Does Brett Kimberlin Want to Put Cory Booker in Prison?

Or “Brett Kimberlin’s Latest Attempt to Criminalize Disagreement”

This is the latest post in what I half-jokingly call The Kimberlin Saga^®.  If you are new to the story, that’s okay! Not everyone reads my blog.  The short version is that Kimberlin has been harassing me for over a year, his worst conduct being when he attempted to frame me for a crime.   I recognize that this might sound like an incredible claim, but I provide video and documentary evidence of that fact; in other words, you don’t have to believe my word.  You only have to believe your eyes.  So, if you are new to the story, go to this page and you’ll be able to catch up on what has been happening.

As regular readers know, Brett Kimberlin has sued... pretty much half the conservative internet.  This is a federal case, in addition to the Maryland state case where he sued myself, Ali Akbar, Robert Stacy McCain, John Hoge and the anonymous blogger known as “Kimberlin Unmasked.”.  He has sued a large number of organizations and individuals, mostly on the right, under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), claiming that we are in essence the equivalent of the Yakuza...

...and the people and/or organizations that Kimberlin claims are involved in this mafia (Japanese or otherwise) includes the National Blogger’s Club, Ali Akbar, Patrick Frey (a Deputy D.A.), Erick Erickson, Michelle Malkin, Glenn Beck, me (of course), John Hoge, Lee Stranahan, Robert Stacy McCain, James O’Keefe, Mandy Nagy, Breitbart.com, the Franklin Center, the anonymous bloggers “Kimberlin Unmasked” and “Ace of Spades,” Mercury Radio Arts, The Blaze, RedState, Twitchy.com, DB Capital Strategies (the law firm that represented me) and Simon and Schuster.

Let me repeat that for emphasis: they are suing book publisher Simon and Schuster, claiming that they are part of organized crime.  I mean just what would a book nerd Mafioso look like anyway?

Um...

To take it slightly more seriously, let me explain his theory, because if any court accepted it, the results would be horrifying to anyone who loves liberty.  First, he claims that it is an established fact that he is innocent of the SWATtings committed against myself, Mike Stack, Erick Erickson, and Patrick Frey.  Then he claims that it is somehow unfactual to even suggest that there might be a connection between him and them, even if one is only saying that this is probably a Kimberlin fan.  Never mind, for instance, that every single one of those SWATting victims have crossed Brett Kimberlin in one way or the other.  Never mind that I was SWATted the same day that Judge Rupp lifted an unconstitutional injunction put in place against me by Brett Kimberlin.  Never mind that later that a person using an IP address associated with Kimberlin ally Bill Schmalfeldt threatened John Hoge with SWATting, and someone who angered Schmalfeldt actually was SWATted.  No, according to Brett it is unfair to say that I suspect that Kimberlin was involved or even to say that I was personally convinced in my heart though I can’t actually prove it, yet.  No, according to Brett you are not even allowed to have negative opinions about him, or at least not allowed to voice them.

So James O’Keefe is selling a book called Breakthrough: Our Guerrilla War to Expose Fraud and Save Democracy, and apparently published by Simon and Schuster.  Here’s how the blurb describes the book:

Acorn Planned Parenthood NPR Medicaid VOTER FRAUD The New Jersey educational association Labor Unions

Hailed by David Weigel in Slate as having “had more of an impact on the 2012 election than any journalist,” James O’Keefe is young, brash, and provocative: a new breed of guerrilla reporter for the twenty-first century. He and his associates have famously infiltrated some of America’s most protected organizations and institutions. They have challenged politicians, bureaucrats, media moguls, union bosses, and election officials, all with the goal of exposing the lies and malfeasance heretofore hidden from the public. Now, O’Keefe chronicles the harrowing undercover investigation that opened America’s eyes to the chicanery of its state houses and the duplicity of the White House during one of the most compromised election campaigns in our nation’s history: the 2012 presidential race.

Of all his controversial sting operations, this was the one that his late mentor, Andrew Breitbart, called “his most consequential.” While still on federal probation, O’Keefe organized an army of citizen journalists, planned a series of video stings to reveal the American system’s vulnerability to voter fraud, and went nose to nose with the most powerful political machine in the world. Along the way, O’Keefe found disheartening evidence that Americans are not nearly as free a people as we may believe, but he also showed just how much real change ordinary citizens can bring about when they are willing to risk the wrath of the powerful. In just a few years, O’Keefe and his citizen journalism corps, Project Veritas, uncovered systemic corruption at ACORN, leading to its defunding by Congress; exposed the contemptuous biases of NPR executives leading to the resignation of two of their top people and a vote to freeze NPR funding by the House of Representatives; showed the callous indifference of New Jersey Educational Association officials to taxpayers and students; and revealed the easy tolerance of fraud at Planned Parenthood, Medicaid, HUD, and other government agencies. Perhaps most important, their work inspired several states to reform their election laws. Free of ideology, Breakthrough is at its core a clarion call for a more ethical society. Despite being vilified and libeled by an establishment media dedicated to suppressing the truth, James O’Keefe has dared to break through the firewall and reshape public opinion by showing things as they really are.

Do you see the words “Brett Kimberlin?”  No, you don’t.  Because this is not a book about Brett Kimberlin—this is about bigger things.  In fact the only mention of Kimberlin comes in this passage:

That passage is buried in a chapter called “The Rise of Richard Head.”  It must have taken Mr. O’Keefe a great deal of self-restraint to call him Richard and not Dick, but he is referring to the New Hampshire Associate Attorney General who had a silly investigation of Mr. O’Keefe for his exposure of New Hampshire’s vulnerability to voter fraud.  That is O’Keefe helped show flaws in the voting system that threatened the integrity of elections and this idiot was thinking of putting him in jail for it, another example of an attempt to criminalize expression with Team Kimberlin’s fingerprints all over it.

So Brett’s theory is that this passage is wrong, and therefore not merely allegedly defamatory—which is the usual  cause of action when someone allegedly falsely accuses you of doing something—but it is also “fraud” and therefore selling it on the internet and through the mail is mail and wire fraud.

This kind of thing is critical to his Rakateering claim.  You see in Racketeering you have to prove first that the “mafia” exists and then that it is engaged in at least two examples of what is called “racketeering activity.”  So that’s one, according to him and then all he needs is another act and he is (potentially) good to go with his RICO claim.

Even if that passage is inaccurate (and remember, Brett Kimberlin will have to prove he is positively innocent of being involved in SWATtings—I wonder how “truth” will work as a defense?), it isn’t fraud.  Did anyone seriously buy the book in order to learn whether Brett Kimberlin SWATted anyone?

But that is Brett’s theory: if you tell any untruth when selling a book, writing for a site that receives ad revenue, or when raising funds, it is automatically fraud and thus a violation of criminal law.  After all, wire fraud and mail fraud are federal criminal offenses, so if his theory is correct these are actually crimes, right?

So, Brett’s going to report Cory Booker to the FBI, right?

I mean after all, Cory Booker was revealed not too long ago to be telling a falsified story in various speeches about a person who doesn’t exist called “T-Bone.”  Here’s him talking about this person who didn’t exist, doing things that no person actually did:

And why did he do it?  Well, there is this theory:

Rahaman Muhammad, a city union leader who has been one of Booker’s strongest critics, was among those who originally questioned the veracity of T-Bone.

He said Thursday he was baffled Booker used the character in the first place, except that it may have appealed to donors.

Ah, yes, the surprisingly deep street thug, a popular trope with the appropriate touch of “urban danger” when appealing to rich elite donors.  So this fits in exactly with Brett’s silly theories: if you lie in a situation where you are raising funds—as we now know Cory Booker did—then that is automatically fraud.  Done over the wires or through the mail, it becomes mail or wire fraud, which are Federal crimes.  But even if Booker only did it in person that is still generally criminal under state law.  So quick, Brett, call the police!  Get the new Senator from New Jersey arrested!

Circling back to the attack on O’Keefe and his alleged partner in the literary mafia, Simon and Schuster, think of how what it would impact freedom of expression in America if this theory was adopted.  First, practically speaking it would be the end of non-fiction books in America.  If one single mistake in a book renders it criminal fraud, and a federal crime to boot, who is going to risk that?  I mean O’Keefe’s alleged “mistake” was on one page out of more than 350 and only a few lines out of that page.  That’s a less than 1% error, and yet Brett Kimberlin is advocating a theory that would send O’Keefe to prison over it and subject Simon and Schuster to the harsh penalties corporations are subjected to when caught engaging in racketeering activities.  Indeed Kimberlin ally Schmalfeldt claims that the FBI will investigate this which suggests that Kimberlin has actually reported all of this silliness to the FBI.  (The FBI is likely to take this about as seriously as any other lunatic yelling on the street, however.)

Indeed, according to Kimberlin any site that receives advertising but says something that is inaccurate is committing fraud and everyone involved should be subject to criminal RICO.  So for instance, that would be the entirety of the New York Times, including many individual reporters.  I mean the New York Times runs inaccurate information all the time: they issue corrections on a regular basis.  A correction is not a defense to fraud: at best it is mitigation of the damage.  So put them all in jail!

The fact that book publishers are not, on a regular basis, going to prison (such as famed historian Stephen Ambrose) and newspaper reporters are not sharing a cell with them (such as the idiot who claimed Mario and Luigi are janitors) suggests that his theory is thankfully wrong.  I would go deeper into the legal mistakes he has made but as I said, I don’t urge people to offer too much in the form of legal analysis.  We don’t want to educate the diminutive terrorist.

Anyway, if you find this entire exercise to be outrageous, please donate to Bomber Sues Bloggers, the legal defense fund in the Maryland case.

And know as you do that I thank you for it.

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Sidebar: Brett Kimberlin associate Bill Schmalfeldt (who got his flabby arse kicked in court yesterday) has written an entire ebook about Ali Akbar.  No, I won’t link to it, lest I push his sales into the single digits, but I wonder if there was any inaccuracies in it?  Should we be reporting Schmalfeldt to the FBI for potential wire fraud?

Bill Schmalfeldt is really, really rooting for Brett Kimberlin’s victory in all of this.  He should be careful what he wishes for.

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Disclaimer:

I have accused some people, particularly Brett Kimberlin, of reprehensible conduct.  In some cases, the conduct is even criminal.  In all cases, the only justice I want is through the appropriate legal process—such as the criminal justice system.  I do not want to see vigilante violence against any person or any threat of such violence.  This kind of conduct is not only morally wrong, but it is counter-productive.

In the particular case of Brett Kimberlin, I do not want you to even contact him.  Do not call him.  Do not write him a letter.  Do not write him an email.  Do not text-message him.  Do not engage in any kind of directed communication.  I say this in part because under Maryland law, that can quickly become harassment and I don’t want that to happen to him.

And for that matter, don’t go on his property.  Don’t sneak around and try to photograph him.  Frankly try not to even be within his field of vision.  Your behavior could quickly cross the line into harassment in that way too (not to mention trespass and other concerns).

And do not contact his organizations, either.  And most of all, leave his family alone.

The only exception to all that is that if you are reporting on this, there is of course nothing wrong with contacting him for things like his official response to any stories you might report.  And even then if he tells you to stop contacting him, obey that request.  That this is a key element in making out a harassment claim under Maryland law—that a person asks you to stop and you refuse.

And let me say something else.  In my heart of hearts, I don’t believe that any person supporting me has done any of the above.  But if any of you have, stop it, and if you haven’t don’t start.