[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.  Or by Twitter @AaronWorthing.]

Hey, to celebrate this day, let’s carve up a liberal turkey and give thanks to him for providing us someone to laugh at.  Ken Ashford writes at the little blog known as the Seventh Sense and I have clashed with him before for his dishonesty. But I had ignored the blog for a few months and apparently when the cat was away the mouse played.

First up we have a post attacking me called: Pig (And Stupid Lawyer) of the Day. In the post he alleges that I said here that if Hermain Cain approached an employee with a sexual quid pro quo (i.e. “sleep with me or you’re fired/won’t get that promotion”) that it was not sexual harassment.  Then he spends the remainder of the post citing things like the EEOC to prove that in fact saying “sleep with me or your fired” is indeed classic sexual harassment.

There’s only one problem.  I never said it wasn’t sexual harassment.  In fact, I said the opposite.  And for extra hilarity, Mr. Ashford actually quoted the passage where I said that such behavior was sexual harassment but failed to understand that I had said it.  Here’s the passage he quoted, just as Kenny-boy quoted it:

Or did [Cain] do the full quid pro quo (“something for something”) and say, “sleep with me or you are fired/won’t get that promotion, etc.?” Now I want to be careful to say that we are not nearly there, yet, but if that is what it was, then it’s not just “sexual harassment.” Seriously what do you call it when you give something of value in exchange for sex? In most states, that’s prostitution.

And then he goes on in self-righteous fashion, thinking that he as Ahab finally has the opportunity to kill his white whale, writing:

No, Aaron.  An employer saying to an employee[] “sleep with me or else you are fired/won’t get that promotion” is the textbook definition[*] of sexual harassment.  It is a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.  Go back to law school (or alternatively, get a job and read the company employee manual).

And all because apparently he doesn’t know what the word “just” means in this context.  Read that passage again.  I said it was not just sexual harassment. If you go to Webster’s Dictionary and look it up as the adverb, definition 3 a will inform you that the term “just” can mean “only, simply <just last year> <just be yourself>.”  So in context I was saying nothing more than that such conduct is not merely sexual harassment but also solicitation of prostitution as well.  I was saying it was both.

Pro-tip, Kenny boy.  Before you accuse someone of being stupid, double check and make sure you aren’t the one being stupid.  Or else that person might make you look stupid.

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[Guest post by Aaron Worthing.  Follow me by Twitter @AaronWorthing.]

Update: Btw, over at Seventh Sense, Ken Ashford is taking me out of context.  Given that I had already corrected a commenter here for taking me out of context in the exact same way, I can safely say that Ashford’s deception is deliberate.

From the first days after the Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United came down there has been a certain irony in many of the denunciations of that decision.  As you recall, that decision involved a film called Hillary: The Movie, a documentary that by all descriptions came off as a long infomercial against choosing the Secretary of State to be in any higher office greater than dog catcher.  Even though it was obviously political expression—indeed precisely because it was political expression—the FEC said that Citizens United could not air ads promoting its movie for pretty much the entire primary season.  Citizens United challenged this holding all the way to the Supreme Court which resulted in the Court striking down virtually all limits on corporate expression in an election.

So right from the beginning there was a certain irony among certain voices who denounced the decision, which I think I captured well in this old passage from my old blog (language warning at the link):

On January 23, the New York Times denounced the Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. F.E.C., stating that “the court[] … has paved the way for corporations to use their vast treasuries to overwhelm elections and intimidate elected officials.” In a twist worthy of Monty Python and the Life of Brian, this editorial was unsigned, representing the voice of the New York Times Co., itself a corporation. It amounted to “this corporation says that no corporation has a right to free expression.”

Next I suppose the entire staff will gather together and chant, in unison, “we are all individuals.”

The irony is less rich, then, that we get version 10.0 of these critiques from Scott Turow.  He has indeed not only profited from corporate expression, being the author of books ranging from One-L, a nonfiction book detailing life at Harvard Law School in the 1970’s (think The Paper Chase without the silly romance and much more about the nuts and bolts of law school), to his breakout hit Presumed Innocent.  Each of these books, including his latest, have been published by—gasp!—corporations or similar structures, and yet he sees corporate expression as an anathema to the republic that should be rallying cry of the Occupy movement:

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[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.  Or by Twitter @AaronWorthing.]

Update: In the comments section in Ashford’s post, Brother Bradley and I have been challenging Ashford particularly the claim regarding emancipation.  We got him to admit that clearly they were referring to Congress when they were drafting the Fourteenth Amendment and he replies as follows:

[quoting me] Except you just said “I am talking about the thinking of Congress at the time of writing the 14th Amendment.”

And when was that?

Unless you are taking everything uber-literally, as if Congress, at exactly one moment (and only one moment) in time, together(!) wrote the 14th Amendment, and had shared a single thought while doing it.

Which is pretty much giving up the whole game.  He is basically admitting that Stengel was literally wrong (or if you prefer uber-literally, heh) and the only way to rehabilitate his statement was to imagine he meant something he didn’t actually say.

And for the record, when was this?  1866-1868.  And when was the Thirteen Amendment ratified?  1865.

Now you might wonder why I am saying that here, instead of other there?  Well, right after after putting up this post, asking me a specific question, he shut off comments on the post.  Mind you, the post right before it is still open to comments, so plainly he intentionally he shut down that post and that post only, because he got sick of us arguing with him.

Which is pretty funny, when you think about it.

Update: The comedy gold becomes more… um…  golden.  He now has an explanation for why he shut down the comments:

The ankle-biters seem to think that repeating the same fallacious argument over and over again amounts to moving the ball forward in some way, and I don’t have the time or inclination to respond to the same bad arguments five or six times.

Which is false, but also interestingly an admission that he was shutting it down purely because he doesn’t like our arguments.  The irony and hypocrisy is so thick you can cut it with a spoon.

(This will be viewed as a “victory” by the ankle-biters, but rest assured, it’s merely shaking them off to address more pressing things in my day).

No, Ken, the victory was when you admitted I was “uber-literally” right which is another way of saying the word “right.”  The fact you make that concession and leave me no chance to respond on your blog means you know you lost and didn’t want the coup de grace of pointing that obvious fact out on your own blog.  In real litigation, there are rarely “Perry Mason moments” when you finally get the person to just confess.  The best you usually get are moments like these, when your opponent’s behavior gives away the truth.

We now resume the original post, as is.

——————————————-

Regular readers know the story, but a momentary recap is worthwhile for those unfamiliar with the story.  A few weeks back, Richard Stengel published a terrible piece in Time magazine about the Constitution.  Apart from the philosophical problems I have with it, I was particularly appalled by the numerous factual errors in it and eventually wrote a piece outlining fourteen clear factual errors in the article and have been hammering the magazine on a nearly daily basis trying to embarrass them into either a correction or a retraction.

Okay, so are you caught up?

But one thing that I think is interesting in all of this is that as far as I know, no one on the left has stepped up to defend Richard Stengel’s terrible essay.  Surely they had seen my posts outlining fourteen clear factual errors Stengel had made, but no one stepped up and said, “it’s not this bad, and here is why?”

Well, that is until Ken Ashford of The Seventh Sense came along.  Of course even then he can’t bring himself to defend what Stengel actually said, so instead he has decided to pretend he didn’t actually say these things, by, ahem, creative misinterpretation.

For instance, let’s take this passage in Stengel’s piece:

In drafting the 14th Amendment, Congress was definitely not thinking about illegal immigration. At the time, the country needed a lot more immigrants, legal or otherwise. Congress was thinking more practically. It wanted to emancipate blacks and allow them to vote so that white Southern Democrats would not try to reverse the gains of the Civil War.

(emphasis added.)  I read that as Stengel declaring that the Fourteenth Amendment was meant to free the slaves and end racial discrimination in the franchise.  But, Ashford explains, there’s supposedly a nuance there that I missed:

When Stengel wrote “It wanted to emancipate blacks….”, the “it” clearly modified “Congress”, not “the 14th Amendment”.

Well, yes, “it” refers to Congress, but not Congress in general.  He wasn’t talking, for instance, about this current Congress.  He was talking about the Congress that drafted the Fourteenth Amendment and specifically when they were drafting the Citizenship Clause, which guarantees most people born on U.S. soil birthright citizenship.  Go to Stengel’s original piece and read the whole section it comes from, which is discussing illegal immigration.  The whole section is about nothing but the Citizenship Clause and was discussing their intent when drafting it. And he wasn’t discussing hopes and dreams they failed to enact, but explaining the goals and purpose of what they did enact, as he saw it, when they drafted and ratified the Citizenship Clause.  But that clause, and indeed the entire Fourteenth Amendment was drafted and ratified wholly after the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment, which is the actual amendment that emancipated the slaves.

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You’re about to listen to one of the most bone-chilling pieces of audio you will ever hear. At least, it was to me when I first heard it.

It’s a phone call that could have gotten me killed.

In this post you will hear that audio clip. You will also read about a months-long campaign of harassment carried out by at least three individuals: Ron Brynaert, Neal Rauhauser, and Brett Kimberlin — much of it directed at critics of Brett Kimberlin. This harassment includes repeated references to critics’ family members, workplace complaints, publication of personal information such as home addresses and pictures of residences, bogus allegations of criminal activity, whisper campaigns, frivolous legal actions, and frivolous State Bar complaints.

And finally, you will hear a comparison of one of those men’s voices to that of the man who made the call that sent police to my home. And you’ll read a declaration from a forensic audio expert comparing those two voices.

BREITBART TOLD THE STORY JUST BEFORE HE DIED

In the last radio interview Andrew Breitbart ever gave, on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show, Breitbart talked about a new ruthless tactic used by thugs against political opponents:

[O]ne of the things they’ve done to people who have worked with me in the past, including an L.A. prosecutor, is to “SWAT.” That means that they’re spoofing phones, pretending to be somebody else’s phone, calling 911, and saying “I killed somebody” and then the person’s home is met with the guns drawn, the SWAT and the helicopters, in a horrifying act. It’s happened twice: once in New Jersey, once in Los Angeles, with an L.A. County . . . prosecutor who [is] associated with me.”

I am that L.A. County prosecutor. And in this post, you’ll hear the hoax call that sent police to my house, pointing loaded guns at me.

THE NIGHT I COULD HAVE BEEN KILLED BECAUSE OF MY BLOGGING

At 12:35 a.m. on July 1, 2011, sheriff’s deputies pounded on my front door and rang my doorbell. They shouted for me to open the door and come out with my hands up.

When I opened the door, deputies pointed guns at me and ordered me to put my hands in the air. I had a cell phone in my hand. Fortunately, they did not mistake it for a gun.

They ordered me to turn around and put my hands behind my back. They handcuffed me. They shouted questions at me: IS THERE ANYONE ELSE IN THE HOUSE? and WHERE ARE THEY? and ARE THEY ALIVE?

I told them: Yes, my wife and my children are in the house. They’re upstairs in their bedrooms, sleeping. Of course they’re alive.

Deputies led me down the street to a patrol car parked about 2-3 houses away. At least one neighbor was watching out of her window as I was placed, handcuffed, in the back of the patrol car. I saw numerous patrol cars on my quiet street. There was a police helicopter flying overhead, shining a spotlight down on us as I walked towards the patrol car. Several neighbors later told us the helicopter woke them up. I saw a fire engine and an ambulance. A neighbor later told me they had a HazMat vehicle out on the street as well.

Meanwhile, police rushed into my home. They woke up my wife, led her downstairs and to the front porch, frisked her, and asked her where the children were. Then police ordered her to stand on the front porch with her hands against the wall while they entered my children’s bedrooms to make sure they were alive.

The call that sent deputies to my home was a hoax. Someone had pretended to be me. They called the police to say I had shot my wife. The sheriff’s deputies who arrived at my front door believed they were about to confront an armed man who had just shot his wife. I don’t blame the police for any of their actions. But I blame the person who made the call.

Because I could have been killed.

The weirdest part of the whole thing was that I halfway expected this might happen. Because I was not the first one it had happened to.

I think it’s about time you heard the call that sent police to my home.

“SWATTING” CAN KILL PEOPLE

What you just heard and read is no joke. It actually happened. The phenomenon is called “SWATting,” because it can bring a SWAT team to your front door. SWATting is a particularly dangerous hoax in which a caller, generally a computer hacker, calls a police department to report a shooting at the home of his enemy. The caller will place this call to the police department’s business line, using Skype or a similar service, and hiding behind Internet proxies to make the call impossible to trace. Anxious police, believing they are responding to the home of an armed and dangerous man, show up at the front door pointing guns and screaming orders.

That is exactly what happened to me. It is a very dangerous hoax that could get the target killed.

Above: an anonymous Kimberlin supporter mocks my swatting in August 2011, before it was publicly known. The reference is to an article about a 2008 swatting case in Dallas.

Although I am an L.A. County Deputy D.A., it is certain that I was “swatted” because of my blog and not because of my job. As Andrew Breitbart noted, this happened to two people within the course of a single week: a man in New Jersey and myself. Both of us had had contact with Andrew Breitbart. Both of us were writing about the same story. And both of us received email threats days before we were swatted. The threat to me said, in part: “Please think about your family. This story is not worth it. I can assure you that.”

WHO IS RESPONSIBLE?

So who perpetrated this crime on me and my family?

I reported the crime to the FBI on July 1, 2011. (Obviously, the Sheriff’s Department was already aware of it, since they had come to my house.) Unfortunately, law enforcement has not solved the case. Worse, they have failed to follow up on a number of leads I have given them.

But there is circumstantial evidence suggesting who may be responsible. I met personally with the nationwide experts on swatting in December 2011: the FBI office in Dallas, Texas. They told me that swatting is an extreme form of harassment — and that swatters typically combine swatting with other forms of harassment, including: complaining to the victim’s workplace, defaming the victim online, “Googlebombing” the victim, publishing the victim’s address online, filing phony reports of criminal activity by the victim, and so forth.

All of these things have happened to me and other critics of Brett Kimberlin since July 2011. The harassment has been relentless and has occurred almost every day. It would literally take a book to catalogue it all. What you read in this post, incredibly, is only part of it.

Why target me? Well, I first wrote about Brett Kimberlin in October 2010, after getting a call from Andrew Breitbart. Andrew told me that his site was going to publish a post about a domestic terrorist named Brett Kimberlin. The story sounded interesting, and I published a post about Kimberlin shortly after the Breitbart post (penned by Mandy Nagy aka Liberty Chick) was published.

The next day, Kimberlin threatened to sue me. He said: “I have filed over a hundred lawsuits and another one will be no sweat for me. On the other hand, it will cost you a lot of time and money and for what.” I asked him to identify any specific falsehoods in my post and he did not. I published subsequent posts about topics like Kimberlin’s alleged murderous plots to escape from prison and exact revenge on his enemies and an examination of his non-profits’ tax returns. In February 2011, I talked about stalkerish intimidation tactics used by Kimberlin and his business partner, Brad Friedman of the “Brad Blog.”

It’s fair to say I have been one of Brett Kimberlin’s least favorite people in the world for a good long time now.

THE RELENTLESS AND VICIOUS HARASSMENT OF CRITICS OF BRETT KIMBERLIN, BY KIMBERLIN AND HIS SUPPORTERS

Beginning about the time I was swatted in July 2011, the harassment I had already experienced from Kimberlin was stepped up several notches — and other Kimberlin critics were also targeted. Several anonymous accounts identifying themselves as supporters of Kimberlin’s have participated in the harassment. These anonymous harassers go by names like @OccupyRebellion, @BreitbartUnmask, Gaped Crusader, and “Just Call Me Lefty.”

But much of the harassment Kimberlin critics have experienced has occurred at the hands of three named individuals: Ron Brynaert, Neal Rauhauser, and Brett Kimberlin.

Meet Ron Brynaert

Ron Brynaert is a so-called “journalist” who last August threatened me and my wife in the most despicable manner possible:

References to my wife come completely out of left field. She is a Democrat and cancels out my vote in every election. The only reason anyone would bring her up online is to intimidate and harass my family.

Brynaert explicitly connected his desire to do violence to me to his defense of Brett Kimberlin. The night he threatened me and my wife, Brynaert defended Kimberlin in a long series of tweets pointing out alleged holes in the case against Kimberlin. Brynaert said I was slandering Kimberlin:

One of Brynaert’s arguments was that certain of the witnesses against Kimberlin had been hypnotized. Apparently, it greatly upset Brynaert that I wasn’t responding to this argument, and he threatened violence as a result:

Ron Brynaert has been a guest blogger at The Brad Blog, run by Brad Friedman, a business partner of Brett Kimberlin’s. Brynaert has described himself as a friend of Friedman’s. Brynaert was for years the editor of a Raw Story, a publication that has teamed up with the Brad Blog to put out Brad Friedman’s radio show:

In 2008, during Brynaert’s tenure as editor of Raw Story, Kimberlin was introduced as the “moving force behind Raw Story.” (Hat tip to Seth Allen.) Kimberlin did not object to that characterization.

Meet Neal Rauhauser

Neal Rauhauser is a creepy far-left activist. There is evidence that, using the handle “Iowa Boy,” Rauhauser has engaged in violent rhetoric, including calling for the public hanging of Republicans and the shooting of Dick Cheney. Rauhauser speaks regularly of the hacking group Anonymous and frequently suggests that his enemies are opening themselves up to Internet harassment.

Above: Writing at Daily Kos, Rauhauser suggests I should be harassed online.

Three days after I was swatted, Rauhauser wrote a post titled “Patterico’s Penalization” that made bizarre accusations about me, and accused me of working with a “cyberstalker” named Seth Allen — a blogger who had criticized Brett Kimberlin so tenaciously that Kimberlin (frivolously) sued Allen for defamation. In that post, Rauhauser publicized a State Bar complaint that Kimberlin had filed against me, and asked readers to get a picture of my wife. Rauhauser also suggested that a private detective stake out Seth Allen’s apartment:

Here is Rauhauser further publicizing Brett Kimberlin’s State Bar complaint against me, and stating his belief that if enough such complaints accumulate, I will be fired:

And here is Rauhauser talking about how he wants to see me fired, prosecuted, and bankrupted — all for purely political reasons:

Rauhauser is a fan of abusive litigation for purposes of political harassment:

Kimberlin has described Rauhauser as an “associate” of his. Rauhauser has written of working with Kimberlin and meeting with him personally. They have appeared in court together. Rauhauser has spoken of working with Kimberlin’s Velvet Revolution organization on Occupy events. In 2011, Rauhauser talked of a new job that he had, and of moving to Maryland — the state that is home to Brett Kimberlin and Velvet Revolution.

Above: as “WeOccupyAmerica, Rauhauser says he is closely connected with Brynaert, to his “chagrin.”

HOW BRYNAERT, RAUHAUSER, KIMBERLIN AND ANONYMOUS INTERNET ENTITIES HAVE TARGETED KIMBERLIN CRITICS FOR RELENTLESS HARASSMENT

On many occasions, Ron Brynaert, Neal Rauhauser, Brett Kimberlin, and anonymous Kimberlin supporters have harassed me and other Kimberlin critics in a similar manner — using tactics that the FBI told me are characteristic of swatters:

• Harassment of wives and family members — As noted above, Rauhauser asked readers for pictures of my wife. He and Brynaert have spoken of investigating my wife’s work as a Deputy District Attorney. Rauhauser and @OccupyRebellion have insinuated that my wife played a role in impersonating fake teens in the Anthony Weiner scandal. Kimberlin supporters @OccupyRebellion and @BreitbartUnmask have spoken of obtaining a picture of my wife. The Gaped Crusader constantly brought up my wife.
  

  The Gaped Crusader wrote like Neal Rauhauser, talked about the same topics as Neal Rauhauser, and once left a comment on my site with the same IP address that Neal Rauhauser used to leave a comment on another site.

  Brynaert has said my wife and I should be fired, and (as noted) has talked about taking a “shit” on my wife.

  The obsession with family members recently extended to Stacy McCain, with Kimberlin apparently having contacting Stacy’s wife’s employer, causing McCain to flee his house. Kimberlin supporter @BreitbartUnmask has mentioned the names of Stacy’s children online. @BreitbartUnmask has publicly outed a commenter of mine, discussed that commenter’s divorce records, and named his father.

• Publication of home addresses — OccupyforAccountability.org, a site related to Kimberlin, published my home address, as well as a Google street view and Google aerial view of my home. The “Gaped Crusader” republished that address.

  Donations at OccupyforAccountability.org go to Kimberlin’s Velvet Revolution. The same post published what the author stated was Andrew Breitbart’s home address. Andrew later told me it was actually a home owned by Andrew’s parents and rented out to others. Kimberlin later sent interrogatories to me at the address listed on OccupyforAccountability.org — and sent interrogatories to Andrew at the address the site had listed for Andrew. Andrew’s interrogatories eventually made their way to him, and he told me about it and gave me a copy of them.

  Kimberlin unnecessarily put Aaron Walker’s home address in court documents. Kimberlin had a habit of putting information into court documents — information that is later disseminated by Rauhauser and Brynaert.

• Workplace complaints — Brynaert and Kimberlin have both filed complaints against me with my office. (Rauhauser and Brynaert have spoken of these complaints publicly.)

  When Brynaert contacted my office, he initially called the very same person Kimberlin had complained to — even though that person was no longer my boss. If Brynaert had simply called asking for my boss, the office would probably not have routed Brynaert to the same person Kimberlin had complained to. But if Brynaert asked for that same person by name, they would route the call to that person.

  Kimberlin also spoke to at least two secretaries in my office, calling me a stalker, a racist, a homophobe, and saying he was going to have to get a restraining order against me. I had to explain to the secretaries that the man who called them had been convicted of setting off several bombs and had been sentenced to 50 years in federal prison — but was now free and harassing me.

  Rauhauser has encouraged people to file complaints against me, as has anonymous Kimberlin supporter @BreitbartUnmask. The “Gaped Crusader” spoke of sending packets of defamatory material about me to candidates running in the election for District Attorney, as well as to defense attorneys on my cases. As noted, Brynaert has stated that my wife and I should be fired. Anonymous Kimberlin supporter @OccupyRebellion constantly talks about how I will be fired and disbarred.

  

  Brynaert wrote to Andrew Breitbart defaming his employee Mandy Nagy (aka Liberty Chick), who wrote that comprehensive piece about Kimberlin in October 2010 I mentioned earlier.

  Kimberlin put Aaron Walker’s home and work address into court documents. The inclusion of the work address contributed to Aaron’s being fired, due to the employer’s fear that a convicted bomber might appear at their workplace.

  Kimberlin contacted Stacy McCain’s wife’s workplace.

  Brynaert contacted a man named Ken Ashford in an attempt to learn Aaron Walker’s real name, and threatened to email every member of Ashford’s firm claiming Ashford had harassed him. Brynaert later contacted the Human Resources Department at Ashford’s firm to complain about him.

• Abuse of court process — Kimberlin has filed numerous frivolous court actions against Aaron Walker and Seth Allen. The details of the court appearances are frequently reported — with a pro-Kimberlin spin — by Rauhauser and Brynaert. In a blatant abuse of the court’s process, Kimberlin served invalid interrogatories in the Seth Allen lawsuit on me, Aaron Walker, Mandy Nagy, and Andrew Breitbart. Rauhauser and @OccupyRebellion publicly referred to those interrogatories and asked when we were going to answer them.

  

  When police gave Kimberlin a picture of Allen from his driver’s license, that picture made its way into the hands of Rauhauser and Brynaert, who published it online.

  Kimberlin threatened to sue me right after I first published my first blog post about him. He told Walker’s pro bono attorney that he is planning a RICO lawsuit against me, Nagy, Walker, and Seth Allen.

  Nadia Naffe’s civil claim against me — Nadia Naffe has now filed a civil claim against me and my boss Steve Cooley — and the lawyer is Jay Leiderman, an online buddy of Neal Rauhauser’s who put out a request on a defense attorney mailing list to investigate whether any defense attorneys don’t like me. Although I have not seen the legal claim myself, excerpts of Naffe’s legal claim have appeared at the web site of self-described Kimberlin supporter and Rauhauser friend BreitbartUnmasked.com. Before the claim was filed, Rauhauser and @BreitbartUnmasked encouraged Naffe to file the sorts of claims that appear in the civil claim.

  Naffe has publicly said that she plans to use her lawsuit against me to ask questions in discovery about the value of my house — a topic in which Rauhauser and @OccupyRebellion have expressed interest in the past. According to a friend of mine, Naffe has also said that she plans to ask me and my wife under oath the true identity of conservative blogger Ace of Spades. Which is not something she ought to care about, since Ace had never said a word about her (although he has now).

  

  

  You know who cares about Ace’s identity? Brett Kimberlin supporter @BreitbartUnmask. He has written entire posts about Ace’s identity. And before I was swatted, someone threatened me by email. That person threatened one other person the same night: Ace of Spades.

  Additionally, Brett Kimberlin has used a subpoena in the Seth Allen lawsuit to subpoena James O’Keefe’s stolen emails from Naffe — despite the fact that there has been a final judgment in that lawsuit.

• Outing — Ace has good reason to be concerned, as this group has a history of outing anonymous critics. Aaron Walker’s identity was outed by Brett Kimberlin after he received an “anonymous tip.” Seth Allen’s identity was also outed by Kimberlin.

  In addition to furiously harassing Ken Ashford for Aaron Walker’s true name, Ron Brynaert also wrote Yale alumni affairs officials asking for information about Aaron. Within a single day of Brynaert’s failed campaign to learn Aaron’s true name and location, Brett Kimberlin wrote Aaron demanding that Aaron disclose his true name and location.

• Whisper campaigns — Brynaert and Kimberlin have both contacted people that they identified as online “enemies” of mine to complain of alleged harassment at my hands. Brynaert has recently taken to contacting other major bloggers to defame me, Aaron Walker, and Mandy Nagy. I have been forwarded emails by Brynaert from several notable bloggers.

• Frivolous claims of criminal wrongdoing — I am told Kimberlin filed frivolous claims of stalking against me with an anti-stalking unit in my office. Rauhauser has encouraged people to report me to that same unit. Interestingly enough, the anonymous person who threatened me by email before I was swatted mentioned the very same unit.

  Brynaert has also constantly claimed that critics of Kimberlin have stalked him and Kimberlin. @OccupyRebellion has made the same claim.

  I am told Kimberlin filed frivolous criminal charges against me with the California Attorney General. Rauhauser encouraged Daily Kos readers to file complaints against me with the California Attorney General.

  

  Rauhauser compiled a large packet of defamatory material accusing me, Walker, Nagy, and others of participating in criminal activity, and said he had sent it to state police in New Jersey and the FBI in Baltimore. He made the entire packet available as a torrent.

  Writing as Stranded Wind at Daily Kos (where he has since been banned), Rauhauser insinuated that I had obtained forged documentation during the course of my employment to support claims by shadowy Internet entity John Reid. @OccupyRebellion has made the same insinuations.

  Rauhauser and anonymous Kimberlin supporters claimed that I criminally intimidated a witness by criticizing Nadia Naffe on my blog — an allegation that apparently has surfaced in her civil claim against me and my boss Steve Cooley.

  Kimberlin claimed Walker assaulted him in a courthouse and made several claims regarding the incident that have been disproven by a video. Kimberlin’s claims were repeated by Brynaert, @OccupyRebellion, and @BreitbartUnmask. Rauhauser and @OccupyRebellion falsely alleged that Walker had been arrested for this crime, and repeatedly asserted that he had beaten Kimberlin.

  Brynaert has recently accused Aaron Walker of “extortion” for sending Brynaert a settlement demand letter in Walker’s lawsuit against Brynaert. Brynaert accused me and Mandy Nagy of being part of the “conspiracy” to “extort” Brynaert. In fact, just yesterday, Brynaert used the threat of going to the NYPD as a way to deter me from publishing this post, saying that he was going to the police as soon as I published:

  I’m waiting until a certain Deputy District Attorney – who has been enabling my blackmailer – to publish his lies, then I’m going to NYPD.

  — Ron Brynaert (@ronbryn) May 24, 2012

  Brynaert has accused me of criminal harassment. @OccupyRebellion has consistently accused me, Walker, and Nagy of being criminals.

  Brynaert, Rauhauser, and @OccupyRebellion have insinuated or stated that I was not swatted, that I filed a false police report concerning that swatting, and that in fact I am the person who committed the swatting of the man in New Jersey.

• Frivolous State Bar complaints or threats to file State Bar complaints — Kimberlin filed a frivolous State Bar complaint against me, and has now filed a State Bar complaint against Aaron Walker. Kimberlin insinuated he might file a State Bar complaint against Walker’s pro bono lawyer. Brynaert threatened to file a State Bar complaint against Aaron Walker and Ken Ashford (the man who refused to tell Brynaert the true name of Aaron Walker).

• General harassment — The “Gaped Crusader,” published a picture of a naked man with his penis exposed, and claimed that it was Deputy District Attorney John Patrick Frey. Here are some Gaped Crusader screenshots:
  

  

  The image above was not fuzzed out on the Gaped Crusader blog.

  Kimberlin supporter @BreitbartUnmasked harassed Aaron on Twitter, and gave accurate details about Aaron’s driving record that do not appear to be publicly available.

  After a court appearance in which Aaron tried to get a peace order against Rauhauser, Rauhauser wrote an email to me and other friends of his which said, among other things: “Given Walker’s state of mind I would say his wife might find him hanging in the garage tonight when she gets home from work.”

  Rauhauser called me at my office and left a message on my work voice mail, claiming that Aaron appeared to be suffering a psychological breakdown and needed help.

  Rauhauser and anonymous Kimberlin supporters have consistently accused Aaron of being bigoted against Muslims. Rauhauser wrote Aaron mocking emails talking about how Muslims were likely to try to kill him because of his “Everyone Draw Mohammed” site. Kimberlin wrote Aaron’s local police purporting to be concerned that, because Kimberlin had been “forced” (he claimed) to file a court document containing all Aaron’s personal information, that Muslims would get hold of that document and put Aaron in danger. Even after Aaron lost his job, someone either arranged for, or pretended to be, a Muslim group that threatened to take protest and diplomatic actions against Aaron’s workplace until they heard Aaron had been fired.

  Kimberlin defenders took court audio of Allen and put it on YouTube, showing a graphic of Allen’s face from his driver’s license picture.

  Mandy Nagy endured months of harassment from Rauhauser, @Occupy Rebellion, and others. @OccupyRebellion mocked Nagy’s illnesses and personal tragedies. She told Nagy that she hoped Nagy died of cancer. She claimed that Nagy (a rape victim) had never been raped. She repeatedly called Nagy a “cunt.” And she told Nagy that Nagy had put her own family’s life in danger.

  Nagy says she has been told by friends that people have been calling them asking questions about her, and that she has seen people seemingly staking out her residence in various vehicles.

  Meanwhile, @OccupyRebellion and Rauhauser have incessantly accused Nagy of “baiting” Anonymous. This claim itself functions to stir up Anonymous accounts, in an apparent effort to get Anonymous to hack Nagy.

Heard enough about this harassment? Then let’s move on to the voice on my swatting call.

THE VOICE

When I obtained the recording of my swatting, in July 2011, I thought I recognized the voice.

To me, it sounded like Brynaert. Specifically, it sounded like someone trying to disguise his voice at the beginning of the call, by talking in a monotone. Then, at the end of the call, when the dispatcher challenged the caller, the voice seemed to lose its disguised quality . . . and it sounded like Brynaert to me.

Here’s the thing: Brynaert was talking to me on the phone when the police came to my house. That is something that the FBI in Dallas also told me fits the M.O. of a swatter.

Before that phone call, Ron Brynaert had told me that he had important information for me about the Anthony Weiner case. And that is how I ended up talking to him on the phone on the night of June 30, 2011, leading into the early morning hours of July 1.

And that is how it happened that he was on the phone with me when the police showed up to my door.

Let’s listen to Brynaert’s voice compared to that of the caller:

I pushed and pushed for law enforcement to do a forensic comparison of Brynaert’s voice to that of the swatter. I found an interview of Brynaert online, so there was a ready sample for comparison. But they wouldn’t do it. (I was constantly frustrated by the failure of law enforcement to follow up on what seemed like obvious leads. More about that at a future date.)

So I decided to hire my own expert.

Kent Gibson is a forensic voice identification expert. He has done work for the FBI and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, as well as the Los Angeles County Public Defender. He is court-qualified in Los Angeles Superior Court. He is a Yale and Stanford graduate who has had extensive experience in audio work. He is the expert hired by the mother of Mel Gibson’s children to authenticate angry recordings that Mel Gibson left on her answering machine.

I first approached Kent in August 2011, but at the time I was still trying to convince law enforcement to do the comparison themselves. By January 2012 I had given up on law enforcement. I sent Kent my swatting call; the swatting call from New Jersey; a call to BlogTalkRadio that sounded like the swatter; and the Ron Brynaert interview.

The following quote is from Kent Gibson’s declaration, sent to me on February 25, 2012:

In this case the following files were presented for evaluation: Tag names for these four recordings are shown in BOLD. The[y] represent calls from two Swat Hoax cases, one involving Patrick Frey and one involving Mike Stack [the man from New Jersey — ed.].

G-8025959 FREY SWAT – Call made to 911 claiming a shooting at Mr. Frey’s residence on 7/1/2011 at 12:16 AM. Caller impersonates Patrick Frey.

Stack Call – STACK SWAT – Call made to police dispatch in Readington, New Jersey. 6/23/2011 Caller impersonates Mike Stack.

Ron Brynaert Interview.mp3 – BRYNAERT KNOWN – an internet radio interview. This caller is suspected of being the Swat caller re: Frey.

Lee Call-in Radio Show – LEE KNOWN (Lee is interviewer’s name, not caller.) This caller is suspected of being the Swat caller re: Stack.

. . . .

CONCLUSION: Considering all of the evidence presented, it is my expert forensic examiner opinion that it is probable that all voice samples come from the same person.

In other words, it is the opinion of an expert forensic examiner that Ron Brynaert’s voice is probably the voice of the man on my swatting call. A call that could have gotten me killed.

PARTING THOUGHTS

What you have just read is a summary. I have lived this daily — literally daily — for almost a year. There are pieces of evidence I didn’t have room to include. There is so much evidence of harassment it would take you weeks to read about it all.

What’s more, I know that this post is going to result in more harassment. I will almost certainly be sued, despite my careful efforts to stick to the facts. There will likely be more complaints to my workplace.

And I have a feeling they’ll find creative new ways to try to rip my life apart.

As an aside, I have listened to Brett Kimberlin in court audio, saying he meets with Congressmen on a regular basis. I want to make sure these Congressmen know what he’s doing.

I have appreciated the support I have felt in recent days, with people like Michelle Malkin, Instapundit, Stacy McCain, Ace, and many others stepping up and being willing to take on this topic.

It is my hope that the support of the blogosphere will not melt away after today. Because the harassment will almost certainly live on.

It’s an important battle to take on. And I want to stress that this should not be a partisan issue. I believe Brett Kimberlin uses lefty politics as a tool — but he doesn’t believe any of it in his heart. He is looking for a buck. I have been heartened to see left-leaning people of all stripes stand up to this guy in the past, from Mark Singer, the author of Citizen K; to Ken Ashford, who refused to give up Aaron Walker’s identity; to the left-leaning lawyer who represented Aaron pro bono.

It is my hope that left-leaning blogs will recognize that this is not a partisan issue. It is a free speech issue.

Remember how I said one of my commenters was outed? And this crew started talking about his parents? And his divorce records? For being a commenter of mine?

What happened to me could literally happen to anyone. It could happen to you.

If you take nothing else from this post, remember that. It could happen to you.

As always, opinions on this site are my own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer. I speak in my personal capacity and not my official capacity, and do not intend to speak on behalf of my office in any way.

UPDATE: I received this today from Roxanne Cooper:

Raw Story was founded by John Byrne in 2004, and has only ever been owned by John Byrne (and minority-stake owner Mike Rogers, who joined in 2009). Roxanne Cooper became the publisher in October 2010, shortly before Ron Brynaert ended his tenure at the publication. Since March 2011, the editorial direction has been under the management of Megan Carpentier, who has complete editorial discretion separate from management.

Brett Kimberlin and Velvet Revolution are not and never have been involved in the ownership, management or editorial direction of Raw Story. Neither Carpentier nor Cooper had ever heard of Kimberlin or Velvet Revolution prior to the start of the events described by Aaron Worthing, Mandy Nagy and Patrick Frey.

So there you have it.

[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.  Or by Twitter @AaronWorthing.]

I try not to pay too much attention to Ken Ashford.  Indeed, he won’t even get the benefit of a link out of this, but this stupidity is something to behold.  The following is the entirety of a post at his stupid little blog:

Fox News Makes Stuff Up, Part 294

Fox News says:

President Obama has declared Aug. 26 — which marks the 91st anniversary of the constitutional amendment giving women the right to vote — to be “Women’s Equality Day.”

Wrong.  Congress decided that August 26th is Women’s Equality Day.  In 1971. Obama is merely following in the path of past presidents.

Now first, let’s say for the sake of argument that they got it wrong.  What of it?  Does this make him look bad?  There are very few people seething in anger that women are allowed to vote now, but I suppose the left thinks that the right is ready to repeal that amendment.  (Rolls eyes.)  But when two of the leading Republican Presidential contenders are women, its really hard to argue that mainstream conservatives want to run women out of political life.

But in fact if you go to the White House’s website, you see the whole thing.  It is styled as a “Presidential Proclamation–Women’s Equality Day.”  And it goes on as you would expect these things to go, until it says:

NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim August 26, 2011, as Women’s Equality Day.

So here is the President purporting to “proclaim” it is Women’s Equality Day.  And if you go to Webster’s dictionary online and take a look at definition 1a for the word “proclaim” here is what it says:

to declare publicly, typically insistently, proudly, or defiantly and in either speech or writing

(emphasis added.)  And it would hardly surprise you to learn that if you switch over to their thesaurus, they list “declare” to be a synonym of “proclaim.”

So in fact he is angry at Fox news for saying that the President did something that the President himself purported to do, and I am willing to bet that every president has purported to do for decades.  Because in the end a declaration or a proclamation, can be nothing more than officially saying something.  Of course proclamations can (potentially) have important legal effects, the Emancipation Proclamation springing to mind, but many proclamations are just words—an example of the president using the bully pulpit.  The President is not, by the language of this proclamation, purporting to command us to do anything, just saying non-coercively, “hey, let’s celebrate this thing.”

And right on for Obama doing that in this case.  We should all celebrate the important milestone represented by the Nineteenth Amendment.

But it is really remarkable that what is basically a puff piece on a presidential proclamation becomes some kind of slander in the fever swamps of the left.

[Posted and authored by Aaron Worthing.]

[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.  Or by Twitter @AaronWorthing.]

So first, someone try to explain to me the theory behind the Rick Perry/dark cloud/racism! theory.  I mean let’s lay this out.  So the left thinks that there are anti-black racists out there who either 1) support Obama, or 2) won’t actually bother to vote against him.  So Perry had to allude to Obama’s race, because, I guess they forgot he was black?  Is that how the theory works?

I mean let’s talk realistically, here, folks.  There is a percentage of white people who just hate black people.  I don’t think it’s a very large percentage, but it’s there.  So does Rick Perry need to do anything to appeal to them?  No, he just has to exist and not be black.  So why would he have to even allude to Obama’s skin color to win those people over?  He’s already got them sewn up.

Meanwhile, of course, we see this example of real racism in the election:

During a sometimes-raucous session of what’s being called the “For the People” Jobs Initiative tour, a key member of the Congressional Black Caucus told an audience in Detroit Tuesday that the CBC doesn’t put pressure on President Obama because he is loved by black voters.  But at the same time, Rep. Maxine Waters said, members of the CBC are becoming increasingly tired and frustrated by Obama’s performance on the issue of jobs. Even as she expressed support for the president, Waters virtually invited the crowd to “unleash us” to pressure Obama for action.

“We don’t put pressure on the president,” Waters told the audience at Wayne County Community College.  “Let me tell you why. We don’t put pressure on the president because ya’ll love the president. You love the president. You’re very proud to have a black man — first time in the history of the United States of America. If we go after the president too hard, you’re going after us.”

The problem, Waters said, is that Obama is not paying enough attention to the problems of some black Americans.  The unemployment rate for African-Americans nationally is a little over 16 percent, and almost twice that in Detroit.  And yet, Waters said, the president is on a jobs-promotion trip through the Midwest that does not include any stops in black communities.  “The Congressional Black Caucus loves the president too,” Waters said.  “We’re supportive of the president, but we’re getting tired, ya’ll.  We’re getting tired. And so, what we want to do is, we want to give the president every opportunity to show what he can do and what he’s prepared to lead on. We want to give him every opportunity, but our people are hurting. The unemployment is unconscionable. We don’t know what the strategy is. We don’t know why on this trip that he’s in the United States now, he’s not in any black community.  We don’t know that.”

Does anyone doubt that this is all because of the race of the people involved—black people not holding Obama accountable because he is a black man?

Now, look, I gave most African Americans a mulligan on the last election.  I understood that after 400 some odd years of ugliness towards them that they were entitled to believe that the day had finally come where a black man 1) who was qualified to be president 2) might actually win the office.  They were obviously right about the second part, and wrong about the first one.  But that decision—to believe Obama was more ready for the job than he evidently was—was a deviation from Martin Luther King’s dream.  They were judging him not by the content of his character—which demonstrated that he was not ready to be president—but by the color of his skin.  It’s wrong, but it’s human.

But just how long is this going to go on?  Can’t we all agree that black people are proportionately speaking just as likely as white people to make a good president, but not the idiot presently in the White House?

And at the same time, how is this whole fake dog whistle episode is not racial discrimination?  After all, would this be done to a black man?

For instance, as much as liberals are freaking out about Perry’s religion, Obama sat in a racist church for twenty years and the media barely batted an eye.  He took the title of one of his books from a racist sermon, and again barely a reaction.  Blatant racism—or at least tolerance of blatant racism—was excused from Barack Obama, and yet Perry is defamed with selective editing in order for liberals to claim he is a racist.  There can be little doubt that they wouldn’t have tried anything like that with Herman Cain.

Update: By the way, the Rick Perry black cloud thing was so lame that even Jon Stewart didn’t bite.  But who did?  Erstwhile stalker, Ken Ashford!  I’m not going to link to his tripe, because maybe that is giving him what he is really fishing for, but you have to admire the chutzpah in this line:

And even if the fact that Obama had black skin was a FACTOR for SOME black voters, that doesn’t amount to a repudiation of King’s dream.

Well, “repudiation” is perhaps a strong term, which is why I used the term “deviation,” but no amount of twisting and turning can change the fact that those voters were doing precisely what Dr. King told them not to do.  But it’s nice to see him endorse the idea that we should judge people by the color of their skin.

And of course he then implicitly embraces the black cloud dog whistle theory:

Here’s the problem with Aaron Worthing (and there are many).  The only “blatant racism” he specifically acknowledges seems to exclusively exude from black people (and Worthing apparently has an odd definition of “blatant”).  He never seems to see it in white people. And it doesn’t take a genius to figure out why.

This in criticizing a post that specifically acknowledges the existence of white anti-black racism.  So here’s your trivia question for the day.  Is Ken so deluded he failed to notice that text?  Or is he so deluded that he thinks his reader wouldn’t notice his blatant lies about what I said?

[Posted and authored by Aaron Worthing.]