privateer via Zero Hedge:

No tyrant on any level can handle derision, it deflates them utterly by reducing their stature to its proper level in a way which they cannot escape.

Yep.

Which Choice Are You Pro?

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All of us are pro-choice to the extent that we believe that we should be free to choose the way we wish. The anarchists among us would agree with that point of view wholeheartedly. Libertarians might moderate that to the extent of limiting choices that affect another person. At the other end of the spectrum, nanny-statists and Progressives would say that choice must be limited by their understanding of what is good for us, by which they really mean the choices they choose.

At the silly end of things, nanny-statists such as Mayor Bloomberg want to take away your right to choose a Big Gulp. They argue that it’s bad for your health and that you’ll be a burden on the healthcare system, yada, yada, yada. At the serious end of things, they want to take away your right to choose to defend yourself with a modern sporting rifle loaded with a normal capacity magazine. They argue that … umm … well, actually they don’t have a logical argument; they just don’t like the idea that you might have a gun. They have to make a stretch to bring some other party’s interest to limit your choices.

OTOH, most Progressives favor a right for a mother to end the life of her child in utero. For those of us who look at the DNA of a child and see a member of our species from conception, it’s clear that an abortion affects an innocent party. Others may disagree about when that child deserves protection, but essentially no one advocates the killing of viable children born alive. The question of when to protect a child’s life is one of those inconvenient questions that many would rather not wrestle with.

That, I think, is the reason for the main stream media’s avoidance of the Gosnell murder cases. I brings that question into focus.

BREAKING: SLAPP Suit Against Patterico Dismissed

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(Bumped. Originally posted 19 April, 2013) Stay tuned for more details. Meanwhile, congratulations to Patrick Frey and his lawyers, Ken White and Ron Coleman.

UPDATE—The noted legal blog Breitbart Unmasked (No, I won’t link to it.) predicted that

[w]e expect Frey will have more success winning the case in his blog than in court[,]

but he seems to have been successful in court after all.

UPDATE 2—Ken White has a post at Popehat with details. Note that Ken White is a great friend of the First Amendment who has worked to defend Patrick Frey, a man with whom he often strongly disagrees.

UPDATE 3—From the Popehat commentary:

Observing commentary on the case has been . . . interesting. I’d divide the coverage into three camps. There are people who are supportive of Patrick, but whose coverage really doesn’t delve into the legal issues. There are the vapid and dishonest partisan hacks who attack Patrick for political reasons, and who don’t address the legal issues at all. There’s the greasy, demi-literate, demented Hutt who wrote an extended quasi-sexual fantasy about a mob murdering Patrick and me. Fun!

UPDATE 4—Patrick Frey has comments on the case here. Among his remarks he says this:

Hi, Bill Schmalfeldt! I understand you were curious about the result of this case. I’m happy to be sharing that with you! And, your sick, twisted fantasies notwithstanding, nobody has yet beaten me or Ken with baseball bats or tire irons. No group of men has thrown us in front of a moving truck as part of a conspiracy to cause our deaths. (If you think I am exaggerating, I have uploaded a .pdf of Schmalfeldt’s violent fantasy here.)

In the interest of balance, I will make a one-time exception and publish these excerpts from a comment Mr. Schmalfeldt attempted to make to this post:

I find it interesting that you go through such lengths to find a single post from a blog to prove “wrong” …

Schmalfeldt goes on to discuss the relative merits of other legal matters, and ends with these words:

I know, I know, this comment will never appear on your blog. But YOU will see it, and in your heart you will realize what a totally disgusting fraud you are. And you will have to live with that.

I’ll let Phaedrus have the last word.

Whoever is detected in a shameful fraud is ever after not believed even if they speak the truth.

On Political Correctness

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When someone would point out an “inconvenient truth” to the left-wing folks I used to hang out with back in the ’60s (I’m a recovering Democrat), they would be told that it could not be discussed because “that’s not politically correct.” Truth has never been a defense to political incorrectness. Only those stories which advance the “proper” narrative may be spoken.

We see the result of that perverse approach in much of what passes for main stream journalism today. If coverage of the trial of a physician accused of mass murder might cause people to stop and think about what happens to babies in an abortion “clinic,” the story must be spiked. If it turns out that a District Attorney wasn’t murdered by right-wing extremists … we’ll be back after these brief messages. If the wacko who shot the congresswoman is a crazed lefty … [crickets]

The printing press broke a stranglehold on information by allowing the mass production and distribution of books, etc., but even into the 20th century, there were still relatively few mass media outlets. The Internet is changing that. Inconvenient facts are becoming harder to hide.

The truth is out there.

Team Kimberlin Post of the Day

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While scrolling through Breitbart Unmasked (I read it so you don’t have to, and, no, I won’t link to it.), I’ve found several posts which contain false information about me. That isn’t particularly surprising considering that I believe the site is run by someone with a history of perjury, mortgage fraud, and other crimes—by someone who I believe is quite simply a liar. And not a particularly skillful one.

Several friends have asked why I don’t sue for defamation. If I did, I would probably win. Eventually. But it would be long process that would be more trouble that it would be worth. You see, being lied about by someone with so poor a reputation causes me no practical damage. No one in his right mind believes Breitbart Unmasked’s nonsense. Indeed, a case could be made that being treated as an enemy by the likes of Breitbart Unmasked is a badge of honor. Oh, I might be able to collect some nominal sum in damages, but it wouldn’t be worth the effort.

Yes, some of the nonsense is annoying, but easiest way to deal with the problem is to let Breitbart Unmasked rant on. For now. Truth has a way of winning in the end.

#BlogHoCoSAO: The Wrap Up

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Thanks to everyone who participated. One thing that I’ll note is that no one seems to have received a substantive response from either Mr. Broccolino or any of his staff. One of the participants called me during the early evening yesterday to say that he had tried to call Wayne Kirwin of the Howard County State’s Attorney’s Office all day, but his calls were always directed to voice mail.

Either Mr. Kirwin was very busy today, or …

I wonder if Mr. Broccolino intends to run for reelection next year.

#BlogHoCoSAO Participants

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This is a list of those blogs known to be participating in Everyone Blog About the Howard County State’s Attorney’s Office Day.

Monitor’s Access
R. M. Nixon (Deceased) / Dead Republican Party
Tanny O’Haley
The Other McCain and here
Batshit Crazy News
Grumpy Opinions
Ameryx le Gallois
The Lonely Conservative
Raging Against the Rhetoric
Joyce Junior
Allergic to Bull
Patterico’s Pontifications
Kimberlin Unmasked
Donlyn Turnbull
They Don’t Fool ME!
The Camp of the Saints
Michelle Malkin
Evi L. Bloggerlady
Lee Stranahan
Zilla of the Resistance
Lowering the Boom
Da Tech Guy’s Blog
Conservative Animal
Political Fireball

Thank you to everyone who participated.

Everyone Blog About the Howard County State’s Attorney’s Office Day

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It’s been two weeks since I requested answers to these questions:

1. Is it the position of the State’s Attorney that operation of a blog allows one unlimited license to contact another person without regard to Maryland Criminal Statutes 3-803 and/or 3-805?

2. Does Mr. Broccilino believe that a public person such as himself may not seek to demand that someone cease contacting him as provided by Maryland Criminal Statutes 3-803 and/or 3-805?

3. Is it the policy of State’s Attorney that non-residents of Maryland must or should avoid entering the state if they are being stalked by a Maryland resident?

I have not yet received a response from either State’s Attorney Dario J. Broccolino or a member of his staff.

I was prompted to ask these questions because of his office’s handling of harassment complaints filed by families from Texas and Virginia that were not prosecuted. Of course, it is possible that a complaint can be filed without sufficient supporting evidence. However, it appears that all of the evidence necessary to establish that harassment occurred and who did it was well documented. The State’s Attorney’s Office’s response was

Stay off the Internet if you don’t want to be harassed.

The Virginia family has also be stalked by a convicted violent felon for the past year. After the wife was stalked by that individual in a Howard County courthouse parking lot, she was told

If you’re so concerned for your safety, stay out of Maryland.

Moreover Jim Brewer, the Assistant State’s Attorney who handled both cases, had no interest in hearing from the complainants. He told them up front that his decision not to prosecute had been made.

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve encouraged others to contact the Howard County State’s Attorney’s Office to see what they could find out about these questions and suggested that today should be a date to report their findings. I look forward to their reports.

UPDATE—One theme that seems to be emerging in the early posts for Everyone Blog About the Howard County States’ Attorney’s Office Day is that most blogger’s requests for information have been ignored. In fact, the only response published as of 6:30 am ET was this one, received by the anonymous blogger who uses the nom de cyber of R. M. Nixon (Deceased):

The ONLY response I have received, as a private citizen is an email requesting my real identity, driver’s license information, social security number as a requirement for a response to Maryland residents only.

Why would driver’s license and social security information be required in order for a State’s Attorney to give an answer about how laws are interpreted? Why can’t an out-of-state person inquire about how Maryland’s law might affect him or his travel plans?

Hmmmm.

UPDATE 2—Here is a list of participating bloggers.

#BlogHoCoSAO

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Tomorrow is Everyone Blog About the Howard County State’s Attorney Day. If you’re going to participate, let me know via a comment, tweet, or email so that I can link to your post on Monday.

Do these two statement accurately reflect the policies of the Howard County, Maryland, State’s Attorney’s Office?

If you’re so concerned for your safety, stay out of Maryland

Stay off the Internet if you don’t want to be harassed.

They are the sorts of things that were told to the Stranahan and Walker families when the sought help in dealing with Internet harassment and stalking. Hogwash! is encouraging other bloggers to contact State’s Attorney Dario J. Broccolino (contact info and more details here) for clarification and to post the answers received along with any commentary tomorrow on Everyone Blog About the Howard County State’s Attorney Day.

#BlogHoCoSAO on Monday

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The Gentle Readers who have been following this blog for the past couple of weeks know that next Monday is Everyone Blog About the Howard County State’s Attorney Day. For those of you who just tuned in, consider these statements.

If you’re so concerned for your safety, stay out of Maryland

Stay off the Internet if you don’t want to be harassed.

Do those two statement accurately reflect the policies of the Howard County, Maryland, State’s Attorney’s Office? They are the sorts of things that were told to the Stranahan and Walker families when the sought help in dealing with Internet harassment and stalking. Hogwash! is encouraging other bloggers to contact State’s Attorney Dario J. Broccolino (contact info and more details here) for clarification and to post the answers received along with any commentary on 8 April, Everyone Blog About the Howard County State’s Attorney Day.

If you’re going to participate, let me know via a comment, tweet, or email so that I can link to your post on Monday.