The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Brett Kimberlin: ‘I Want to Be Left Alone’

Posted on | July 12, 2012 | 41 Comments

Brett Kimberlin could have been sentenced to 230 years in federal prison

“Brett C. Kimberlin schemed to elude justice with a series of bizarre plots designed to murder, maim and rob his enemies, create havoc . . . and discredit the chief government prosecutor.”
— Joe Gelarden, “Kimberlin case a maze of murder, deceit,” Indianapolis Star, Oct. 18, 1981

“A drug-dealing colleague had memories of conversations with Kimberlin that struck him as odd: ‘We’d see a girl, who was pubescent or prepubescent, and Brett would get this smile and say, “Hey, what do you think? Isn’t she great?” It made me very uncomfortable.’ Another recalled Kimberlin introducing Jessica as ‘my girlfriend,’ and if irony was intended, it was too subtle to register. To a coworker . . . Sandi confided that Kimberlin was ‘grooming Jessica to be his wife.'”
— Mark Singer, Citizen K: The Deeply Weird American Journey of Brett Kimberlin, Page 78

“By accusing others of wrongdoing, Kimberlin seeks to evade responsibility for his own wrongdoing. What I’ve called the ‘accuse the accusers’ strategy . . . looks very much like obstruction of justice.”
— Robert Stacy McCain, June 30, 2012

FROM AN UNDISCLOSED LOCATION
The post title is a quote from the transcript of Brett Kimberlin’s June 29 “peace order” hearing against John Norton. Kimberlin made this  plea under questioning by Norton’s lawyer:

Lawyer: The only questions I have, the only… you are [a] convicted perjurer, correct? Correct?
Kimberlin: Yes, when —
Lawyer: All right.
Kimberlin: — I was nineteen years old. Thirty and forty years ago.
Lawyer: All right, and you’ve been in prison for bombings, correct?
Kimberlin: Sir, we are talking about the last thirty days.
Lawyer: Correct?
Kimberlin: That’s what this issue is about, you know you can try to attack my credibility. Your client took the picture, your client —
Lawyer: Sir.
Kimberlin: — was at my house.
Lawyer: Sir, answer the question.
Kimberlin: I want to be left alone.
Lawyer: Correct?
Kimberlin: I want to be —
Lawyer: Correct?
Kimberlin: — left alone.
Lawyer: You’ve been in prison for bombings, correct?
Kimberlin: No, I haven’t.
Lawyer: Where you served prison time, correct?
Kimberlin: No.
Lawyer: [louder, more stern.] Correct?
Kimberlin: Yes.
Lawyer: Okay. And it was related to bombings out of state, correct? Multiple bombings.
Kimberlin: No. You know, I’m not going to get into that. You know, if you want to talk about—
Lawyer: No further, no further questions.

Read the rest of Aaron Walker’s post. Keep in mind that the only reason Kimberlin became an object of widespread attention since May 17 is because Kimberlin has pursued a campaign of legal harassment of bloggers, including a false accusation of assault against Walker.

Brett Kimberlin is a liar, and his dishonest attempts to evade responsibility for his own actions by pointing the accusing finger at others is a remarkably consistent trait of his warped personality. Kimberlin has never admitted his guilt for the heinous crimes of which he was convicted, and has tried to portray himself as a victim of injustice — a political prisoner! — while seeking publicity for his rock band:

Epoxy arose out of the hellish depths of Brett’s time in prison for exercising his First Amendment rights to speech and political activity. Without any trial, Brett was hauled off to federal prison after being targeted by right-wingers who wanted to punish him for being a musician, writing a book and speaking out about politics.

In fact, Brett Kimberlin was a drug dealer, not a musician, when he was convicted in 1981 of a series of terrorist bombings in Indiana and — far from being “right-wingers” seeking to “punish” Kimberlin for “speaking out about politics” — the lead investigator in that case, Ben Neihaus, was the son of a former Democratic Party official. Yet Kimberlin’s dishonest claims of victimhood deluded certain gullible writers:

Who says that a great band has to fit into a set formula to be a success? Not Brett Kimberlin, the lead singer, guitarist and songwriter for the critically acclaimed, three-piece band Epoxy. . . .
Kimberlin’s first CD, “Nothing Else,” reflects his varied influences, mixed with a grittier and more powerful type of garage rock and early punk rock. Almost a musical biography, “Nothing Else” draws on Kimberlin’s experiences as a political prisoner as well as his stance on subjects ranging from the death penalty to the stagnant state of public indoctrination to everyday life. . . .
“It is a non sequitur to hear a teenager from a middle class background sing about how bad his life is — but as a political prisoner who was abused, tortured and released into the world again, I have the credibility to sing about all aspects of life from a very unique and pure perspective.”

Kimberlin used his criminal history for purposes of publicity, evidently supposing that no one would fact-check his false claims. Having cited his 17 years in federal prison as the basis of his “credibility” (!) Kimberlin subsequently sought to criminalize adverse publicity by calling it “harassment.” Any competent attorney familiar with libel law would inform Kimberlin that his status as a publicity seeker, who has used his personal notoriety to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for his tax-exempt non-profit groups Justice Through Music Project and Velvet Revolution, makes him a public figure under the Sullivan precedent.

(Of course, Kimberlin’s infamy as the “Speedway Bomber” should be considered sufficient to establish him as a public figure under the Sullivan precedent, but it is unlikely anyone would be writing about Kimberlin’s criminal past if he were working as a Wal-Mart greeter.)

Kimberlin has most unwisely sought to suppress the truth about himself by threatening libel suits against Patrick Frey and Mandy Nagy, and actually pursued a libel suit against Seth “Socrates” Allen. Because truth is an ironclad defense against the charge of libel, these threats from a notorious criminal are ultimately impotent, but Kimberlin — who claims unfamiliarity with the term “lawfare” — apparently seeks to deter adverse publicity by these threats, which can be genuinely intimidating: Who wants the hassle of being named as the defendant in a lawsuit, no matter how frivolous?

When this attempt at legal intimidation failed to silence his critics, however, Kimberlin began claiming that he was the victim of “harassment.” This is laughably ironic, in that harassment is the stock in trade of Kimberlin’s non-profit Velvet Revolution, which has publicly demanded criminal prosecution of a variety of public figures, including Republican strategic Karl Rove, U.S. Chamber of Commerce president Tom Donohue and the late Andrew Breitbart. None of the persons targeted in this manner by Kimberlin’s 501(c)4 “progressive” group has been convicted of any criminal wrongdoing, but the accusations have helped raise many thousands of dollars in tax-exempt money for Kimberlin’s enterprises.

“Accuse the accusers” — the convicted felon accuses law-abiding citizens of criminal malfeasance, and when anyone questions Kimberlin’s bona fides as accuser, they are in turn accused of politically motivated retaliation or “harassment.” This creates confusion, because Kimberlin then cites his own accusations as proof that his antagonists are bad people acting on bad motives: Seth Allen is a mentally ill “stalker,” Aaron Walker is a deranged “Islamophobe,” et cetera.

This confusion can deceive anyone who doesn’t take the time to understand that (a) Brett Kimberlin is profoundly dishonest, and (b) Kimberlin has a lifelong habit of making accusations against people who might expose Kimberlin’s wrongdoing. It has often been the case that people who tangled with Kimberlin found themselves forced to defend themselves against his accusations, and the defensiveness of Kimberlin’s targets can have the effect of making them seem — to the uninformed observer — to be whiners, or nuisances morally equivalent to Kimberlin himself.

Kimberlin deliberately attempts to sow confusion because he cannot withstand the kind of sustained scrutiny that would cause people to start asking questions about his unseemly interest in the pubescent granddaughter of Julia Scyphers. Mrs. Scyphers was murdered in July 1978 in what investigators at the time believed to be a contract killing carried out by a member of Kimberlin’s drug-smuggling gang.

The 1978 murder of Julia Scyphers remains officially unsolved, and there is no statute of limitations on murder.

Many people have been deceived or confused by Kimberlin’s tactics, but no honest and intelligent person can be permanently deceived by him. Kimberlin could have been sentenced to 230 years in federal prison for the crimes of which he was convicted. Instead, he was sentenced to 50 years and ultimately served only 17 years, despite the suffering Kimberlin cruelly inflicted on Vietnam veteran Carl DeLong and other innocent victims.

Brett Kimberlin is a vicious liar, a coward and a bully who dishonestly claims victimhood while he unjustly harasses those who speak the truth about him. Yet he has the unmitigated gall to stand in a courtroom and tell a judge that he only wants to be left alone!

Can his lies be permitted to triumph? Only if we lack the courage needed to vindicate Jefferson’s famous maxim: “Truth is great and will prevail.”

– Robert Stacy McCain, Whereabouts Unknown

 

 

 

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Professor Reynolds also links Patterico’s concise summary of the Kimberlin-Raushauser-Brynaert story. I’ve paid relatively scant attention to Brynaert — whom Patterico suspects of complicity in his July 2011 “SWATting” — but notice what happened to Dave Weigel when Brynaert learned Weigel was planning to write about Kimberlin: “How the f**k can you report on Brett Kimberlin without contacting me?”

Brynaert’s serial harassment of other reporters covering the Kimberlin story is . . . well, interesting, to say the least.

UPDATE II: Lee Stranahan on Kimberlin’s partner Brad Friedman and the intriguing boast of their tax-exempt group Velvet Revolution:

We have grant making ability to be able to immediately deliver funds to our members, large and small, to support their opposition actions on the ground, on the net, and across the airwaves.
We work with volunteer and paid attorneys who can go into court to quickly stop major assaults on the rights of the people.

How much money has this allegedly “charitable” operation spent on this 21-month “lawfare” campaign against Kimberlin’s critics? What public purpose has been served by the harassment of Seth Allen, Patrick Frey, Mandy Nagy, Aaron Walker and others? How much has Kimberlin paid Neal Rauhauser, and what services has Rauhauser performed for that pay?

Questions, questions, questions . . .

 


Category: The Kimberlin Files

Comments

41 Responses to “Brett Kimberlin: ‘I Want to Be Left Alone’”

  1. smitty
    July 12th, 2012 @ 11:23 am

    We wanted to be left a loan, too, but the O-Dough didn’t show. :'(

  2. Finrod Felagund
    July 12th, 2012 @ 11:35 am

    Whoever is cross-examining him next, when he claims that he just wants to be left alone, they should ask him “Why can’t you leave Aaron Walker, Patrick Frey, et al alone?”

  3. #BrettKimberin The Cliff’s Notes Version | hogewash
    July 12th, 2012 @ 12:10 pm

    […] UPDATE–Stacy McCain has this summary of Brett Kimberlin’s background and how he lies about his past. […]

  4. robertstacymccain
    July 12th, 2012 @ 12:16 pm

    What I want to see is someone to get Kimberlin under oath and start asking him questions about how much he’s paying Neal Rauhauser.

  5. Rich Vail
    July 12th, 2012 @ 12:17 pm

    Let this be a warning…

    NEVER EVER, piss off Stacy McCain!

  6. Finrod Felagund
    July 12th, 2012 @ 12:21 pm

    Most definitely.  There are lots of fun questions that could be asked of him under oath that he wouldn’t want to answer that would get him and his buddies in all kinds of well-deserved trouble.

  7. Monitor2112
    July 12th, 2012 @ 12:26 pm

    I’d love to see a more in depth reporting on Brynaert.  His participation in all of this is the most confusing.  Someone will hopefully clear up the mystery surrounding his participation someday.

  8. Monitor2112
    July 12th, 2012 @ 12:26 pm

    oh…great article above.  Very powerful and fits Kimberlin to a T

  9. PaulLemmen
    July 12th, 2012 @ 12:30 pm

    As well as where it is paid, what the provenance of the funds is, from what account, banking institution and the transaction record for that account for the past three years …

  10. Pablo
    July 12th, 2012 @ 12:50 pm

    He’s crying about the exact same thing he and his Velveeta Revolution were doing to Breitbart, Rove and the Chamber of Commerce’s Tom Donahue.  Well, almost. No one has put up an Indict Brett Kimberlin website.

    Notice how it’s never a crime when Kimberlin does it?

  11. Pablo
    July 12th, 2012 @ 12:51 pm

    As soon as you realize that the majority of the Team Kimberlin players are certifiable insane, the confusion starts to clear.

  12. ReaganiteRepublican
    July 12th, 2012 @ 1:26 pm

    That’s like lighting the building on fire then complaining about the heat

  13. JeffS
    July 12th, 2012 @ 1:34 pm

    Kimberlin wants to be left alone so that he can continue plying his trade of scamming money and harassing people. 

    It’s what he does.  It’s all that he does.

  14. Bob Belvedere
    July 12th, 2012 @ 1:46 pm

    He’s attempting an old standard Leftist trick: accuse your opposition of exactly what you are doing in order to increase the confusion and cast the seed of doubt in the arbitrators.

  15. Bob Belvedere
    July 12th, 2012 @ 1:46 pm

    It’s what Bolshes do.

  16. Wombat_socho
    July 12th, 2012 @ 1:48 pm

     I was thinking more along the lines of the teenager who kills both his parents and then throws himself on the mercy of the court because he’s an orphan.

  17. EarlScruggs
    July 12th, 2012 @ 1:51 pm

    Notices he drags people into court and then claims that their defenses are harassment.  

    If he doesn’t want to answer questions in court, he shouldn’t go to court.  

  18. Tennwriter
    July 12th, 2012 @ 1:51 pm

    You’re a bad, bad person. Punsters deserve to be PUNished.

  19. fourbten
    July 12th, 2012 @ 2:07 pm

    Why the hell can’t you get a more recent picture of this character? 

  20. Aws3942
    July 12th, 2012 @ 2:16 pm

    From the mug shot… is he really 5’4″?  That would explain an awful lot.

  21. Adjoran
    July 12th, 2012 @ 2:32 pm

    Wow, Kimberlin really does NOT like to be questioned, does he? 

    Get him on the stand as often as possible.  A lot of judges wouldn’t have allowed him to blatantly avoid answering questions like that.  Contempt citations can be large clubs.

    And depositions in civil discovery can go on for days.

  22. Instapundit » Blog Archive » PATTERICO: A Condensed Version Of The Kimberlin Story. UPDATE: Related thoughts from Lee Strana…
    July 12th, 2012 @ 2:32 pm

    […] ANOTHER UPDATE: Brett Kimberlin: “I want to be left alone.” […]

  23. The #BrettKimberlin Report D+48: He’s Got Greta Garbo Eyes « The Camp Of The Saints
    July 12th, 2012 @ 2:42 pm

    […] From Stacy’s post: …Keep in mind that the only reason Kimberlin became an object of widespread attention since May 17 is because Kimberlin has pursued a campaign of legal harassment of bloggers, including a false accusation of assault against Walker. […]

  24. JeffS
    July 12th, 2012 @ 2:53 pm

    Wouldn’t a BK meltdown from THAT be epic?

    Heh!

  25. richard mcenroe
    July 12th, 2012 @ 2:54 pm

     Here you go….

    http://tinyurl.com/87fsu3r

  26. Red
    July 12th, 2012 @ 3:11 pm

    More like never harass his family.

  27. #BrettKimberlin and Chutzpah | hogewash
    July 12th, 2012 @ 3:42 pm

    […] UPDATE–Stacy McCain says: Brett Kimberlin is a vicious liar, a coward and a bully who dishonestly claims victimhood while he unjustly harasses those who speak the truth about him. Yet he has the unmitigated gall to stand in a courtroom and tell a judge that he only wants to be left alone! Share this:TwitterFacebookLinkedInEmailPrintLike this:LikeOne blogger likes this. This entry was posted in Blogging, Crime and tagged Brett Kimberlin by wjjhoge. Bookmark the permalink. […]

  28. Adjoran
    July 12th, 2012 @ 4:17 pm

     The financial questioning alone would be epic – although any number of lines of questioning would tend to make his head explode if these transcripts (including from the Walker hearings) are any indication.

  29. EarlScruggs
    July 12th, 2012 @ 4:24 pm

    Except of course he doesn’t answer the questions that are easy to check truthfully.  He is a convicted perjurer.  He will just lie.  

  30. ReaganiteRepublican
    July 12th, 2012 @ 4:26 pm

    Exactly!

  31. ReaganiteRepublican
    July 12th, 2012 @ 4:28 pm

    That’s what turned Reagan against the far Left back in his movie days… the unions fought with what he saw as ‘underhanded’ methods, and it immediately rubbed him the wrong way

  32. Steve White
    July 12th, 2012 @ 4:37 pm

    I’d like, as part of the interrogatories, to have Mr. Kimberlin produce the applications he submitted to the Tides Foundation and the other foundations that have been giving him and his “non-profit” Velvet Revolution money.

    That would be an interesting read.

    As Paul Lemmen notes, an accounting history of all funds disbursed by Mr. Kimberlin’s VR would also be an interesting read.

    It would also be interesting to subpoena the Tides Foundation, etc. for their records, to corroborate anything Mr. Kimberlin might say in the interrogatories.

  33. CallMeStormy
    July 12th, 2012 @ 5:29 pm

    So I take it that Kimberlin’s favorite movie is GRAND HOTEL, wherein Greta Garbo delivers the immortal lines, “I vant to be alone, I just vant to be alone.”

  34. Thomas L. Knapp
    July 12th, 2012 @ 6:52 pm

    “[A] series of bizarre plots designed to murder, maim and rob his enemies, create havoc . . . and discredit the chief government prosecutor.”

    He throws in that  last part like it’s a bad thing.

  35. jwallin
    July 12th, 2012 @ 9:10 pm

    More like killing one’s parents and then pleading for mercy because you’re an orphan.

  36. Dungeonmaster Jim
    July 12th, 2012 @ 10:06 pm

    I suspect his mania for privacy is because, if we examined his ‘nonprofits’ we would find they are pretty much fronts to funnel him money while not having to pay the judgements he owed to the widow of his victim in Speedway. 

  37. Dungeonmaster Jim
    July 12th, 2012 @ 10:11 pm

    I am thinking more in the lines of ‘Citizen Kane.’ 

    “You’re going to need more than one lesson. And you’re going to get more than one
    lesson.”

  38. Like all bullies, Brett Kimberlin whines like a girl when people hit back. « The Daley Gator
    July 12th, 2012 @ 10:58 pm

    […] McCain has the news that Little Brett just wants to be left alone now that he is getting some of his own medicine. I ask, is there anything more pathetic than a bully […]

  39. The #BrettKimberlin Report D+49: Brett Garbo Part II « The Camp Of The Saints
    July 13th, 2012 @ 10:05 am

    […] commenting on the report by Stacy McCain I quoted yesterday, Dan Collins writes: …Kimberlin learned that he could fool some of the […]

  40. The Damn Dirty RINO
    July 13th, 2012 @ 11:09 am

    Brett Kimberlin’s big advantage . . ….

    Keep peeling. . . . so far has been the extremely complicated nature of the details surrounding his activities and associations. The fact that the story is an exercise in onion-peeling has provided a convenient excuse for more credentialed online outle…

  41. FMJRA 2.0: A Day Late And A Dollar Short : The Other McCain
    July 15th, 2012 @ 8:23 pm

    […] ConservatoryHogewashGrumpy OpinionsThe Camp Of The SaintsDa Tech GuyDarth ChipmunkThat Mr. G GuyBrett Kimberlin: ‘I Want to Be Left Alone’HogewashInstapunditThe Camp Of The SaintsHogewashThe Daley GatorThe Camp Of The SaintsDamn Dirty […]