Where'd Todd Go?
...On Dealing With Psychopaths and Stalking
Preface: No Average "Bullying"...
This is a very frightening story about stalking and harassment...about what a few bad ham radio operators can do with just a few carefully-selected evil words spoken to just a few all-too-paranoid people in just the right very powerful places, and how an innocent person's entire life can be turned upside-down, and his or her civil rights can be quite easily taken away by those with paranoid, prejudice, and hatred in their hearts, who have just the right "connections".
Do you know what it's like to be treated by an entire town like you're a criminal? Do you know what it's like to be accused, tried, convicted, and sentenced for a crime you didn't commit...and yet, not ever see the inside of a courtroom, much less know what you've been accused of? Four levels of government think I'm a bad person, and I don't even know what it was that I did wrong. It sure seems everybody else does, though.
Mass hysteria is an amazing thing to watch happen...who can spark it, how far it can go, and the damage that it can do...before anyone first realizes that they were influenced by it.
What led up to it, how it happened, what happened during, and what happened after...is a large-scale learning experience in psychology and sociology.
I watched helplessly while six ham radio operators systematically went to people in local and higher government circles and caused them to believe that I was such a serious problem that drastic tactics had to be used to "take care of me" and Alachua County SKYWARN. The hams had even been able to convince everyone that I was so smart and so bad that normal due process could not be used to handle me because I was supposedly too smart for that. So everything was handled under the table, unofficially, without notification to superiors, to upper echelon, or on paper. Due Process and the Constitutional Amendments and SOP manuals were all thrown out the door because people wanted to BELIEVE that I was bad. To them, there were no other possibilities, no other explanations, and they would entertain no other theories which would DISPUTE what they wanted to believe. Using carefully chosen speech, the hams caused a very frenzied fear and panic over an organization and it's leader. ...And there was nothing that I could do about it except sit back and watch, and cry, and scream "WHY?!" to the sky and to God. Once paranoia gets a foothold, it spreads like a cancer, and it becomes it's own monster...indestructible, unstoppable - a boulder hitting two, then four, then eight, then sixteen, and thirty-two more, etc. - all building up speed on their way down the mountain. Then all the boulders come back to roll OVER the victim, and his friends, and his family, and his professional associations, causing an unbelievable amount of destruction and havoc and ruined lives. And when it's all done, and everyone suddenly realizes that they made a really huge mistake, and that they were completely wrong, well...then everyone who caused the damage runs for a hiding place, and denies their own involvement to a quite expert pathological degree, while at the same time leaving the victim in the same place of a completely decimated reputational status and a permanently destroyed life. ...With no acknowledgement of the wrong, and no apologies, and no recompense, and no effort made to help him back up to where he was before. Quite frankly, this is because to admit the wrong is to open everyone up to lawsuits, and criminal charges, and wide-scale public humiliation and chastising.
Gossip is not funny. Malicious words are not funny. ...And "sticks and stones" is utter bullshit. You remember "Sticks & Stones". Right? It was always your response to bullies when you were little.
I never understood bullies. Not for a long time. You'd think that people like that couldn't possibly exist in this world considering how we're all supposed to be intelligent and how this is supposed to somehow rise us up above the animals and all. Have you ever noticed how they like to work together in packs and gang up on you? Have you noticed how they seem to get this synergistic sadism going while they kick the shit out of you? What kind of people are these? It's like they don't know mercy, care nothing for it, and like they become strengthened and empowered over all the pain and suffering and damage that they cause to you. And that all in itself is frightening enough...realizing that you're not dealing with a normal group of human beings, but rather, with some people who are pretty deep-heartedly sick and twisted and dark. You might be laying there on the ground in a pool of blood, with broken bones, and broken teeth; and yet...they still kick. ...And they kick some more, and then some more, and they continue to punch, and kick a few times more. What kind of people are these, indeed. That is the kind which was chasing after me. Oh, they didn't actually kick, or punch. Instead, they lied, and slandered, and lied some more, and slandered some more...until 4 levels of government, 16 government agencies, 6 police departments, and 4 civilian organizations all believed that I was a serious problem that needed to be "handled".
Much evil exists in this world. Such darkness...more so than you know. ...So much so that you would not care to believe. But it exists, nonetheless. And it can come...from people who are pretending to be your best friends; your biggest supporters. ...From people...who pretend to be of God; and people who pretend to be there to protect you...
You know, Oscar Wilde once said: "He has no 'enemies', but is intensely disliked by his 'friends'." (sigh) In my situation, I have found this to be true. I was surrounded by so many who claimed to be my friend; people who caused me absolute havoc while hiding behind words designed to make it all sound like the havoc was done in my "best interests". You know...to "help" me. However, I challenge anyone who reads this story to still hold the conclusion by the time they are done that anyone mentioned herein had in any way acted as a "friend".
It should be noted that NO names have been changed, here. These are real people - many holding real, public positions. I have not held back.
This blog entry has been up for over four years, now (as of December, 2013), and it has been visited by everyone mentioned within it, as well as by three local police departments, the local State Attorney's Office, and the FBI. I have the IP logs to prove it. The names include officers in those police departments who actually sabotaged cases to protect people whom they thought at the time were innocent, but who were actually duping them. No ONE, no lawyer, no police department, has even so much as sent me a Cease & Desist, a restraining order, made a phone call, knocked on my door, sent me a letter, an email, tried to talk to me or contact me in any way, or tried to take me to court over it. No one herein named wishes to make this any more public than it already now is. To do so could ruin their lives. To publicly stand up and fight me, to call attention to everything they did, would mean immediate political self-assassination. In a perfect Sun Tzu realization, I began to notice that the bad guys are VERY frightened of this blog and curse it's existence but do not seem to be able to do anything about it without calling some form of highly public wrath upon themselves. ...And the sad thing is...it didn't have to BE this way. It all could have been so very easily prevented if just ONE PERSON at ANY LEVEL had spoken the following very words: "Do you have any proof of that?"
Sun Tzu's very first law was that if you didn't want to have the war then you shouldn't fight it. Why did these people have to have the war? Most of all, why didn't they first try to find PROOF that the bad guy was actually a bad guy before they took any actions at all? Sun Tzu also taught that if your enemy cannot put down the war, then you should fight the war more aggressively than your enemy, and, in the end, chop off your opponents head and hold it up for all the other enemies to see. That is what this blog is. ...And the most ironic part?...is that the sword that is cutting off their heads, so to speak, doesn't really belong to me, but instead to my enemies. For some "primitive" guy who was around several thousand long years ago, Sun Tzu really knew what the hell he was talking about. Even thousands of years later, his teachings still ring undeniably true, and always seem to win the test of the challenge; and this blog is testament to that. It actually held back the FBI when someone in the NWS tried to invoke them to harass me into silence. The NWS didn't like that I was mentioning names of federal government employees in my blog, and wanted to "take care of it". The FBI investigated the blog and noted that people in city, county, state, and federal government were apparently picking on a guy who was a federal government employee himself. That I guess changed the whole ball game. Then, as quickly as it was all started, the FBI just..."went away". Interesting, huh? I guess so much for the FBI "taking care of" me. Oddest thing I've ever experienced in my life.
Actually, it now appears that a rogue agent of the FBI is what was investigating me - not the FBI itself. This agent was acting alone, surreptitiously, as a favor to Al Sandrik. He was working at a lonely little 4-man "outpost" of sorts in the middle of nowhere in Virginia. I was able to track the IP address right to it with the help of a nice old man who used to be an agent long ago, who was now a telephone operator for the FBI. Apparently he liked mysteries and he became interested in my story and he was able to help me pinpoint the location of the building, and even it's phone number. A later phone call to that building nabbed me how many people were operating it, although the agent who answered would not give me any names. Four people is much easier to track. I think, now, that the man I was talking to WAS the guy who was Al's friend, giving me the runaraound. I'd be anxious to investigate to see if either of the 4 names cross paths in a background employment history check with Al Sandrik in Naval Criminal Justice - as Al once bragged during a spotter training class. If that turned out to be dead spot on - if there was a connection - then that would be very interesting indeed, and Al, and the agent, would be nabbed. But no...there was no real, official "investigation" of me. It was just Al...misusing/misappropriating government resources to dig up informational dirt on someone that he apparently disliked, trying to cull a "favor" of a past friend he once worked with in the Navy, I suspect. Had the FBI really been investigating, there would be a lot more to this story. But there isn't. So what happened was done under the noses of the FBI, by a agent acting surreptitiously who didn't want upper echolon to know. I know. I've called and made complaint, and asked questions about it. They have nothing in their records to show any investigation of me whatsoever. Odder still though, was that on notification of this weird "event", there was no further FBI investigation of it as you might expect. Wouldn't you think that they'd want to know who was doing all that mis-using? Al Sandrik had a friend in the FBI and he tried to curry his favor and the rogue agent utilized official government resources to "investigate" someone without the knowledge or approval of FBI HQ, without the authority of a Judge's signature. That's a no-no, and Al could get into a lot of trouble for doing that, and so could his little FBI "friend".
Ironically...placing this blog up was the only thing that made all the harassments actually stop. It is testament to the fact that "bullies"...just don't like publicity. No matter how much they might tell you to keep your mouth shut; no matter how much they may threaten you and how frightening it initially feels to experience that...the moral is that you should NOT keep your mouth shut and that you should complain as loudly in fact as possible. Otherwise, they retain a complete control of you and they will always hold the upper hand over you. And when your bully has the upper hand...you should break it...with as loud a snap as possible for all their friends to hear. This very strategy has actually worked extremely well for me, in fact. ...Unpredictability. They don't know how to handle that. My bullies instead ran away and stopped everything dead rather than continue and chance being caught by a witness. Getting caught is a very frightening thing for bullies to deal with. They're actually pretty chicken-shit, at heart. It's a big secret that most victims don't know about. Most victims never realize this though, and that's why bullies are so often allowed to get away with what they do. The victims are usually too afraid to stand up for themselves for fear of even worse reprisals.
All that being said though, today I still find that I am extremely frightened of ham radio operators and I really don't ever want anything to do with them ever again in my entire lifetime. I'm scared shitless of them. I still have my license, and I keep a 2-meter radio in the car for dire emergencies, but it is disconnected and otherwise not used. I still have my ham tag on my car but its main purpose is mostly so that so that my callsign remains seen by all of the people who caused me so much harm so that they know that I'm still here and that they haven't been able to make me completely disappear; and hopefully, it also causes them something of a serious migraine. ...But really, that is as much as I ever want to do with ham radio anymore because of what the hams here have been so easily able to do to me. Hams scare me because of how much POWER they are blindly given by emergency management and other powerful agencies, and because of how many times that I have seen them severely ABUSE that power to cause harm to others.
While I understand that there are those who had nothing to do with the Alachua County hams, I no longer see ham radio as something which should be supported by emergency management or any other government services to any real trusting degree. This is because in all of my lifetime's experiences with ham radio operators, I have seen too much infighting, too much rabid talk, too much hate and spite, too much jealously, too much irresponsibility, and far too much immaturity. When hams are given too much power, they become arrogant and get a god complex. They are far too willing to be able to use it to cause harm to others. Until such time as I see a change in this attitude and behavior, I am also defacto scared of emergency management and how easily it can be manipulated by hams. Local emergency management has shown just as much irresponsibility and immaturity. In terms of my personal treatment by local EM, it was extremely unprofessional, and dangerously negligent. Ever since we lost Craig Fugate and he became the Director of the Federal Division of Emergency Management, things just haven't been the same here in Alachua County. Dave Donnelly just isn't as responsible and I've found that a lot of his actions just haven't been well thought out or very prudently handled, and he has allowed himself to fall into the line of fire for some very seriously actionable things - by taking gossip and rumor and acting upon it without first asking a question so very simple as "Do you have any proof of that?" ACOEM, and NWS, at this time, are not in possession of any affidavits from their supposed "sources" that touted that I was such a "problem". And they cannot now later obtain them, after the fact, either. This is turning out to be quite a nightmare for them, now.
You know, it occurs to me that if there were ever to be a way "in" found by terrorists into our government operations, it would be through emergency management by posing as trusted ham radio operators, who today apparently aren't checked much beyond a lowest-level security check.
While I'm at it though, I feel compelled to make one thing perfectly clear here so that there is no misunderstanding... We're not talking about government conspiracies in this blog. I just don't believe in those. What I do believe is that ignorant people with self-serving interests can obtain positions in government and then abuse the powers which are given them; and/or that otherwise good people who hold government positions can become manipulated by self-serving amateur radio operators whose goal is to twist facts in ways which serve themselves and to use that to cause fear and panic in innocent-yet-gullible leaders who don't know better. THAT...I actually believe in. (Those leaders are still responsible for their actions and inactions, though.) THAT is what is being described, herein...and nothing more.
It is hoped that what is contained herein may be of some actual, helpful learning service to others who have been victims of bullies or the more hardcore "psychopaths".
(This particular blog entry continuously under construction. Keep checking back. It's a long jumble right now. I know. But I'm putting it together slowly and over time it will eventually become better formatted and organized. So bear with me.)
NOTE: This particular blog entry contains "cite" references which are clickable and take you to a separate page which contains additional information about the linked topic, such as example emails, journals kept, or more detailed descriptions of something. The cites are denoted by superscripted, bolded numerals. They ARE composed of smaller type and could be easily missed.
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Chapter 1 "ARE YOU GOING TO BE ALRIGHT?"
Just before my mom died of cancer some years ago in June of 2007, she asked me: Are you going to be alright...with the SKYWARN thing, I mean?
I remember feeling caught off-guard. I stared at the ground, my mouth agape. I suddenly found myself fighting this overwhelming urge to cry. Catching myself, I closed my mouth, looked back up at her face, and smiling I said "Yah. Sure. I'll be fine. I'll be alright. You know me. I'm way stronger than them." I feigned a chuckle.
I was in her room at Hospice, standing next to her over her bed. She was struggling laboriously to breathe through the O2 mask. She wasn't too much longer for this earth...and I knew it; it was just a matter of time. She died just a few days later. It was the last real conversation that I'd had with my mother. After this, she went into a days-long coma and then she died. I never really got to prepare. I never was able to get in my good-bye. With all of the insane things that were all going on at the same time - including having to deal with the insensitive hams who were stalking me even up to the time of my mother's death - I'd felt ripped off of that moment.
...My mom had DAYS; she was in SO much god-awful pain; she was about to DIE and she knew it...and all she was concerned about wasn't herself; but me.
...I lied. ...Straight through my teeth, I lied. I wasn't strong; I was a god damned wreck, and I knew damned well that she knew I was hiding it. I had no idea what was going to happen. I had no idea if this would ever be resolved, if I'd ever get my name back, if the Alachua County SKYWARN program would ever see the light of day again. Six local hams had...done things...gone WAY too far...put the lifestyles and careers of many people at risk because of what they had done. Everything was destroyed, and my name was left in ruin. ...Everything that I had worked so hard on over the many years...laid waste. In my life, all I've ever wanted to do was help people. I did that. ...I guess a little too well. Some people in ham radio circles became jealous and continually tried to think of ways to get me "out of the way."
There is no real SKYWARN program here in Alachua County anymore now because of what the hams had done - aside from a web page and any personally-arranged educational presentations we might put on, here and there...if any. The Weather Service loathes coming back here again to do any more spotter classes or presentations because they are too afraid of the things that have happened down here, and too disgusted to sort it all out or to deal with all the questions that they don't want to be forced to answer. ...And with good reason.
...And ALL that I had ever done, was sit at home...and watch it all happen, out of my control - and there was NOTHING that I could do. ...Nothing. I had no control. (sigh) I had NO control.
Many have wondered what happened to me these past number of years.
...Stalking, harassment, harassment of friends, of family, bullying, cyber bullying, cyber stalking, other computer crimes, threatening of my friend's careers (by Jay Lieberman/KE4FER), threats vague, implied, indirect and direct of harm, to keep my mouth shut (by Scott West/KG4VWD, and Phil Royce/KE4PWE), of meeting me in "dark alleys" (Phil Royce/KE4PWE), people creating accounts in my name and using them to send me harassing emails (Melissa Royce/KE4WBQ), threatening messages left on my answering machine (Scott West/KG4VWD, Melissa Royce), scary SONGS left on my answering machine (Melissa Royce/KE4WBQ), hacking of my computers (Jeff Capehart/W4UFL) and the resultant perusal of federally protected Personally Identifiable Information. Jeff himself kept a dark secret from everyone around him. He was a past criminal; an ex-con who, along with his then girlfriend Susan Tipton/K9PDL, had been convicted of hacking University of Florida computers before. All except Jay Leiberman had actually committed some form of a cybercrime in order to harass and stalk me.
You know, when celebrities are stalked, they're stalked by maybe one individual. ...At least, one at a time, anyway. ...Usually.
...I was stalked by six...simultaneously...sometimes in coordinated, tag-team fashion. One would stop, and another would take over. Sometimes they'd double-team me, or triple-team me. They were relentless, and merciless. ALL were ham radio operators, and either Members or Associate Members of both the Gainesville Amateur Radio Society and the University of Florida's Gator Amateur Radio Club, as well as being concurrent members of some form of Emergency Management and/or Red Cross program or another such as CERT, or ACFR Reserves, or the ACFR ham radio club, or something. They all served in public service activities in some fashion or another, such as providing communications for local walks or runs, or in shelters during local emergencies. This helped to provide a form of alibi which itself provided an invulnerability if ever their integrity was questioned. Doing anything to make these people stop was exceptionally difficult because they had the ear and cooperation of people in important places.
There were threatening e-mails (Scott West, Melissa Royce). There was e-mail bombing (Scott West), and pager bombing (Scott West). ("Bombing" involves overloading of your email and/or pager/cellphone with messages, so much so that your mailbox quota can be filled, or your communications are disrupted. You can also end up with excessive charges on your bill as a result.) Malicious gossip and rumor was spread around strategically to various important places and public officials, and to many people in the general public, resulting in the disreputation of my name and that of Alachua County SKYWARN, and a total destruction of any opportunity for any further civilian-run spotter programs in this county or ANY county across the entire NWS-JAX County Warning Area. They created duplicate impersonating accounts in Yahoo and Facebook for Alachua County SKYWARN (Melissa Royce), and even as recently as February 2010 created a duplicate account in Twitter (Melissa Royce). Those accounts serve no actual functional purpose, are never used, do absolutely nothing, nothing is ever posted to them and they are completely blank. And yet confused, unknowing people continue to subscribe to them and I've not been able to get Melissa or Emergency Management (the agency responsible for her at the time and under whose power she created them) to remove them. In February, 2009, one of my stalkers hacked into our EMWIN server (Jeff Capehart), perusing logs which contained names, email addresses, telephone numbers...otherwise known as "PII" or "Personally Identifiable Information" of those who had subscribed to our free weather alerts dissemination program. When personally asked WHY he did it, Jeff responded "BECAUSE YOU WERE PISSING ME OFF!!! YOU WOULDN'T DO WHAT I WANTED!!!" (The story is elaborated upon more later in this blog.)
...And every time I went to anyone in authority, I was treated like I was being ridiculous. The police and other authorities actually became a hindrance, actually interfered, got in the way, and both deliberately and accidentally (through incompetent carelessness and/or outright refusal to believe me) sabotaged any cases that I had filed or attempted to file. (This includes GPD, UPD, ACSO, and the local State Attorney's Office.) My harassers knew too many people, participated in too many public service activities, were looked up to by everyone, and I...was just some idiot who was "picking" on them, as the blaming decry went. The bullies never had to prove anything, nor explain anything. On the other hand, I had to have "proof" of everything or no one wanted to give it any serious attention at all. The police would generally (and conveniently) describe the situation as a "turf war" - even though I was a non-participant and it was all one-way. Once they had done that, they used it as excuse to blow it all off. Once police departments label your situation as stupid, you're done for. You can forget it. ...And they all back each other up, too.
If they make a mistake in investigating, they'll lie, they'll "forget", they'll deny even having talked to you about some things, or that some conversations ever even happened. Because once they realize that what you were complaining about was actually REAL, and that they guessed wrong about you, and that their ignorance of your situation actually ended up causing you further harm that could have been prevented by them, then they go into a denial mode to protect themselves. They buddy up and support each other with lies, and exaggerations, denials, and misplaced or deliberately uncollected evidence. They don't want lawsuits, and bad press attention, or embarrassment, reprimands, or destroyed careers. Lawsuits and criminal charges would mean a courtroom. A courtroom would mean a mandatory investigation. An investigation would prove that what I'm talking about herein actually happened, and in so doing, serve to legitimize my case...and they don't want that. And in considering just how badly people acted and just how far people went, the Press would really have a huge field day with all of this. It would make the national news. I mean...seriously: four levels of government, sixteen government agencies, six police departments (including the FBI and Naval Criminal Justice), and four civilian organizations (including a national one called the National Association for Amateur Radio [ex ARRL]). The Press loves conspiracy theories, and "Big Brother" picking on the little guy...and it would be handed to them on a silver platter by the very same people who were supposed to be out there to protect us. So they cover themselves, and in so doing, the innocent victim ends up becoming the bad guy..."for the good of the many", "for the good of the whole." You, and your plight, become sacrifice. Now you're a liar. Now you're a lunatic. You're labeled. Cops write up the reports to make you sound like you were crazy. They leave out important details about your interaction with them...conversations had, requests made, calls made, emails sent, actions they were supposed to take but didn't, inexplicably. They all disappear.
All of this...has happened to me.
The song once left on my answering machine was weird. "...WHY don't you just BREEEEAK down!...".1 It had been left by someone who had used a false Caller ID, which indicated that it had supposedly been sent from a Comfort Inn located off of Archer Road here in Gainesville (in the area behind the Target store). The lyrics when sung completely out have a completely different and very innocent context. However, considering what was happening at the time, I knew that the message that was left was meant in a much more dark and sinister way by the person leaving it. When you consider how it was left and that the CID was falsified, no one will argue with me there. The part that was left on my machine was the last part - the last two paragraphs. It wasn't an accident. It was a message...that some smart ass had edited and crafted specifically for me. When I called the hotel and asked if they had any record in their logs of any calls being made to me from their number, they checked and found no such record. Was the hotel clerk in on it? Was she lying? Was she responsible; or perhaps covering for somebody she knew? Was I being ridiculous to even suspect the hotel clerk like that? Was I being overly paranoid?
I had no idea at first how anyone could even get away with something like that without being - I dunno...an employee of the phone company? ...an officer of the law, with access to specialized electronic equipment located within what would have to be agencies such as the Alachua County Sheriff's Office, or some other law enforcement agency? But I mean, devices such as these would be held behind locked, secured doors...with keycard- or passcode-controlled access. Right? And wouldn't they keep a log of who accessed this equipment, too?...of who used it, how long it was out, who brought it back, and how it was used? Wouldn't you think that there'd be a video camera to record who accesses the room? I mean, Otherwise...who the hell would have access to the seemingly illicit equipment required to do such a thing as that?
Pfbt! That's the movies, people. They don't protect stuff to that degree, they don't keep track of who accesses specialized equipment like they do in 'Mission Impossible', and that holographic display that they use in 'Bones' to put faces together (and do other things) does not exist.
I have no idea how GPD, or ASO, or whoever else who owns dangerous equipment such as that actually handles their security; but somehow, I seriously doubt that they keep it as tightly secured as I suggest, above. And if there was just ONE bad cop with access to it...that's all that it would take.
THAT BEING SAID, I don't think that this came from stolen or illicitly-used police equipment. I doubt it. Too risky.
One of my harassers - Philip Royce - works for the Alachua County Sheriff's Office. He installs and fixes mobile unit radios. He's the "Lead Equipment Installer", or something like that. He didn't like me because I once told his wife Melissa to stop calling me all the time. He'd openly bragged to numerous hams that I should "watch out" and that I "better hope (he) doesn't meet (me) in any dark alleys", and things like that. I wondered if it might have anything to do with him. ...Because see, his wife, in violation of cyber stalking laws, had once sent me a harassing email by forging my name to create a Yahoo account. So the family kinda has a history of this sort of stuff. But I was just guessing. I mean, sheesh! I'm accusing the Sheriffs Office of all things now, here!
But you know?...that's how this stuff goes, though. That's what it does.
Then I rented a movie recently called "Untraceable", and I lost my breath when Diane Lane's character mentioned something called a "SpoofCard" [http://www.spoofcard.com]2, which allows people to call others up using a false CID, and to use computer-generated voices in male or female choices, and to harass innocent people. I looked it up on the web. It's real. It actually exists. It's NOT some writer's imaginary suspense tool. So far, there hasn't been any objection from legislators and there are no current laws against the use of stuff like this at this time. It's very real, though. It really does exist. And there's nothing that you can do about it, apparently. If people want to use it to harass you, they can.
I have been in hiding from these scary people, trying to stay out of their way, and they would still attack. If I wasn't available directly, they'd just go after my friends, or my associations, or my public service-related contacts. One was going to try to destroy my best friend's career in the Navy through the use of false information designed to make the Navy think that she was a some sort of an extreme security risk - a vague implication that she might be a terrorist! ...Just to get at ME! I lost friends and acquaintances because so many different people were simultaneously attacking me and any people who associated with me - even my business-related associations. ...And they disassociated with me, not because I was a problem, but because it was dangerous to associate with me, and to associate with me might mean that they too might become targeted, and/or, their families. This was not incorrect or failed logic, it was prudent and very accurate precautionary thinking; and sadly, there was nothing I could do about it. They were absolutely, 100-percent correct to react this way, and I knew it. I knew it. There was nothing I could do. It devastated me.
I cried a lot; repeatedly. And I didn't have anybody to go to. My mom had just died. My family was gone. My friends were hiding. My car had just been totaled because someone was driving on a license that had been suspended due to a previous DWI, and suddenly I was having to rush around in a rental car to find a replacement so that I didn't lose my job. At the same time, that job often required me driving up to 200 miles away to do surveys for the Census Bureau[see note]. I was doing double-time hours to try to stay ahead in the midst of the loss caused by having to rent a car for two weeks while trying to find a replacement auto. I have to say that the Census Bureau really helped me out during a very super horrific time for me. They did what they could to actually help me in a dire situation, and I was very grateful. They asked if I needed some time off, but I actually needed MORE hours to keep afloat; so they tried to accommodate me by giving me twice the normal caseload. But the double hours and mileage meant nearly no time to myself. I had a funeral to arrange, a eulogy to write, a remembrance video to put together, a replacement auto to find. I suddenly had old tax and other documents to go through, TWO tax returns to research and file, and a sudden executorship and last-minute unhandled final affairs with numerous companies to handle which Mom had not taken care of. I had all of this to worry about...ALL AT ONCE. Meanwhile Jeff was taunting me with Scott while at the same time he belittled my situation and tried to make me feel like I was an asshole for suggesting that he lay off and that having to deal with all of that was quite a lot for someone. (I still have that email.) He acted like an especially insensitive asshole during that time. Everybody did. I was literally getting NO sleep because every moment of my god damned days were being taken up for a good many months. ...And all the while, these guys were cruelly playing games and toying with me! I had to deal with it totally alone, by myself, and give my OWN consoling. I can tell you from experience that dealing with all of this was NOT easy and I would NEVER wish anything like it upon anyone else. My stalkers had ZERO sympathy, ZERO emotional understanding, and didn't care about any of the hardships that I was having to go through. They just wanted to destroy, destroy, destroy...at ALL costs. There was NO other agenda. Just...DESTROY. ...EVERYTHING. These are some REALLY scary people.
If you have to deal with stuff like this for long enough, what happens to you is that your entire mission in life becomes just to find NORMAL people...so desperately just to find normal people...normal people to be normal friends. You end up crying to yourself, asking, "Why can't I have NORMAL friends? ...WHY?" ...People who mean what they say, who will stand BY you, who won't betray you when the crunches come, whom you can trust and share your secrets with without fear that they'll try to use them against you...people who like you for you and not because you have something they want or because they want to try to use you for something they think that they can suck off of you - like some form of attention or fame or spotlight that they may even see you as "hording" from everyone else. Things like honesty, loyalty, integrity, honor, chivalry...these otherwise normally non-significant things suddenly start to matter to you a lot; and you start to look for those qualities in people; and suddenly everyone is on probation and everyone is being analyzed. Suddenly, you also begin to realize just how quickly people really are ready to sacrifice one another, and just as suddenly you also begin to doubt in people, and you lose a lot of faith. That's what this does to you. Suddenly the whole world becomes a much darker place and your emotions drop and you come to a crossroads: Do I give up completely? or do I keep moving forward and onwards...believing in myself and standing up for what I believe in...no matter what? NOW the world is a giant test...in your strength, in your character, and in your belief in your own self.
I will confess that on a number of occasions I actually thought about buying a gun and putting it to my head. They were that bad; and I was that badly depressed as a result of the things these people were doing. Everything in my life was upside-down. People were harassing and stalking me, and the police wouldn't help me, and would actually make FUN of my situation. All around me, my friends were running away because they didn't want to be attacked for associating with me. EM and NWS were actually led to believe that I was a real problem, and no one wanted to talk to ME. What do you DO in a situation like that? What do you do?
I eventually came around, though. I always come around. I'm too damned stubborn and strong. I don't like bad people winning. I always get back up. It's just not in me to accept bad situations and just let the inevitable happen like some stupid deer in headlights if I can help it. People may successfully get me down for a time; but for some odd reason I always come out of it and - like a dumbass rushing straight into the bullets - I get right back up and I do what I can to alter my situation, and to try to improve it. There is always a way. Sometimes you just have to sit back and think about it. Sometimes, it takes a while to realize. There's always something you can do; something you can use. I'm patient. I always find it.
Meantime, having good people around you is important. In your life you should always seek out the strong, good-hearted people, and keep them close to you. In my situation, though, the people who had claimed to be my friends were dropping like flies. Only one remained. Though it was stressed by what was going on, that friendship still remained, regardless.
Some times, you'll think you've found some decent people. But most, you'll be wrong, and end up disappointed and distraught, because these dark people tend to surround themselves with dark people - people who are sometimes even darker than they are. They'll even con other people into believing that you're the dark one, and then you'll end up finding yourself battling endless lines of newer and newer people who gullibly believed them. For every gullible person that you knock down, the dark people have a way of endlessly drawing upon more gullible people who are willing to believe in them and become their servants. You can knock down ten thousand...but "Saurumon" (so to speak) just has another one hundred thousand hiding in the darkness, somewhere. ...And they just keep coming. Finding real FRIENDS...is not possible in such a world, because you don't know who to trust, and because the legitimate people often end up scared away after being attacked too many times.
You end up standing all alone, by yourself. Where do you find consolation in such a situation? Where do you find strength? Where do you find encouragement? All lame poetry and writings aside which would otherwise lift your spirits, the absolute truth is...without REALLY good friends who are willing to stand by you no matter what (and most all of mine ran for the hills out of fear of attack or retribution by my stalkers), there IS nothing. It's all on you...alone.
I keep this poster above my desk in my office here at home...
...I came upon it while perusing Michael's one day with my girlfriend. They just had it out there on display. I suddenly stopped and stared and then some tears started coming down my face. She asked me what was wrong. "Look at the poster!", I said. "...What does it SAY?" She began to read the words beneath it. "No" I said. "I meant look at the picture itself. What IS that? That's ME! That's my life! That's what's going on...RIGHT now...NO words needed. ...The harassments, the stalking, the problems, me standing in the middle of it all, and not being able to do a DAMNED thing about it; but still standing there, nonetheless. It says EVERYTHING without having to SAY anything at all." We stared at it a little more. Then I read the words beneath, and the words said exactly what I already saw in the picture. We took it home.
The picture depicted in art the situation of someone standing in amidst a scary, threatening sea, rock-bounded in place with no where to go, nowhere to hide, with the seeming power of GOD happening out of control all around him, and not being able to do a damned thing about it. It to me seemed to show someone in the midst of God-awful-scary situations, with the entire world seeming to be threatening him all around, and attacking at his foundation. And yet, it depicted that person still standing there, nonetheless, and the most important part - still carrying out the more-important mission regardless of it all - and trying to do something to protect the people.
The picture is reminder to me to not let what these people did get to me, to stand strong, no matter what happens. It is reminder for me to keep on truckin' on, no matter what they throw at me. It is reminder to keep my morals, my values, my ideals, my wits, and my sanity. It is reminder that I am better than the bad people, and that while everything in my immediate world seems to be going so badly, I've still got my my cats, my teddy bear, my good looks, my girlfriend, my sense of humor, I'm still surviving, and I hold on to the hope that other people can still see what is really going on. But in reality, that's actually doubtful because of the immense control that the bad people seem to hold on others. Still, I see this poster every day, and it allows me to continue.
Oh and, if you're wondering who the artist of the painting is...his name is Steve Bloom. Thank you, Steve, for the right-on, perfect sentiment.
Chapter 2 BECOMING AN UNWILLING EXPERT
I have effectively become an "expert" now on harassment and stalking; on psychopathy and sociopathy, and other Anti-social Personality Disorders. (Note that I said "effectively", and not literally. I make NO claim to having any degrees on the subject. That being said, having read what I have, and experienced what I have, puts me a bit farther ahead than most.) I have purchased four books on the subject, now - each with copious highlighting, notes, and Post-its attached. They include Nasty People (Jay Carter), the sociopath next door (Martha Stout), Without Conscience (Robert D. Hare), and Snakes In Suits (Paul Babiak and Robert D. Hare). All are very good books on the subject of Anti-social Personality Disorders and psychopathy/sociopathy. For those who have been victims of people like this I highly recommend them: for general people, cops, social workers, and even research workers - be you psychology-related or forensics-related. You can't do any research on these people without first understanding some VERY important things about them. To TRUST them during your research efforts is to make a HUGE mistake. These people have the ability to make a cop believe that a senseless murder was actually okay, and actually even necessary, and you WILL come away laughing, grinning, and agreeing with these types, even feeling sorry for them, and/or even feeling that they were inspiring people to talk to!...even innocent! In fact, if you're particularly gullible, you won't even MAKE it to the part where you get home and ask yourself how that even just happened. Some come away truly believing in every word they heard, convinced to research no further than the self-deluded speeches of the psychopath, becoming a die hard follower! I'm not making that up. Trained psychoanalysts have complained of having been so manipulated and duped during prison interviews with them. It's been documented...time and again! Read the damned books, people! It's more important than you know. I've also read online articles such as Suffering Souls (John Seabrook), and watched documentary films such as The Art of Urban Survival - Chapter One: Defense Against The Psychopath (Stefan H. Verstappen) which makes a good quick summary, and I, Psychopath (Ian Walker). Unfortunately, I know more than most average people know about socio/psychopathy - barring other victims, and not counting, of course, the psychologists out there who have actually made specific studies into it. I know for a fact that I know far more than the local cops apparently do...and I can tell you that they know utterly nothing, and believe in a lot of utter nonsensical, suppositional, and "gut feeling" crapola, instead - which is almost always wrong. They aren't aware that they should even be concerned about such a thing called "psychopathy" or "sociopathy". It's a very unfortunate and very disconcerting thing too, because they are the people you go to to handle problems with people like this. And when they don't know what they're dealing with, it's usually YOU who ends up getting blamed, accused of exaggerating things and of blowing things way out of proportion, and there's a tendency in police departments to minimalize the events and the trauma that you're going through, and to even make fun of you, and to look at you like you're the problem, instead. It's quite scary to experience. You have NO idea what it's like. And what usually happens is, when the bad guys see that even the COPS aren't willing to come to your rescue, they usually get worse. And that's what happened to me. (In my case, cops went as far as to deliberately sabotage a harassment case that I'd filed against two people, and another department haphazardly fumbled a computer hacking case that I'd filed against another person - preventing it from ever seeing the light of day in any courtroom - because they'd listened to a Faculty Advisor who spoke highly of the perpetrator and vouched for him. [The same Emergency Manager who had interfered in the previous harassment investigation that I'd filed with GPD had talked with the Faculty Advisor and convinced him yet again that I was a problem, not the perpetrator.] As a result, the police didn't take me seriously, and keystone-copped the handling of the investigation and the evidence.)
I wouldn't have known to research the right subject had I not accidentally read Nasty People, a book that my mother happened to have on her bookshelf. I was packing away her things and I came across it. Dunno where she got it. I know that at one time she was having a problem with some really mean and vindictive co-workers at the VA and I suspect that her lawyer may have suggested it to her. I read it. And what I read matched just about everything that I had been experiencing. It consoled me and scared me at the same time. After reading that book, I wanted to know more; and I graduated on to the others.
I wanted to know what was wrong with me that so many people felt they needed to treat me this way, and bring harm to me. I wanted to understand. I wanted to know what to do. How do I protect myself? How do I make them stop? What was going ON? ...and WHY? What the hell was DRIVING these people to go SO FAR??? ...to go so far that they often put themselves at risk of being caught, and so vehemently that they end up risking the careers and lifestyles of those around them, too, without concern? What made them so TUNNEL-VISIONED on attacking me? There is either a very, very real HATRED going on, here...or there is something definitely, seriously, and DREADFULLY wrong with these people! ...What did I DO????
But it wasn't me. It had nothing to do with me. It had to do with them. It had to do with people who wanted fame and attention and power. At first I was a means to thier ends. But when I discovered who they were, suddenly I was in the WAY of their end, and I'd figured them out; and they felt it was necessary to destroy my reputation and believability in order to protect themselves - before I called their attention to the rest of the world.
I was dealing with "psychopaths."
...And all of them...were either Officers, Members and/or Associates of the Gainesville Amateur Radio Society (GARS) and the University of Florida's Gator Amateur Radio Club (GARC). Both organizations were producing people who were by the perfect definition a real danger to society.
But I'm done hiding. I'm done putting up with these people. I'm not going to deal with it anymore. I'm standing up for myself, now. And I'm coming back out into the light again. I can't let these people destroy me and my life. I have to get control back.
In the meantime, I have decided to document it. I've decided to put it out there for other people - as warning to the existence of these types of people, as warning to watch out for them, as a means of recognizing the things that they can pull, the things that they can do to you, as a means of understanding in some way, and in so doing, thus becoming a means of coping, and of consolation to other victims by helping them to know that it wasn't their fault. It is also hoped that some scientists somewhere will be able to aid in the study of bullies and bullying; of psychopaths.
There is SOME random, miscellaneous information about what happened to me available elsewhere - such as in the Alachua County SKYWARN What's New and News & Announcements pages, and in some other places - that I've been slowly working on. But they weren't really the appropriate venue, and more importantly, it was hard at the time to rehash the things that were happening to me. For a while it was like this: You want to warn people and to let them know; but then, what happened to you is also so traumatic that you really can't bring yourself to go back over it again at that moment. I'd start writing, and then I'd say to myself "I just can't go fully back into this just yet." And so, I'd stop typing and the entry would be shorter than I wanted, or perhaps even contain so little information that it would not make much sense. But lately, this blog seems to be gleaning most all of my energy and attention right now, and I think I'm going to go with it and make THIS the most important document. I'll copy it to some other side places, too; refine it; organize it better. Then I think I may even actually look into publishing it...be it with changes, as a psychological thriller; or maybe as an educational tool based on real-life events. I don't know. But I'm NOT gonna sit by and just take this up my butt and "keep my mouth shut" (as Frederick Scott West once put it), if that's what people are thinking.
Chapter 3 WHAT IS A PSYCHOPATH?
All this talk about "psychopaths". What IS a "psychopath", anyway?
Friedrich Nietzsche wrote: "The irrationality of a thing is no argument against its existence, rather a condition of it.
Here's is what I have learned about psychopaths from actual personal experiences...
Psychopaths con. Psychopaths manipulate. Psychopaths lie. Psychopaths cheat. Psychopaths want something from you, but you rarely ever know it until it's too late. They're good at hiding their secret motives from you. If caught in a lie, they brush it off with a very quickly answered denial and something just as nonsensical and just as confident-sounding as the original lie, which often either sounds good enough to throw you off again, or at least leaves you feeling just as frustratingly confused as when you began. Usually though, most people never even catch the nonsense in the words because people like to listen more to the SOUND of confidence in someone's voice, rather than for the logic. Psychopaths know this, and they use it as a tool with a mastered excellence. They're good at using you without you ever figuring it out until it doesn't matter to them anymore. But by the time you figure it out, it's usually not before they brought some extreme damage to your life. Psychopaths always have an ulterior motive. If they are hovering around you, you have something they want, or they think that you can be utilized like a tool to GET what they want. They almost "woo" you when they think they need you. They impress you with their knowledge and abilities. They may do you lots of favors to try to win you over. They may immerse themselves in lots of public service work to hide behind and give themselves a seeming "alibi" if their personality is ever challenged. With psychopaths, it's always "a means to some end." When they're done with you, they discard you like so much trash. They always try to make you do things which can be used against you later, for the "just in case". Psychopaths never share information that you want without getting something in return, now or later. They never really give anything away "for free". There WILL come a time when they want your favors in return...and it's always something inconvenient. If you figure them out and get in their way, they will destroy you. They know everyone, have more friends than you, know more people up high than you do, can curry more favors and power than you, and have a way of making everyone trust and believe in them, while making you look like an idiot and a nutcase.
Psychopaths are very often very highly intelligent. They are good at what they do. Experts, in fact. Unless you know what you're doing, it is very dangerous to attempt to fight them publicly.
They don't understand the "good" emotions, and yet they know very well the "dark side" emotions. They have no conscience. And this is hard for the rest of us "normals" to understand...like fully comprehending what "endless space" really means. It's foreign to us. We want to apply normal psychology to them, but that's not possible. We want to apply normal human thinking and reasoning to them. We want to forgive them and to help "rehabilitate" them; but that's dangerous because it can't be done - because they're genetically or sociologically predisposed to be what they are, and to do what they do. To try to rehabilitate them usually results in our own destruction in the end. God, Jesus, Allah...they are tools to the psychopaths. They'll only use them to make you think they've "seen the light" so as to buy themselves time to formulate their next plan. Do they understand the meaning of God's teachings? No. To them, God was just some idiot whose sole purpose is to create sheep prey for them.
Psychopaths can easily be detected if people would just listen. Often psychopaths say things which are highly contradictory, and/or which make no sense. But they HIDE their deceit behind carefully constructed intonation and inflection designed to sound exceptionally confident; so much so that no one ever dares challenge them, even when what they're saying is obviously flawed. No one challenges their contradictions because no one wants to end up in a publicly loud verbal fight with them, and risk looking or sounding stupid in front of them. For this reason, no one usually makes any accusations against the psychopath. No one ever wants to publicly call them OUT, because no one wants to face it if they happen to be wrong. It's not something most are willing to stand up and do. It could be dangerous like that. Thus, this is also how psychopaths are able to get away with what they do, and why they're able to get away with it for so LONG.
In the beginning of Chapter 2 of Dr. Robert D. Hare's book, Without Conscience - The Disturbing World Of The Psychopaths Among Us is a quote:
"He will choose you, disarm you with his words, and control you with his presence. He will delight you with his wit and his plans. He will show you a good time, but you will always get the bill. He will smile and deceive you, and he will scare you with his eyes. And when he is through with you, and he will be through with you, he will desert you and take with him your innocence and your pride. You will be left much sadder but not a lot wiser, and for a long time you will wonder what happened and what you did wrong. And if another of his kind comes knocking at your door, will you open it? --From an essay signed, 'A psychopath in prison.'"
Dr. Hare also states: "Lying, deceiving, and manipulation are natural talents for psychopaths. [...] When caught in a lie or challenged with the truth, they are seldom perplexed or embarrassed -- they simply change their stories or attempt to rework the facts so that they appear to be consistent with the lie. The results are a series of contradictory statements and a thoroughly confused listener." [Chapter 3, p. 46]
He also states:
"Often, their behaviour serves to confuse and repress their victims, or to influence anyone who might listen to the psychopath's side of the story. Manipulation is the key to their conquests, and lying is one way they achieve this."
[...]
"One almost amusing example of how psychopaths lie can be exemplified by a man who's footprint was discovered at the scene of the crime.
'No, that's not my foot' he said, even though everyone knew he was lying.
This is how psychopaths operate. They will deny reality until their victims have a nervous breakdown."
[...]
"The most amazing thing, however, is their selective memory. A psychopath might not remember the promises he made to you yesterday, but he will remember something from the past if it suits his purposes in some way. They often do this whenever they're confronted or caught in a lie."
Do I feel stupid for being so fooled by my psychopaths? No. In the case of my psychopaths, they fooled an awful lot of people. ...An awful lot. They fooled people in government, and in civilian organizations.
They fooled...
4 levels of government:
City
County
State
Federal
13 government agencies:
City of Gainesville
Gainesville Police Dept
County of Alachua
Alachua County Office of Emergency Mgmt
Alachua County Sheriffs Office
State of Florida
State Atty's Office - Gainesville
Florida Division of Emergency Mgmt
University of Florida
University Police Dept
Dept of Commerce
National Weather Service
National Weather Service Field Office - Jacksonville
6 law enforcement departments:
Gainesville Police Dept
Alachua County Sheriffs Office
University of Florida Police Dept
Gainesville State Attorney's Office
Federal Bureau of Investigation (hit this blog for a week after a week-long series of immediately previous hits from NWS-JAX)
Naval Criminal Justice (these guys would hit this blog inbetween hits from NWS-JAX and the FBI, and sometimes by themselves)
4 civilian organizations:
3 local
Gainesville Amateur Radio Society (GARS)
Gator Amateur Radio Club (GARC)
ACOEM Amateur Radio Club (Alachua Co Ofc of Emer Mgmt)
1 national
National Association for Amateur Radio (once known as the American Radio Relay League, or ARRL)
So, again...do I feel stupid? No. Not at all. I mean yes, I do...but not because I was actually stupid. I was conned very badly by some very cunning people. ...And so were emergency managers, NWS meteorologists, and police officers in City, County, State, amd Federal levels of government. So if I'm a dumbass, so are they.
So how do you win against the psychopath?
If the psychopath is targeting you, remember two words: "tunnel vision".
Psychopaths are very often narcissists and pride themselves in being smarter than you. This egotistical superiority complex often gets them into big trouble in how they have an almost obsessive compulsive desire to prove to you just how much smarter they are than you; and that can be utilized. They often can have a tunnel vision focus on causing you pain and suffering in revenge, and they'll go out of their way to cause it. This too can also be used against them. It is up to you to figure out exactly how. HINT: They often forget to go too out of the way to cover their tracks, because they think that no one is smart enough to find them anyway, or they think that no one will even bother to look. (And they're usually right. PDs can be very lazy.)
See this blog? For me, this was my defense. It was the ONLY thing that was able to make them stop.
You see...psychopaths HATE limelight, and being called attention to. They will always try to make you believe that your efforts to win against them are fruitless, and that you should give it up and let them be in control. That's what they WANT you to believe. They spend so much time studying us humans that they learn in us certain "patterns" that our weaknesses, called our "emotions", bring us. They learn how to manipulate our feelings and emotions to their advantage. While they may not understand our feelings, they know how to USE them to the fullest in order to get what they want. They use fear of embarrassment, or calling public attention to our fallacies to keep us in line. They humiliate and berate us constantly so that we don't have time to think, and so that we'll think that they are gods and the only thing that can save us. ...And in so doing, we very often actually believe them and fall prey to it. It takes us a long time to realize what's going on, and for that spell to be broken. But when it's broken, and they realize it, they become even worse.
If you want it all to stop, you have to think and react to everything in the complete opposite to what is normal. You can't cry when you're supposed to. You can't panic when you're supposed to. You can't break down when you're supposed to. You have to do everything in the opposite. This throws them off. Suddenly you become confusing to them. Suddenly, they don't know how to make you work in their favor. STAND UP to them. YELL at them. LEAVE them. MAKE the threats of calling the cops, if necessary. Then...ACTUALLY CALL THE COPS! Take away all of their points of control. Take away all of their previous confidence in being able to manipulate you. DON'T be predictable. Be completely UN-predictable. They don't know what to do with that. They don't know how to handle it. It throws them off, completely. You're no longer something they can manipulate and control. You're a liability, now. A risk. You're not something they can predict on anymore. It now becomes necessary to leave you alone, to get away, to run, to hide. They usually go bother someone else. This is the only way to defeat a psychopath. Note that I'm not advocating hitting, harming, or violence. I'm advocating non-violent means of protecting yourself. Use publicity AGAINST them. They don't like publicity. You'll learn this as you read more about my plight in this story.
IF, on the other hand, your particular psychopath happens to be a violent one, then I recommend making preparations secretly to run away, yourself. Leave. Don't stay. Get away...before something dreadful happens to you. In the case of the violent psychopaths, I do NOT recommend letting them know that you suddenly have more confidence. It is just way too dangerous. In that case, I instead recommend making them continue to BELIEVE that you have no confidence, and that you ARE just as stupid as they believe. USE that...to keep them off their guard. You can use that to get away. Make your plans. Tell no one. Get everything ready. And when they are least expecting it, make your move. Don't hide with people he knows, even if family. Hide with people he wouldn't expect. I don't know how to advise you there. In this case, you'll have to come up with your own plan. ...Perhaps advocacy groups, and/or shelters...in counties outside of the one you now reside in. Be ingenious. But be deliberately backwards in your thinking, so that he cannot predict you, or outsmart you. Randomness. It's a cipher to them. They can't decrypt that. That's your protection.
Chapter 4 AN UNCOMFORTABLE SUBJECT
This is not going to be something that a lot of hams or public service workers will want to hear, or want to have to admit to, or to even believe. It's long. It's not going to be comfortable. It will in fact be extremely UN-comfortable. It involves popular people that many people know and like very much - hams, and public service workers, and other people who are otherwise very highly regarded and looked up to, greatly respected, admired, and believed in. ...People who do a lot for others in "favors"; and yet, who maliciously caused the harm on purpose, and people who had no clue that they were being duped but who still helped to cause the damage, nonetheless, even after having been told. ...It includes hams who volunteered for a lot of things and who made themselves available to help all, who hid behind their public service backgrounds, who along with other people in public service and in government leadership arenas, allowed themselves to get caught up in some very bad things, and who duped and encouraged other otherwise good people inside Emergency Management, the National Weather Service, and even in various police departments into believing that I was some form of a serious problem and to follow along, working together in "putting a stop" to the "Great, Powerful and Evil TODD", seriously believing that in the end they were doing the right thing.
Laws were broken. Business cards were forged. Titles were made up. Government agencies were conned. My complaints of harassment were ignored. Stories were exaggerated, important facts were left out. Gossip, rumor and slander spread rampant and unchecked or verified. Government and public officials were duped, and they were convinced into taking actions against an innocent person, and against an innocent program which encompassed the entire southeast Georgia and northeast Florida NWS-JAX County Warning Area. Everyone truly believed that what they were doing was for the right thing, for a good reason, for a good cause. No one stopped to ask for proof or verification of anything, first.
Superiors and upper echelon were left out of the loop. Actions were taken while in uniform and wearing the logos, on the clock for their agencies, and yet undocumented, under-the-table, so as to prevent the victim from being able to press charges against anyone specific, or from being able to make a claim about anything specific. But also as an additional unfortunate side effect, clueless people up on high never knew of what was going on underneath them - about the actions that were being taken in by the rogue employees which were putting themselves and their agencies at risk of even larger legal problems. Everyone did "favors" for somebody else, without verification of facts first, without filing official reports, without notification of superiors or making sure that anything that was being done was being done in the proper, official order and manner, or without checking to make sure that the civil rights of the innocent weren't being violated. All four possible levels of government became involved in the end - city, county, state, and federal. Damage has been done, and people and agencies are now committed, at fault, and responsible. They can't halt or take back what has been done. Now they have to answer for it. All they had to do at any time was ask one very simple question at every occasion: "Do you have any proof of this?"
Chapter 5 DRAMATIS PERSONAE
Many people, organizations and agencies are now at risk of lawsuits and much embarrassing Press attention. Many people are at risk of loss of their good government careers. A cop was convinced to sabotage a harassment case. Organizations were convinced that I was a problem, including the Gainesville Amateur Radio Society, the Gator Amateur Radio Club, and the American Radio Relay League. Government agencies were convinced I was a problem, including the Alachua County Office of Emergency Management, the Florida Division of Emergency Management, the National Weather Service, the State Attorney's Office, the University of Florida, University of Florida Police Department, and the Gainesville Police Department. Many people within these agencies and organizations were convinced that I was a problem, and to take some form of action against me - and yet, without any proof being required, documented, or requested; including: Angie Enyedi, Steve Letro, and Al Sandrik of the Natl. Weather Service Field Office in Jacksonville; Chief Dave Donnelly and ex-Chief William May, Retd. of the Alachua County Office of Emergency Mgmt (ACOEM); Detective Joseph Mayo, Gainesville Police Dept.; Detective Michael Metz of the University of Florida Police Department; and Paul Eakin/KJ4G, Northern Florida Section Manager, American Radio Relay League (ARRL). On the civilian organizational level, you can add the following individuals who played a direct hand in causing all of the problems, directly engaged in the stalking and harassing, and/or had knowledge of it and said nothing, and/or who built all of the confusion that caused so many agencies and organizations to take the actions that they did: Jeffrey Donald Capehart/W4UFL, Susan Ann Tipton/K9PDL, Frederick Scott West/KG4VWD, Jay Lieberman/KD4FER (now deceased), and especially...Philip Spoffard Royce/KE4PWE, and Melissa Shires Royce/KE4WBQ. Others in GARS who also particularly maliciously engaged in the spreading of the gossip and the rumors included now deceased members John Warne/K4KAM, who pretended to be a friend while stabbing me in the back; and especially Bill Wells/K4RDP, who actively campaigned against every project that I ever decided to take on simply because I did it well and it seemed, in his opinion, to take attention away from GARS.
Hundreds, potentially thousands of people by now: ham radio operators and civilian SKYWARN spotters - across the Northern Florida and Southern Georgia area - were given the impression that I was a problem by Paul Eakin/KJ4G especially, who actually campaigned using what in fact was my personal pain and suffering out in the wide-open public while running for the position of "Northern Florida Section Manager". And he did it, without verification of facts, first.
...And that was a common theme - non-verification of facts before acting. It kept repeating with others...with everyone involved, in fact. One person would hear something, decide it's not necessary to verify the facts or even to contact me to let me know, then they'd take some action, do something stupid - committing themselves, which would only end up causing some problem for me, AND for them. (sigh) ...And there was NOTHING that I could do about it. It was always about who had the power and who had the control. Everybody else always had the control. Where did I ever have any control? I was usually always left out of the loop because everyone always took it for granted that the rumors were true, and that to contact ME, why well that was just not necessary and Todd would only get upset and yell at us, and so WHY do that. ...Right?
EVERY agency and organization in the end took it out upon not just me but the local civilian SKYWARN program, as well. But it was the AMATEUR RADIO program which was the problem, not me or the civilian program. No one was paying attention to what was really happening. The civilian program was just fine. The hams were acting like psychopaths, and convinced every agency that the problem didn't lay with them, but elsewhere. The agencies took it out on the civilian programs unfairly, while SUPPORTING the hams and actually COOPERATING with them, giving them jobs, roles, positions, enacting agreements, and giving them all sorts of power - which they then used to continue to harass and stalk, only now they were using the power given to them by the government. It was disheartening and sick.
Because my stalkers were involved with Alachua County Office of Emergency Management and had thier ear, even ACOEM was used to attack me and Alachua County SKYWARN.
Chapter 6 HOW TO DUPE A GOVERNMENT AGENCY TO TAKE OVER AN ORGANIZATION THAT DOESN'T BELONG TO IT...
Melissa Royce (now remarried and going by the name Melissa Shires-DeSantis, who identifies herself in online places with the username "mesochic") simultaneously convinced both ACOEM and the National Weather Service, and a number of clueless ham operators who worked with her, that I was relinquishing control of ACS and handing it over to her. Melissa forged business cards, possibly even letterheads, gave herself made-up, nonexistent titles to make herself look and sound official, told them that I was "leaving the program", that I was putting her in charge, that I was "passing the torch" on to her. She convinced them to create their own actual Standard Operating Procedures Manual for ACS, placing ownership and control of ACS into ACOEM hands, dictating the powers and duties of everyone in ACS, including me. Neither ACOEM nor NWS had any clue that she was duping them. No one questioned her at all. (The linked version above is ACOEM's final version, still using the name "Alachua County SKYWARN" within it. I downloaded this from their site in case they might one day try to make it disappear.)
But Emergency Management has Melissa to thank for one thing: If Melissa can so easily forge a business card, and all she had to do was say that she had this or that title, and be ACCEPTED by Emergency Management, AND be given a broad range of powers that could be used to harass and harm others, then ANYONE can. ...And this brings about a very SERIOUS FLAW in the way that Emergency Management works with civilians. Let's replace that word "civilians" with "terrorists" and now this exposes how serious the problem is. Theoretically, all ANY terrorist has to do is simply SAY that they're someone with this title, and that background, and they'll be given carte blanche immense power...even WITH a background check. The background checks performed apparently didn't include a check of the Palm Beach County Clerk of the Court - which is where Melissa had come from. Had they DONE that, they would have noticed some things that might have been a red flag. (As of the time of the writing of this blog, there are currently now some additional records in the ALACHUA COUNTY Clerk of the Court, too, which dupe an event that occured down in WPB.) Melissa was able to use powers given her by Emergency Management to stomp on and to attempt to take OVER a pre-existing organization and she led them to believe that it was all okay...by someone who was not a lawyer, not a politician, not a lawmaker, not an Emergency Manager, not anyone in official power to do ANYTHING. And they followed her BLINDLY, and without QUESTION. I'd like EXPLANATION, there. How could they be so STUPID?
Like I said... Where did I have any power?
Chapter 7 IRRESPONSIBILITY IN EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT ON DAVE DONNELLY AND RET. CHIEF WILLIAM MAY ALACHUA COUNTY OFFICE OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT
In September, 2005, I sent Dave Donnelly (then Asst. Emergency Manager at ACOEM) an "unofficial" email describing problems that I was having with some local hams3, and warning him that if I was not able to make these people stop that I might have to resort to filing real police complaints against them. I did this because these people were hams, friends of his, whom he was working with in his organization, and, aside from being something that I was required to do, I felt he also had a right to know.
A year later, in March 2006, I'd JUST had a face-to-face with Dave Donnelly (who was then the Assistant Emergency Manager) regarding the same local area hams (who were coincidentally involved in ACOEM-run programs such as ACFR-Reserves, and CERT, for examples) who were stalking and harassing me. We'd actually met at Big Lou's Pizzeria in downtown Gainesville for lunch specifically to discuss just that.4 We continued communicating by email about it, but it quickly became apparent that I wasn't actually being listened to when suddenly, out of the blue, Dave sent me a copy of a section of a "Standard Operating Procedures Manual" governing "Alachua County SKYWARN". In specific, the section dealt with the "Coordinator" position in Alachua County SKYWARN.5 He asked for my "approval" of it, and that started the decline in the relationship between me and ACOEM. Its revelation to me was completely out of the blue and a sudden shock. "What the hell is THIS?!!!, I said to him. Dave didn't understand. Dave didn't get it. Dave must have thought that I was nuts. Apparently, without my knowledge, Jeff and Melissa had been telling him that I wanted to do this - with Melissa even going as far as to forge business cards which had "Coordinator" printed upon them. And when I got angry, they both implied to him that I was changing my mind and reneging on my word. Dave was totally clueless and I was getting very angry with him because he wasn't acting very responsible or very intelligent at all. In all of this he never once got with me and clued me in to what was happening. I never knew it was even going on. He had assumed that Jeff and Melissa were always proceeding lawfully and with my knowledge and consent, and keeping me in the loop; but...without personally verifying that that was indeed the case. Dave was starting to look very different to me...like someone very weak-willed who was being played like a puppet. He was once someone I respected and admired and looked up to; and now suddenly he was making me his enemy and I was taken aback. He wasn't interested in investigating the situation or even in justifying his irresponsible actions in this situation. He was acting on some kind of automatic pilot. Something akin to someone holding up their palms over their ears and singing "LA! LA! LA! LA! LA!", and I just couldn't break this "spell" that he was in. He truly believed in Jeff and Melissa without fail. He didn't seem to want to believe that his favorite crew could be duping him, and he seemed to much rather want to believe that it was instead me who must be crazy, I guess. (If you're paying attention, you'll note that this theme reoccurs a lot: people who don't want to believe that they're being duped by people who are supposedly such great allies and public servants.) Mr. Donnelly simply ignored the details of the situation as much as he could, and he'd obviously decided that he didn't want to get "involved". But he'd already gotten involved. He'd already acted to help commit this damage, himself. Dave was completely blowing me off and keeping me out of the decision process loop, and then feeling anger towards me when I complained - as if I was going to be the problem, period; and that was the way of Life. It wasn't so simple as he wanted it to be. You can't just help the bad guys and then just "decide" to not take responsibility for it and to back out, now. (In my lifetime, I have noted this to be a very consistent thing among humans...how people do things to cause damage, and when the crunch comes and it becomes apparent to them that they just did something to dreadfully screw something [or someone] up, even supposedly GOOD people want to flee the scene and on the way out they'll throw up their arms and try to make the standard claim "I just don't want to get involved!", and hope that this is sufficient excuse enough to make it all "just go away" for them. And they do this while slowly trying to back out the front door. The high prevalence of this in today's society would seem to suggest a deficiency in previous generations in teaching their offspring important moral ideas and values such as taking responsibility for one's own actions and "owning up" to the mistakes you make because it's the "right" thing to do. Seeing it thrown to the winds in government leaders is not at all encouraging; but then, not at all surprising, either. When a highly public leader screws up, he can lose his home and everything that he owns to a lawsuit. Oh yah, man.)
I was getting so sick of the insane psychology that I was seeing in people all around me. The recent face-to-face meeting with Mr. Donnelly had apparently meant nothing. I couldn't believe the man had sent me that document, knowing that it had been composed by the very people whom I had JUST TOLD HIM had been harassing and stalking me! It never occurred to him that maybe the wool was being pulled over his eyes, that he'd just been played for "stupid" by the very same people I'd earlier complained to him about*. But again, he trusted my stalkers instead, and assumed that I was the problem. I mean, considering how complicated all of this is, it's just easier to believe that. I understand the problem. I'm not stupid.
Now things were beginning to make sense. I'd just been sent a harassing email from someone threatening "changes soon" for Alachua County SKYWARN. I had no clue what it meant. It suddenly became plainly obvious. It was Melissa, trying to tell me that she had been busy conning Mr. Donnelly into believing that I was quitting, and to use the power of ACOEM to take over another organization without him realizing it, right under his own nose.
I went to Chief Will May (now retired), and asked HIM for help, and told him about this problem I'd been having with hams stalking and harassing me, attacking my friends and family, too; hams who were concurrently involved in many ACOEM functions (ACFR Reserves, CERT, etc. - and thus under ACOEM's responsibility), and now they were apparently attempting to convince ACOEM to actually take over control of Alachua County SKYWARN - an organization neither founded, created, owned, operated, funded, nor run by ACOEM itself. Chief May had insisted to me that "No one was trying to take over Alachua County SKYWARN"; and yet, in the same breath he suggested that I sit down with all of my harassers and "come to a mutual agreement."6 I was taken aback at that. I told him that I intended to do no such thing. I don't sit down with the criminals and sign documents agreeing to let them take this and that from me so as to obtain...what?..."protection" from further harassing and stalking in the future? You don't ask a victim to sit down with the rapist, and then ask the victim to "come to an agreement or we won't listen to you." I was so angry. The Chief's response had been blindly made without knowing anything about the actual facts and he was obviously making a starting bell assumption that the problem lay with me and thus, that there was no problem at all with his people, because why that's just impossible. Then the Chief broke off all communication with me, and would not respond to me anymore, which was childish and irresponsible, and violated my rights.
The thing that's important to realize here is that the Chief WAS God. He blows you off; that's it. His reaction was not appropriate considering the subject matter that he was being told about. It was serious. This was an official complaint about stalking and harassment going on from people within his control and employ. It was in his mission, and his agency's mandate, in the Florida laws for him to take it seriously and to investigate. But he had obviously personally labeled this as something that was not serious enough to warrant any attention on any official level, not a matter important enough to entertain, or to investigate. He effectively shut the door in my face. My stalkers saw this.
Chapter 8 "WE DON'T CARE"
"[...] No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
- 14th Amendment, Section 1, U.S. Constitution
So here we are minding our own business, when along comes big bad government which says (effectively) "We've decided to just up and TAKE your organization, oh and AND THE NAME that you've been using for fifteen years - because we think we CAN - and really...we DON'T give a rats ass what you think about that. And oh by the way, we don't believe your accusations against our people, and we're not going to look into it or do anything at all about it because we really just don't care. Now step aside, please..."
Melissa Royce called herself the "Coordinator" of the "new Alachua County SKYWARN program" as she put it to the Gainesville Sun7, and to WCJB/TV-20; and she even created a Yahoo group for "Alachua County SKYWARN" using the username "AC-Skywarn".
We already had an Alachua County SKYWARN Email Alert List, and it had been in operation since 2003, and her group's username was suspiciously close to our own ("ac_skywarn"). Melissa knew exactly what she was doing. She wasn't a dummy. She knew of the existence of our group, of the existence of our email listgroup, everything. She was doing this to harass, and using ACOEM and even the NWS to do it. She was "cyberstalking". We also run the SKYWARN-L Florida SKYWARN Discussion List, which has been around since 1998, a year after ACS was first founded; and the ACEMWIN-HURR-L Hurricane Bulletin Listgroup, and the ACWIN series of weather bulletin listgroups. We run the Alachua County SKYWARN web page, which has been around since 1997, and the Alachua County EMWIN Project web page (we send severe weather bulletins to the public as a public service for free), which has been around since 2002. We also run the Index to SKYWARN Web Pages On The Internet (since 1997) to help people find other SKYWARN groups across the country, and Mobile Scanner & RADAR-Detector Laws In The United States (since 1995) so that hams and spotters and others know where the use of scanners is appropriate in the US. It's NOT like we're an unknown, or we're not visible, or people can say they looked and couldn't find us out there. You can't do a keyword search for 'SKYWARN', 'Alachua County', or even for 'Todd Sherman' without coming across all of this stuff multiple times! And it's been out there since 1997. There are no excuses. They could have chosen ANY OTHER NAME THEY WISHED for their organization, but Melissa wanted to use this one because she knew it would bother me...and ACOEM backed her up. Legally speaking...ACOEM is run by a bunch of morons who just don't think too hard. Legally speaking, ACOEM was being led by a number of bad hams into actually attempting to take over another organization and to take OVER the use of it's name without any lawyers being contacted at all. WHY? It's just Todd. Right? Who's going to stop them from doing that? ...Todd? ACOEM was huge, and they thought they could do anything that they wanted and permission from ME wasn't necessary or required as far as they were concerned. They probably also told themselves that the County OWNS the use of the words 'Alachua County' and by golly Todd's just gonna have to relinquish its use!!! Right?
...WRONNNNG!
If the use of the words "Alachua County" in any business or organizational name is illegal and considered the sole ownership of the county of Alachua then there are an awful lot of businesses and organizations out there which are operating illegally, right now. (Such as Alachua County Feed & Seed Store, Alachua County Special Olympics, Alachua County Childcare Center, Alachua County Lawn Care, etc.) And even if such a thing were TRUE, these businesses and organizations have been using those names for quite a while now and in all those many years no one has spoken up and said a thing. Therefore, THE PRECEDENCE BEING SET is that no one cares about it either way; and therefore, the County has relinquished it's rights to lay any such claim by it's own inactions. Sorry, but that's the way the "precedence" ball bounces. So if THAT'S the angle ACOEM was taking, it was a bad choice, and sounds much like something a self-proclaimed, do-it-yourself, "at-home" lawyer rather than a REAL lawyer might suggest. And if that's the case, then ACOEM deserves whatever embarrassment and humiliation they get from it.
There was this well-oiled "synergy" going on between Melissa Royce and the Alachua County Office of Emergency Management. Melissa fed them BS. They believed it without question or challenge. Then they gave Melissa absolute power...to do WHATEVER SHE WANTED...without any challenge.
In ACOEM, nobody ever listened what I was telling them. I was telling them that the very people that they were so proud of and supportive of were stalking me and using their given powers and contacts inside of ACOEM to harass and stalk me, my friends, my family, and to attempt to take over another organization. To them, I was just a raving lunatic. I was crazy. Right? They didn't want to believe me. Chief May and Dave Donnelly heard something else entirely whenever I spoke, and only saw me as being ridiculous. They saw what they wanted to see and refused to believe anything I was telling them I assume because it sounded just too ridiculous. (This is sounding familiar.)
Nonetheless, a complaint was filed with ACOEM, twice, through two individuals, now. Those two acknowledged me directly. And rather than follow harassment protocol and procedure, they chose to listen to the harassers and to blow me off entirely. Procedure and protocol and due process were thrown out of the window.
ACOEM then continued to pursue the creation of their own spotter group anyway, using Alachua County SKYWARN's name. Even today, the Alachua County ARES site STILL has links to Melissa's Yahoo "Alachua County SKYWARN" listgroup on their Mission Statement, Calendar, Nets, Contacts, and Archives pages, even though her little SKYWARN program itself is no longer in existence. (See real group vs. fake group.) Again, had they formed their OWN organization, using a different name, I wouldn't have cared. But they insisted upon using the name of OUR organization. It did not seem to matter to anyone in Emergency Management. No one there seemed the slightest bit worried about me, or ACS, or about what Jeff and Melissa were doing using ACOEM's power. That is the strangest feeling in the world to watch while a government organization attacks you and your organization and seems to laugh in your face.
UPDATE, 1/19/2010: www.alachuaem.org suddenly disappeared, and has been replaced with www.alachuaemcomm.org. Links to the imposter ACS Yahoo group still remain, though.
UPDATE, June, 2011: After noticing in my IP logs some hits recently by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and even from United States Navy Network Information Services, apparently immediately after some hits from NWS-JAX[see logs], I noticed as well that someone had also "coincidentally" just removed the links to Melissa's false web sites from the ACOEM Yahoo site. That's pretty interesting. (Took 'em long enough. I mean, I'd asked them a few YEARS ago to remove those links and they ignored me. Suddenly, the FBI begins an investigation and someone out of the blue just "remembers" my old complaint and complies. However, I don't think it was to be nice to me. It is obvious that it was done to try to cover some asses. It confirms a definite line of communication between NWS-JAX and the Alachua County Office of Emergency Management regarding the investigation. It shows a kind of co-conspiracy involvement going on between them - one giving the other a heads up, and the other attempting to remove certain evidences of harassment and/or involvement before the FBI could have a chance to see it. I mean, I saw the FBI hits, and at nearly the same exact time, I watched the doppelganger AC-SKYWARN links disappear almost live. It was kinda funny to see it happen, actually. Kinda satisfying. ...The bad guys were running for cover, in a manner of speaking, as a direct result of their own stupid mistakes. It was kind of satisfying to watch all that scurrying happen, and knowing WHY they were doing it.) Meanwhile, the rogue Yahoo group still remains nonetheless, and ACOEM has not attempted to force Melissa to remove it, yet. Removing the link doesn't remove their responsibility for it, though. Of course, ACOEM's Yahoo page sysop is Jeff Capehart. And this just so smells of an attempt by Jeff to cover his ass rather than of ACOEM trying to do the right thing. I guess I should file a complaint against ACOEM, and then issue a Cease & Desist. Maybe that'll get the right attention to the matter. I mean...it's not as if I've got some sort of bridge I'd be burning there or something. The hams did that for me already.
They held one spotter training class, which I attended - 1) to show that I was not intimidated, 2) to show them that I was still out there, and 3) because I was due for the two-year refresher anyway. They passed out applications for this new "Alachua County SKYWARN" organization to people. That clinched it for me. I didn't make any scenes. I remained quiet. I went home after the class very pissed off.
Finally I threatened Dave himself and ACOEM with a lawsuit and demanded he/they cease using our name. There was no official, verbal, written, or email response from Dave, and he took his sweet time, but they did appear to finally stop...to some extent, anyway. They stopped having meetings. But the paperwork remained online - even today. It was obvious he did get on it in some fashion, but his long delay seemed to imply a begrudging resistance to it. I hoped that he got on some people for it all, too. But I doubt it. I sincerely doubt it. He probably just labeled me as a lunatic jerk and went on with his life in his Dave-ley oblivious little way, cursing me for being an asshole or something. In fact, ACOEM ceased all attempt at putting together any kind of a spotter program after that. ...Which is what makes me think he gave up outright. ...And that was not my intent. I wanted them to stop using our NAME, and the resultant implication that the proud history which belonged to OUR organization had anything to do with theirs. I wanted him to be more diligent and to watch his people a bit more closely and responsibly and to make sure that his people weren't given unwarranted powers which could be used to abuse and to cause harm to others as Melissa was doing. This is not an illogical complaint or unreasonable want. They were attempting to take over another already existing organization, and they were giving my stalkers power to do that and to harass and stalk me, and my friends, my family, my associations, and I wanted it to stop. That's ALL that there was to it. So now, Alachua County has NO real spotter program - as a direct result of what the HAMS did, here, and because everybody is scared and doesn't know what to do. Who is telling the truth? Who is lying? Who is the real victim? Who is the real problem? Nobody really has a clue, so everyone becomes stagnated, bogged down, held hostage by fear of being wrong.
It's a little too late to put on the brakes and look NOW, though...AFTER the "accident" has already happened and now that the wounded are now lieing all around the accident scene, so to speak. They took a little too long to finally "get a clue".
Chapter 9 "...A SERIOUS PROBLEM"
The Alachua County Office of Emergency Management itself has been a very SERIOUS, SERIOUS problem for me in how it has repeatedly ignored my harassment complaints entirely, but most unbelievably in how it actually personally interfered with my ability to investigate my harassments with other agencies and organizations and thus my ability to try to protect myself, offering unnecessary and unresearched personal opinions to an officer of the law in the Gainesville Police Department which convinced that investigating officer that I was a problem, not the victim, while having absolutely nothing tangible on-hand to actually prove that I was at all the problem that it said I was. This unconfirmed "gossip" from emergency managers caused that officer to think that I was actually attempting to use the law to harass innocent people and that the harassers were the victims, instead. As a result, in violation of Title 18, Section 242 of the U.S. Code, "Deprivation of Rights Under Color of Law", the GPD officer deliberately sabotaged my harassment case because he thought he was protecting the innocent. Emergency Management has been extremely irresponsible and incompetent and insensitive in their handling of my problem, have shown no sympathy towards my problem, and in fact has shown an outright denial of the situation. I challenge ACOEM to back up any effort they have made in handling of my situation with documented proof of anything done; anything. There is nothing. No investigation. No questioning. No documentation. No witnesses. And I'll bet even upper echelon didn't have a clue that anything was even happening. But actions were taken against me. How are they going to explain them? ACOEM has nothing to cover itself with. The officer in GPD claims to have had conversations with Chief William May. I would like to know what those conversations were about. What was it that Chief May said? ...Because after that, that officer went rogue. It appears that I'm a victim of inappropriate oppression-related conversations and actions, here. It looks like there was some conspiracy-related planning to "take care of the bad guy" being set up between all of the involved parties.
Now, ACOEM, Dave Donnelly, Chief May, are all in fear of a lawsuit, and yet they have no understanding of why...or of what just really happened. Still, it all could have been avoided had they kept me in the loop, and talked to me. But for whatever odd, inexplicable, reasons (not to mention reasons which were against standard policy and procedure)...they did not. I make no apologies. This was wholly their own fault. They have no excuses, here. They probably could have helped to prevent all of the eventual problems that occurred had they just kept in touch with me, and stopped treating me like I was being ridiculous. But they chose not to, and my stalkers ended up (however unintentionally on the part of Emergency Management) only being encouraged by EM's lack of proper due diligence and observance of proper procedures to make sure nothing like this could accidentally happen to innocent people and that civil rights weren't inadvertently thrown out the window.
I suspect ACOEM did finally begin to see Melissa for exactly all that I had been telling them...years later; and that they'd realized they'd just picked on the wrong guy and maybe even caused him a LOT of trouble...
...BUT, they can't apologize or admit the truth or the huge mistake that they'd just made because it could open themselves (and many other people and agencies and organizations) up to criminal charges, a lawsuit, or some other sort of really heavy bad news. So everyone kept their mouths shut, kept it hidden from the public, and from upper echelon (i.e., City and County Commissioners/government) - and especially from the Press. Because I assure you, if City and County leaders had known what their people had just done to someone, and the huge embarrassment that it could cause for the City and the County, they probably would not have allowed it to go without investigation and severe reprimand. And if this got out into the Press!... Everyone involved was oh so very irresponsible, here.
[Future: Add NWS sections (Angie Enyedi, Al Sandrik, Steve Letro incidents), here.]
Chapter 10 WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN A COP GOES BAD? ON DETECTIVE JOSEPH MAYO GAINESVILLE POLICE DEPARTMENT
There's a scene in Cape Fear where a lawyer (Sam), stalked and harassed by an ex-convict, is consulting with a private detective...
Sam (upset): "...I mean WHY can't anybody DO anything for me?! What, WHAT GOOD are COPS and LAWS and DUE PROCESS?!!... Detective (holding up his hand): "SAM, Sam, Sam... Lem'me explain something to you. See, the system is set up to handle generalized problems like burglary and robbery...but if SOME lone creep out there TARGETS you for some obscure reason...the system's SLOW and SKEPTICAL. It's PATHETIC, even..."
Detective Joseph Mayo, of the Gainesville Police Dept. was the detective who was assigned to a harassment case that I had filed in 2006. Someone had sent me a harassing email. At first the case was against unknowns (because we weren't sure who had actually sent the email), but which, when the email's header information was checked out with greater scrutiny, later turned out to be against a husband and wife team - Phil and Melissa Royce. The "originating IP", when plugged into a browser, took you to Philip Royce's personal web page.
At the same time, unknown to me, apparently Melissa Royce had been working very hard on local Emergency Management leaders trying to convince them that I was handing an organization called "Alachua County SKYWARN" over to her, and that I had made her the new "Coordinator" of that organization. No one had bothered to contact me to confirm it. Emergency Management allowed Melissa to even go as far as to draw up an actual "Standard Operating Procedures Manual" which dictated how ACS was going to be run - under the Alachua County Office of Emergency Management. All of this effort was kept from me, and I had no idea at all that it was even going on.
Not long after that began, someone then apparently opened up a Yahoo account using my name (spelled incorrectly), then sent the harassing email, and then deleted the Yahoo account in order to erase the evidence. It threatened Alachua County SKYWARN. The email itself contained no threats of physical harm, but mentioned "changes coming" for the organization. ...It came on the heels of YEARS worth of stalking and harassment by multiple area hams, and I wanted it to stop.
I'd already warned people that if it didn't stop that I was going to start going to the police 1) to start putting things into the record, and 2) to start filing charges against people, and 3) because apparently it was necessary to set public EXAMPLES, and I DESPERATELY NEEDED those examples, because there currently weren't any consequences out there which made people think twice about what they were doing. ...Whatever it took to make all of this ridiculousness stop. After all, that is exactly the procedure recommended by the police to do whenever you are stalked and harassed. Remember that...
So when this happened, I did just that. I wanted Det. Mayo to subpoena the IP logs from Bellsouth and Yahoo - a VERY simple task, to confirm the IP information in the email header which, when actually checked, pointed to Philip Royce/KE4PWE's personal web page. (OOPS!) I needed to prove that header information was not forged or made up. I needed to verify it, back it up with logs. That was the detective's ONLY mission. It was VERY simple. It required no effort except to fill out a form and submit it to the service providers.
At some point during the investigation, Det. Mayo was told by Emergency Management that I was a "problem" and without anything to back that information up - in documentation or signature or in any official way, Det. Mayo took it upon himself to deliberately delay subpoenaing the legal documentation that I had requested - which documentation would have helped me find proof of who had sent me a harassing email. I found this out because word of this was bragged to me by one of my stalkers, Jeff Cepahart, who told me that Det. Mayo had shared everything about my case to the two very people whom I had filed the harassment complaint against - Phil and Melissa Royce. I was told that Det. Mayo was saying everything that he thought I wanted to hear, and that he was deliberately delaying getting anything done.
Do you know how scary it is to hear your stalker tell you all about your case - all the intimate details that he SHOULD NOT KNOW - right back to your face?!
Again, Mayo had ONE job: to subpoena the IP logs from Bellsouth and Yahoo. He had six months to do it and all I got were excuses. He never called me; I always had to call him. He never had time. He was always out to a seminar, a meeting, a class, or something. He always feigned interest, even promised that he was the best; but his voice betrayed otherwise. It sounded...acted. I...suspected he wasn't being forthright with me from almost the very beginning. I never felt comfortable talking to him, or like I didn't have to worry. His voice was always condescending and I always felt like I was really screwing up his day, putting him out. He took SO LONG to get anything done. In the end, he lied to me and told me that he had obtained the IP logs and that they looked like there was "some anonymizing and spoofing going on". When I told him to make copies of them so that I could bring them to other expert witnesses to analyze, he called me back and told me that for six months he had been pulling the wrong case file - that he had continually pulled someone else's case file, accidentally...but repeatedly, over and over, for six months in a row. It just didn't make sense.
He told me that he had never subpoenaed the logs. that he never intended to subpoena the logs "because the State Atty's Office had always said that it appeared to be a civil matter rather than a criminal case." (This actually has nothing to do with subpoenaing logs; only which courtroom you're going to hold anything in. I know what he was TRYING to get me to believe but I knew too much and he didn't realize it. He was BS'ing me and I knew it.)
I put him up against the wall and asked him WHEN he had told the SA's Office about this. He hemmed and hawwed. I had to repeatedly ask the question, and push the answer out of him. I did it deliberately so as to force him off balance so that he didn't have time to make something up. Finally, he told me that he had only just asked them recently. ...Recently.
So he lied. First he'd said that the SA's Office had "always said" - implying that he'd been in contact with them since the beginning of the case. In fact, when I asked for the copies, I think I must have scared him because he apparently realized that I was catching on, and he knew he needed an excuse or he'd be in some big trouble. So he then called me back and gave me that lame final explanation to "alibi" himself.
So I guess he made it all up. It makes sense, now, because nothing he'd said to me ever made any real sense.
In the end, he treated me like I was a tyrant for wanting to know what had happened, about what he had done, and why he never acted in six months on something so SIMPLE...and he hung up on me. In his own words...
"Mr. Sherman, I'm not obligated to tell you ANYTHING, I don't HAVE to explain myself, and I'm going to hang UP now. Okay, Mr. Sherman? Good-bye."
That was as much "justice" as I was going to get out of this. It was now too late.
Due directly to the officer's specific interference in my case, the expiration period had lapsed, and the logs were no longer obtainable because they had by now been destroyed to the ether by he two companies, who are not obligated to keep such logs beyond that amount of time.
The detective had sabotaged any chance for me to try to make people stop, or to set any examples. At the same time, he had now shown my harassers that even the POLICE department was not going to help me and this made them feel indestructible and untouchable, and they CONTINUED to harass me. He'd screwed me...on purpose, and I was completely helpless. I DID keep a running log of what was going on. This is interesting reading.8
What do you do when cops go bad? How do you defend against something like that? (sigh)
Bad cops in the Gainesville Police Department. Oh my god! I can't believe it! But there it is.
The Final Report of Detective Mayo9 made no mention of phone discussions, exchanges of emails, the interviews with Emergency Management...just one phone contact with me. The final report made no mention of the fact that I had requested he subpoena the IP logs, or that he'd repeatedly told me that he had them, or any mention of his "mistakes". Where IS it? Where did it all GO? What happened to all of that interaction? His final report, in fact, was condescending, and was deliberately worded to make me sound like I was an idiot. There is no excuse for a report like that, after six months of supposed "investigation". It's a sloppy report done last minute - like a college student who'd waited until a couple hours before his final was due. It's half copied from the previous officer's inadequate report of the situation. But in the end, Detective Mayo's final report only makes damn sure that no future officer who reads that report EVER takes me seriously....EVER. His words were uncalled for, and his irresponsible handling of my case only caused me more problems and helped aid the wrong people.
While thinking he was helping the good guys, Detective Mayo DIRECTLY, with AFORETHOUGHT and INTENT, aided and abetted and collaborated with the bad guys in the commission of a computer crime, and in committing computer-related harassment and stalking crimes. By stalling subpoenaing of the logs, and making sure that the evidence was erased and I couldn't do anything then about it first, and in working with the Royce's to do this, it became a conspiracy. In so doing THAT, he became a co-conspirator. He deliberately and with aforethought prevented evidence from being obtained. He interfered with it's collection. He also apparently must have given the State Attorney's Office false ande/or misleading information which caused the attorney assigned to the case to label it as a "civil" case instead of a "computer crimes" case, which is what it actually was. What did Detective Mayo leave OUT of his report to Attorney Libby to bring him to that wildly incorrect conclusion? Being the dumb criminal, though, Detective Mayo had actually implicated Libby! I don't think Libby would appreciate that.
These actions protected Phil and Melissa Royce. These actions caused the erasure of evidence. These actions...gave my stalkers carte blanche to continue harassing and stalking me. In working with the Royce's, a police officer in the Gainesville Police Department had now become the harasser and stalker, and was partially responsible for the computer crime.
I'm never going to get my name back, or see Alachua County SKYWARN's reputation and credibility restored. The cop knows people in Emergency Management, and they know people in the City and the County...the Board of County Commissioners, government leaders, politicians, senators, etc. And all they have to do is have one person do a favor for another, and do a favor for someone else, and things can be made to disappear, or to be thrown out, or ignored entirely. It's in fact how I got where I'm at. One person did a favor for the hams, who found someone in Emergency Management to do a favor for them, who had the cop do a favor for them, etc. (sigh) Sadder thing is...in everybody doing these favors, these people became committed to crimes, to bad things, to bad people, and now they're all in positions where they could lose their careers at any moment if one person speaks too much, gets drunk, brags more than they should have...and then all the other dominoes fall. And I'm patient...and I'm waiting...and I'm persistent. I'm not letting this go; I'm not giving this up. [Stares at his watch, leans back in his chair, yawns, tilts his cowboy hat forward over his eyes and begins to rock.] I'm used to having to wait. I'm good at waiting.
Jeff Capehart was my lead stalker. He was the one who encouraged everyone else and gave them ideas. Jeff also described personal details about my case to me that he should not have known not being a party to the particular case himself at ALL. Apparently the detective was letting them all know, at EVERY step, what new was happening with the case, so that they could prepare, or make up a cover, or whatever. For example, I'd mentioned to the detective not to give them any hint about wireless devices, in case they didn't have one. This way, they couldn't say that someone stopped by outside their home and tried to send the message from their system to try to make it LOOK like it was them. Not even a week later; NOT EVEN A WEEK LATER, Melissa was actually USING that very excuse. Son of a BITCH! And before the case was closed, Jeff approached me with questions about my own case: "Did you say (this) about Dave Donnelly? Did you say (this) about Chief May? Did you send the detective a stack of emails 'this thick'? What did you think this would accomplish? Did you think it was going to GO anywhere? Do you think the detective takes you SERIOUSLY? What would you do if I told you that the detective thinks you're STUPID? that he thinks you 'don't know what you're talking about'. He thinks you're 'just using the law to harass innocent people'. I'm told that he's been saying whatever he thought you wanted to hear so as to delay actual handling of the case until the expiration time ran out." (sigh) What the FRACK was this UNINVOLVED GUY doing with all of this information??? How did he KNOW??? ...Phil and Melissa had TOLD him; and the cop, of course...had told that to Phil and Melissa. The detective acted completely inappropriately and acting on personal gut feeling which was incorrect and which had no business in the case and which in the end caused me more problems and great pain. He inexplicably cooperated with and shared information with the other party.
I want EVERYONE to be perfectly clear on this: Jeff Capehart contacts two other stalkers and they give him personal information about my case. The other two stalkers had obtained this information FROM THE COP ASSIGNED TO MY CASE, in violation of policy and protocol. And so, Jeff BECOMES WITNESS TO THIS INAPPROPRIATE ASSOCIATION going on between the cop and the bad guys. As of the date of this writing, Jeff STILL has not approached GPD with this information, insisting that since it went from 1) the cop, to 2) the other stalkers, to 3) to him, that it is thus "third hand information" and "not admissible". I have repeatedly advised him that this is not the case, the he is DIRECT witness to Phil and Melissa admitting that a cop told them that he'd sabotaged a case - that the cop admitted this to the very people that the case was against! ...And Jeff is REFUSING to go to the authorities with the information, making himself an actual accomplice to it! HE KNOWS ALL ABOUT IT; and yet he REFUSES ANYWAY to go to the authorities! (No moral compulsion. It's completely missing in him. It's common with this guy to "logic" his way out of responsibility like this, and to continue to allow harm to come to me. He in fact has repeated this very thing over the years with me. ...Causes me problems, logics himself out of responsibility, blames me for bringing it upon myself, never comes to my rescue or does anything to make it stop.) To make himself feel better, he even went to a few local FDLE seminars about stalking and harassment that was put on by some local cops (in fact, he's repeated this tactic TWICE that I remember), and only gave them HALF of the information, left very important facts and details out, genericised it, and asked them if I had a case. The cops, knowing only so little and not understanding that they were being duped, would tell him "no". Then he'd bring this back to me saying "Yah, well the cops think something completely different and they think you don't have a case." Here's one of the emails he sent me as recently as March of 2009, after he'd broken into the AC-EMWIN computer, and after I'd demanded he do the right thing and finally contact GPD:
"Hey, I contacted an agent with FDLE in the Gainesville Field Office and presented him with the situation. He basically said you would have to file the complaint yourself with the local PD because the agencies don't pay attention to 3rd party complaints. The complaints have to come from the affected person. He also said the best you could hope for would be an administrative reprimand on his personnel file, but that it is likely not worth pursuing."
He just kept going to other completely uninvolved police agencies trying to get them to say things which EXCLUDED him from doing the right thing, by leaving important stuff out, and then waiting for the answer he KNEW they would then give him back, and use it to try to convince me that I had nothing to go on. But he would NOT go to the INVOLVED agency and tell THEM what happened and see what THEY said. This is not a man of conscience who wants to do the right thing. It's a man who knows he was involved in an unethical way and who doesn't want to call attention to that fact that he had obtained information he had no business obtaining, and no business knowing nor reason to know. ...PERIOD.
And so, to this day, Detective Mayo has not yet been brought to justice, because Jeff Capehart will not approach GPD about it and tell them what he knows. Jeff keeps applying criminal law to the situation and since it's handled internally and he thinks there's no criminal consequences for him to compel him to answer, he sees no reason to help. This is psychopath thinking. He's just making excuses.
It's actually in his best interest not to come forward. You see, to bring this to GPD's attention means that the detective would get in trouble. The detective might spew...everything. His connection to Jeff would become obvious, they'd ask Jeff why he never brought it to their attention before, why he took SO LONG to come to them with it; and then Jeff might end up in trouble. Once the cop went down, he might spew about his other government connections, and what THOSE people told HIM, and THEY'D go down. And the cycle might repeat until we got all the way to NWS-JAX. The entire thing might crumble and fall apart if only Jeff would just go report this to the authorities. But he's keeping his mouth shut 1) because he doesn't want to get into trouble, and 2) he doesn't want to have his involvement pointed out to the world that he's been working so hard to build up a "perfect nice guy" image to, and 3) because it's just too much fun torturing me and he gets off on it and he loves being able to be in control of me and my life. It's a thrill for him.
In all of my dealings with Jeff, I have always noted how remorseless Jeff has been towards me. He sees himself as doing nothing wrong. He has repeatedly told me that he does the things that he does to me to help me. He truly believes that he's doing favors for me. It's SICK. I listen to him speak and all I want to do is WRETCH.
I have repeatedly told him to stop, to leave me alone, to stop working others up against me, that he is not to talk about me or Alachua County SKYWARN to anyone anymore...ever, that he's not to track where I go on the web, that he's not to pester my friends, family members, or associations. And he has repeatedly refused. One day he even said "NO!" in an email. He is relentless and will not stop even when asked. He is obsessive-compulsively fixated on me and in causing problems in my life and every time I try to catch him or go to the authorities people either ignore me or sabotage me. I cannot make him stop. I believe it is because the authorities have shown him that they do not care and that they do not intend to do anything about it and so, Jeff likely feels, he is being allowed to harass me...as if a law out there says that he can. And this is what the police have done to me by sabotaging my case, and especially by treating me like I was stupid.
Chapter 11 GOSSIPPING FOR LIMELIGHT
PAUL EAKIN / KJ4G
NORTHERN FLORIDA SECTION MANAGER
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR AMATEUR RADIO (ARRL)
NOTE:Lately in the IP logs (Sep 2012) I have begun to notice hits from keyword searches hunting for an ATTORNEY in Jacksonville named Paul Eakin. The Paul Eakin mentioned herein is not the same person. The Paul Eakin mentioned in this blog is an amateur radio operator with the callsign of KJ4G, full name Paul L. Eakin. The attorney's full name is Paul M. Eakin. They are not the same person and as far as I'm aware they are not related to each other.
Paul Eakin of the American Radio Relay League (now known as the National Association for Amateur Radio), for some inexplicable reason, got himself involved in something that was not at all his business, that he had no actual power to do anything about, and which I am SURE he now VERY highly regrets ever getting himself tangled in. He had NO BUSINESS getting involved. He didn't even KNOW me. He proceeded publicly against someone he'd never met, never shaken hands with. In so doing, he took responsibility for being the purveyor of facts about something without knowing the facts - at least from any reputable sources willing to make themselves known, or from anyone who seems to actually have anything tangible to hold up.
Paul used gossip and slander heard about me - without first obtaining any documented proof of the rumors - publicly in his personal political campaign to become ARRL Northern Florida Section Manager. (He actually won.) He told me that people in ham radio circles in other counties were spreading rumor about this "ham", who ran the SKYWARN program in Alachua County, who was apparently attempting to "control" the SKYWARN program there. Long story short, he implied that he was here to save the day, and that if elected he was going to be in control, and that there would be no more "dynasties". He was an outsider who had no clue what was going on, had an incorrect impression that I was a problem, and he implied that he would be in control of our local SKYWARN program. SKYWARN is an NWS program, not an ARRL program. Ham radio does not have a say in its operations. Ham radio participates in an NWS-owned program. Period. Not the other way around. He thinks it's an ARRL program. It is not. He thinks it's an ARES/RACES program. It is not an ARES/RACES program, and he is misinformed in how it actually operates. It is a Department of Commerce program; not an ARRL program. The ARRL has nothing to do with the Department of Commerce, or the National Weather Service. Mr. Eakin came into the game right off the bat thinking that he would be able to control something he neither had the power nor the authority to operate. He was a busybody who was interfering with something not in his control. He was interfering with something he did not have the authorization to interfere with. He was also misinformed on who was the problem. He was interfering with a stalking and harassment situation and making it worse for the victim. Paul sent me an email to "explain".10 Information-wise, it was completely useless to me. It mentioned no names as far as who was spreading the gossip that he had heard. After repeatedly asking him who was spreading this misinformation, Mr. Eakin refused, time and again, to share with me any of the names of his sources, preventing me from being able to confront them about it. He was obviously not going to cooperate with me at all. Eakin was just another meatball Nazi and I hate meatball Nazis. And his brand of meatball Nazi "help" was about as welcome as a fart in a phone booth.
In the email, Paul says that he wanted to "help clear up any issues so the section business can move forward". ("...Section business?") During his campaign, he promised hams that he would make changes so that situations like what happened with Alachua County SKYWARN would not happen again. (...Whatever those "situations" were.) What did the civilian-run (i.e., not ham radio run) Alachua County SKYWARN program, which was not tied in any way to the ARRL, pose to him or to hams or to amateur radio as an "issue?"
Before I had actually come to know about it, Mr. Eakin was apparently out there campaigning about all these problems that I was causing and how he was going to come along and make all these sweeping changes to make sure that it never happened again. ...But he was leaving me completely out of the loop. The man was using my personal pain and suffering - a painful problem that I had been experiencing at the hands of local ham radio operators for years - and without knowing what he was doing, he was using it in his personal political campaign in the name of the ARRL. He evidently had no interest in hearing my side, or he would have come to me at a much earlier stage, before he had even begun campaigning using my troubles. But where had he gotten this information from?
Then Jeff Capehart comes along. It's always Jeff, you'll notice. Always the guy with all the information for some reason - and yet again, he dangles Mr. Eakin over me, telling me how there's this guy out there who is running for a position in the ARRL who is talking about (me)[emails]. And as usual, Jeff refused to tell me this guy's name for quite a while, using it to torture me, like he did with previous situations with Jay Leiberman, and Scott West, before. He would mention things just to upset me, and then withhold the name of the individual who was making the threats, or saying things about me. Then he'd claim that he was only telling me to "help" me, and that telling me who was saying it was pointless because it would only make me upset. (sigh) (pause for people to think about that for a second)
When I was finally able to get the name of this person out of Jeff, I told Jeff to have this guy contact me IMMEDIATELY. Of course, Jeff took his sweet time about it.
Finally, after threatening to bring a lawsuit against Mr. Eakin,, he then contacted me. He pretended to be very nice, and acted like he was someone there to help. He asked for my side. I explained things to him. I yet again went into the long story about what had happened...but only to waste my breath. Basically, he just wanted the information, and in order to get it he'd offered to help me. But in the end he went back on his word, and ended the conversation with "good luck" while I got absolutely nothing of any use out of him. ...Nothing that I could use to defend myself with, to make people stop talking, to know who was responsible. He was a son of a bitch. (I have recordings of our phone conversations. I'll put them up at some point when I can find the time.)
Alachua County SKYWARN was a civilian-run organization that worked extremely well. We were not "run" by any ham radio groups or by any emergency management agency. Hams could participate; they just didn't RUN us, and that was by design - which some hams didn't like. (This actually caused no problems. There were no complaints at all about us, from anyone. But the hams made it into a problem.) We shared important reports with EM and NWS. That was as much as we were obligated or required to do for ham radio. We're not here to recruit new hams for the local ham clubs. We're not here to offer ham radio courses. We're not here to pass flyers around for the local hams clubs. We're not here to "publicize" the local ham clubs. We're not here to teach people how to handle portable tower setup and takedown, incident command training, or to chase storms in bright orange ambulances, bring food to firefighters, be on call for fire/rescue, or anything else like that. Ham radio had no say in our organization or how it was supposed to be run.
The hams did not like that. It bugged the crap out of some who apparently wanted to be able to control ACS.
If anyone wanted to form their OWN spotter group, that was perfectly fine. We had no way of controlling that. But the implication that we had any kind power to keep people from being able to do that - here in Alachua County, and especially anywhere else in Florida - was obviously ridiculous and stupid. Paul completely missed the total absurdity of that suggestion. It really just didn't matter to him, though. He was obviously looking for a "scandal" to use in his campaign, to shock people with, and to lure them into voting for him, and he had apparently found one and used it very well. (It sounds like it came from Phil Royce. Phil had said that he was going to try to prey on everyone's fears in a similar fashion to turn them away from ACS.) Obviously no one offered Paul any proof of the accusation. Obviously Paul sought to make no real hard effort to obtain such proof of the accusation beyond making a phone call to me that I forced him to make after I'd caught him spreading rumor without check. But I want it to be clear that he didn't make contact because he had made the first effort and he was trying to do the right thing or something. I put the word out publicly that I didn't like what he was doing - how he was talking about me, about ACS, and how he was completely avoiding any contact with me, and keeping me completely out of the loop. So, only to cover his ass, he finally called. But let me make this one-hundred-percent clear: he had to be given threat of lawsuit first, before he finally responded. His handling of this very sensitive situation has not in any way been exemplary. It has in fact been extremely careless and irresponsible. I have web counters here and on other pages, and I know that he's viewed this page and the relating cite subpages more than a few times; and he has not attempted to make further contact with me or to rectify the situation, or to share any of the information that I have requested from him...names, addresses, telephone numbers, email addresses, positions of any people in some office in some agency. ...Nothing, zip, nada. This isn't fair. You can't accuse somebody of something publicly and then withhold the names of those accusing him and deny that individual any chance to defend, or to speak on his behalf, or to face his accusers. These are basic civil rights. It's basic "due process". They are a guaranteed right set forth in the Constitutional Amendments. Paul seems to have taken them out of the picture FOR me. And this guy has on more than one occasion bragged to me that he was a "cop". So you'd think he'd know all of this.
ADDENDUM - 12/01/2011: It has been brought to my attention from quite a number of people, now, that Paul was, in fact, NOT a cop. He was a member of the FHP "Auxiliary". This is a far cry from the actual Florida Highway Patrol. It is not the same thing. I'm now being told that he is under investigation by the FHP for, among quite a number of other things, bragging on a number of occasions that he was an actual FHP officer. I do remember in conversations with him, myself, that he bragged that he was a cop and in particular I remember him telling me that he was often called to do "crime scene investigations". Bullshit. If he was trained in crime and it's investigations then the man would have been well trained on why it's not a good idea to spread information about someone so as to protect all parties on the off chance they're innocent. Eakin was utterly and unforgivably outright CARELESS TO THE POINT OF NEGLIGENCE in that regard - at least with the handling of my own situation.
You know, I don't even think he realizes that, effectively, for all intents and purposes, by the WAY that he was using the situation of some innocent victim whom he'd never even known in his political campaign, and how it was affecting me and my life totally outside of his calloused, oblivious concern...he was actually stalking and harassing me. I'm sure he never once saw it that way, or cared. Narcissistic bullies never do. But in the end, that's basically how he ended up treating me.
At any rate, any business there was to be had should have been between us and the National Weather Service. Period. NO ONE ELSE.
But there really was no "business". It had all been made up by the Gainesville hams.
Of what I do now much later know, I know that the hams had accused me of a power play, of preventing others from being able to form their own SKYWARN groups. That was totally false. There was no proof of such a thing at all. It was all malicious rumor. What the hams weren't saying was that ACS was preventing the LOCAL hams (let me repeat...the LOCAL hams) from controlling Alachua County SKYWARN itself - not SKYWARN as a whole. There was no connection to ham radio other than the fact that they were allowed to participate at any time if they so wanted. ...And that was by deliberate design because from previous experience we knew the hams to be troublesome control-mongers, and they had been a threatening menace on more than one occasion to other competing organizations, and a very serious problem themselves.
Because of their previous attempts to interfere, we tried to keep a tight reign on the attempted control of our own group, which was a group totally separate and apart from GARS, GARC, or any other group. It had been run just fine since 1997. We cooperated WITH Emergency Management in our SKYWARN activities; but ACOEM did not control us, either. That is, they didn't own us. They had not founded our group. That was also by design. We'd seen, from history, the problems that come from EM controlling other ham agencies in other surrounding counties. John Fleming himself backed this up with stories to me about how EM and/or Sheriff's Offices in other surrounding counties had interfered with ham organizations before, basically taking control of much of their operations, sometimes confiscating equipment. We tried to avoid that by being a completely separate group. The hams went to EM and used that with a dark twist, and made them angry by touting that we were trying to control everything, and EM believed it. We'd repeatedly offered hams a chance to be more closely involved with us. But they chose not to, most often citing that they would not support us with finances or manpower, but they would "support the concept and idea". This is basically the BS way of saying, while clapping to make it sound good, "We're so proud of what you're doing - but we just don't want to get involved." We TRIED to hold spotter nets. GARS members would never volunteer or come forward to RUN nets. They wanted to chase, not to be bogged down to a microphone at a desk at home. We didn't support chasing, either, and hams didn't like THAT. (Individually, and when held to be off the record, we found the hams wanted to chase. But officially and on the record, why of course they all condemned chasing. UGH!) GARS could have formed their own spotter section. They chose not to. But in our experience whenever we TRIED to hold nets, they accused us of storm chasing (so as to villainize us), and they forbade us from HOLDING any nets; or they attempted to make people who participated in the nets pay dues TWICE because we were calling it the "Alachua County SKYWARN Net" - even though most of the participants were already currently-paying members of GARS. The proposal came from Bill Wells/K4RDP, whose idea basically amounted to a "use tax" on the repeater. It was kept within the Executive Board, and they threatened us with it. But knowledge of it was not shared with the General Membership, and they did not record it in the Secretary's Report as they were legally supposed to.
GARS was never cooperative and some even made it perfectly clear to us that any spotter nets held every time there was a storm was quite frankly a pain in the ass to some, because others wanted to ragchew, and to those individuals, the spotter nets got in the way of that. To that end, it started to become a problem every time there were storms. There'd be NO ONE on the air all day...until a storm came, and then suddenly people from GARS would get on there and "ragchew" (hold long conversations and refuse to vacate the frequency when requested) in order to prevent us from operating. I actually have recordings of hams doing this. It was HAMS who got in the way of having any kind of spotter nets, not the other way around as the rumors suggested. Mr. Eakin was WAY out of his ballgame with this, and he had absolutely NO REAL CLUE what was actually going on down here, and he was interfering with stuff that involved both civil and criminal investigations and they were still ongoing at the time that he was mucking around with things. The man had no business ever getting involved. ...Not at ALL. All he did was fan flames, and make things worse for me in my connections with FDEM in Tallahassee and here at home by the use of his unresearched, unverified, and extremely irresponsible gossip...
I've had hams stalking and harassing me for many years. I've put up with it for a long time. But this, this is just totally ridiculous. Today, there are no spotter nets, because the ARES program runs none, the redneck hams hog the frequency during inclement weather. And it STILL goes on today. Eakin's done nothing to make good on his promise. Supposedly we've been out of the way for a number of years, now. What's the problem NOW? It's called lack of participation, inability to reach volunteers. The enthusiasm base just isn't there. Right now, there is NO spotter program anymore because of the HAMS, not because of Todd Sherman, or the civilian organization that he ran called "Alachua County SKYWARN". Paul has done me and ACS a grave, extremely unnecessary, and not-asked-for disservice by his unwarranted interference and lack of knowledge, and lack of care for accuracy OR follow-through in his "investigating" practices. Paul Eakin acted incompetently, irrationally, and irresponsibly.
Paul had REPEATEDLY been asked over the time since he nosed his way into our lives to come forward with contact information regarding his "witnesses" and he has refused any contact. He is attempting to elude me and all it is doing is making me angry and I am thinking of having a compel order issued not to him but the ARRL. I think I'm going to have to involve the ARRL directly in this, hold them responsible, go after them. This seems like it's going to have to be the way if I want anything done.
We NEVER told anyone at ANY time that they could not form their own group. We never at any time had that kind of POWER. There is no documentation to support that...ANYWHERE. What IDIOT goes around believing that some individual has more power than NWS and EM and is able to "control" people in the manner suggested in his email, and DOESN'T see it as obvious BS? It doesn't make sense. He was also told that his Alachua County Emergency Coordinator, Jeff Capehart/W4UFL, was in fact a very serious problem for me; and yet, Paul went to him anyway for advice on the situation and how to handle it! Jeff also knew in FULL DETAIL just EXACTLY what was going on down here and, advising Paul that the situation had "resolved itself" (UGH!), was an outright lie on his part. It had not "resolved" at all, and the harassments still went on - even as recently as March of this year (2009), and there is still at this time no SKYWARN spotter program in this county. What Jeff meant was, ACS had been rendered impotent as far as any further spotter training classes would go; and for a SHORT time, he and Melissa were in the process of creating a group using our group's already existing name, and at the time everything looked like it might actually go THROUGH. But then I caught on and threatened a lawsuit and tried to get ACOEM to cease attempting to use our name and to cease all attempts to take over our group, AND to try to get control of the hams whom they were supporting who were stalking me. ACOEM stopped the takeover attempt; they SLOWLY removed references to the ACS name in PUBLIC documentation that was being handed out; but references on the web still exist, and can still be seen. But they did nothing about the hams, and continue even today to support some of them. Otherwise, they threw up their hands and gave up altogether.
I don't blame them. The whole situation was crazy. But they BLAMED ME, instead of acknowledging anything that I was telling them. They took actions which caused me great harm. They tried to hide it all under the table. Now they're responsible. They stopped everything involving the takeover before things got WAY out of hand; which is good. I actually understand that thinking. They began to realize they had no clue what was going on around them and that people were being hurt and now they could be held directly responsible. So they ceased EVERYTHING. But it hardly helps the victims out there. They brought this upon themselves, though. It does no good to blame ME. It would do them a lot of good to admit what they did, that they were duped, and take the heat. But blaming me is just easier, and doesn't cost a career, and the loss of an entire home.
In the end, I can't believe it went this far. In the end, I can't believe people took unconfirmed information and went so FAR with it, took the drastic ACTIONS that they did, ENCOURAGED the stalkers without check as they did. It's still sort of a dizzying nightmarish realization. And it happened...because no one wanted to dare challenge the Monarchs and tell them that they weren't really WEARING any clothes, for fear of what could happen to them if they did. This whole thing...it's as simple and as complicated as that. Some people saw opportunity; USED my situation. Paul was one.
In the end, Paul ACTED like he wanted to help, gathered information off me to use towards his own political ends, and then did nothing to help at ALL. He'd answered NONE of my original questions, stayed WAY off topic, BRAGGED of himself and gave me political literature, shared NONE of the contact information with me that I had originally asked him for, and he abandoned me. He inflamed a situation, and then left me hanging. He had no intention of actually getting involved in any real way to correct the situation. He was full of it. Paul involved himself in something that was not any of his business, that he was not privy to official information about, his sources were not backed up by anything official. He caused harm to an innocent person and only exaggerated an already bad situation that I was going through...and he used the name of the ARRL to do it. He should be held responsible for that.
His suggestion of "management" of our situation is out of place. His world is amateur radio, not SKYWARN.
This is a common confusion among hams...that SKYWARN is an ARRL thing; that SKYWARN is a ham radio thing. That is incorrect. It is a DoC thing. An NWS thing. Ham radio can PARTICIPATE in it. That's as far as ham radio "control" of SKYWARN goes. Our program was deliberately decided to be civilian-run for a FEW very GOOD reasons: 1) the local hams here get into too much trouble and have shown consistent inability to follow through with instructions, or to adhere to safety standards. 2) None of the local area ham radio clubs wished to support the general, non-ham, civilian public if we formed a SKYWARN group under them. They made that loudly clear to us. We wanted to support EVERYONE. 3) I'd seen the past mistakes and problems that other surrounding county clubs have repeatedly had with involving themselves with Emergency Management. They have a bad history of tending to want to run everything like a military operation, requiring people to take all sorts of courses which are wholly inappropriate and totally unnecessary for anyone who is a SKYWARN spotter. Spotters are required to look up, identify a potential severe threat, and pick up a cellphone. I'm sorry but that is ALL that there is to their mission. Requiring EMCOMM this and EMRISS that training, dragging a heavy dummy across a track, becoming a member of CERT, or ACFR-Reserves, or other EM programs, or learning Incident Command...these things have NOTHING AT ALL to do with spotting. There is ZERO argument on this. The PROBLEM lay in the fact that some hams simply DISAGREED with my thinking. What they MEANT was that I would not relinquish control of the organization that I had founded. They could have started their own if they wanted. Mine was not going to be destroyed by politics, or by hams who couldn't follow instructions who followed truckers through five counties when specifically told not to when they thought the guy was a jammer. I always had my management hat on, and I denied some projects for expense, for lack of manpower, and even because they were just ridiculous. Some hams did not like this. So yes, in this sense, I was a tyrannical leadership type. But anyone who ever puts on a management hat knows exactly what I mean. I'm not a jerk. I always did the RIGHT thing. What they MEANT was...that ACS was SO good in what it did that we tended to OVERSHADOW the other organizations. This made some hams angry. We had no objection to more spotter groups, especially under ham radio groups. I always ENCOURAGED more spotters, and my classes often had a hundred at a time, in fact, which is kind of unprecedented. In fact, NWS funding was tight one year and I actually forked out the money out of my OWN pocket to mail out Advanced certificates to those spotters that the NWS could not afford the actual POSTAGE for!!!11 I've spent HUNDREDS on the Alachua County EMWIN Project, myself.
This is what I mean. You have to be careful with gossip and rumor. It COULD be malicious falsities, designed to make good people fall for it and to do just EXACTLY what they ended up being conned into doing here, in the end. Paul had been duped by the very hams he says he serves. He deserves it. He's been told.
This also serves as PERFECT example why I made ACS a CIVILIAN, not a HAM, organization. I've lived here a VERY long time. I've been a ham here for 25 years come next year. I KNOW my local area hams. They are NOT responsible. They gossip WAY too much. They get into WAY TOO MUCH trouble. They have to be BABYSAT. They tend to blame others for their mistakes as a standard. They're not willing to take full responsibility for their actions. They want you to cover for them when they screw up, etc., etc., etc. These idiots who come from out of town, who take rumor and then take some form of action against me and/or who interfere not knowing the full situation, and not wiling to HEAR the full situation or to do much research at all...they have no business getting involved. In Paul's case...we have yet to even MEET face-to-face. We've had TWO phone calls. The man does NOT know enough about me to make any kind of an educated guess, much less a "judgment", even. Paul's involvement in our affairs, was inappropriate ,and had no business even happening. We're not a ham radio club. We're not an ARRL club. Where the HELL does Paul or the ARRL fit in with us or have any SAY in our operations or right to operate peacefully? But if anyone wanted to get involved in "finding the truth", they should have hired a lawyer for me. That would have gotten right too it RIGHT FAST. But I note nobody seems willing to involve any lawyers, or DO any inquiries, or any investigations, or otherwise risk putting anything going on here into any official, publicized record. Very interesting. No, that would be too dangerous a thing...to actually have any kind of INVESTIGATION into organizational and agency ethical actions. Right? I've actually been DEMANDING official inquiries and investigations for YEARS now and no one seems the least bit interested in actually getting involved in doing such a thing. Interesting, indeed. Sure sounds shady to me. NOBODY TRUSTS THIER POSITIONS STRONG ENOUGH TO HOLD UP TO CLOSE AND/OR PUBLIC SCRUTINY? Hmm. THAT'S scary, if anything.
Paul had been out there discussing me and Alachua County SKYWARN with other people and having open public discussions about me and Alachua County SKYWARN and decided to leave me completely out of the loop. I found out only because one of my ham radio stalkers was using his knowledge of it to torture me. Paul would have gotten away with it had Jeff Capehart kept his mouth shut. At first he'd just tell me that there was this ARRL guy out there who was talking about me in the public circuit, in his political campaign suggesting that he was going to "take care of" situations such as mine. Jeff would not reveal to me who it was for some time, then finally admitted it to me. I put the word out that I didn't appreciate it and that I wanted him to stop and to do the right thing and to contact me before he spreads rumor like that, talking about it in public circles without any verification that it's true or not. So he finally he decided to contact me.
Paul would NOT divulge to any names, or titles, or positions, or contact information of those whom he had heard the gossip from. Jeff Capehart had also added that Paul had said he'd also heard things from people at NWS-JAX, NWS-Tallahassee, and in the Florida Division of Emergency Mgmt. Paul refused to tell me WHO specifically was saying these things, or what exactly was said - only that it was about me and it had to do with "problems". He said that he wanted to know "my side". I thought he meant to HELP me. But apparently, he only intended to gather further fodder to use in his campaign, and then he just as abruptly left me hanging once he'd gotten what he wanted. On the phone, he told me that he was also a cop - one who deals in crime scene forensics, too. This bothers me especially because he took gossip and slander and rumors, my personal pain and suffering, and USED it in his personal political campaign, without so much as a signed document in example to prove anything first, not a complaint filed, not a judgment in his hands. Nothing. There WAS none. He put those rumors back out in the public circuit in a wider, uncontrolled way. That's not fair. There was only one SKYWARN program at the time...mine. And I was the "guy" who "ran" it. He took gossip and slander and rumor, and purported it publicly as if it was fact SOLELY because of the status level of the source, not because he had anything to prove the rumors. He said he was going to do things to "prevent these kinds of things from happening again." WHAT things?!!! He wouldn't tell me. But in doing this, he not only put himself in the way of a lawsuit, but the American Radio Relay League, too - the agency that he was a member of, and for which he was running for a position in. His involvement in my personal affairs and spreading them out in public has only exasperated an already painful situation for me, made it worse, spread it farther out into public than it needed to be, and helped it get even farther out of control; and he DID it...because he wanted to use it in a way to boost his political career. I think he should have acted much more prudently and carefully. He acted wholly inappropriately, and USED my situation to help gain himself a personal goal - a political position within the ARRL; a status level. I have repeatedly tried to get names and specifics out of this guy, and he has repeatedly ignored my emails and calls. He's just NOT willing to cooperate. It's okay to talk about what he's heard about ME; but when I want to try to do something to get to the SOURCES, why gee that's not allowed because now he's revealing personal information about innocent people. Am I guessing his line of thinking correctly here? He UNDERSTANDS privacy and protection and realizes control is important but when it comes to ME, why, that's different?
At the very least, his email verifies that NWS-JAX DID INDEED talk to other people about there being problems with me and ACS, contrary to their public denials. I still need to know the name of the individual(s) that he got this information from. Spreading rumor about me and then PROTECTING the person(s) spreading it is wrong, extremely unethical for someone holding the position and title for the organization that he does, and unfairly violates my civil rights. Being careful with what he says NOW is just way too late and he needs to do the right thing.
Still. He's a cop. He's supposed to be logical, reasonable, CAREFUL - with evidence, evidentiary contamination, rumor and misinformation control, keeping things generally always under control. He's supposed to be TRAINED in all of this. But with me, I guess that's just out the window? I don't see his handling of the situation as fair at all, and he's made my life only that much more difficult by spreading the gossip farther out there than I can even TRY to get a hold on it. On top of that, he's not willing to share with me his sources and for that, I'm thinking about a lawsuit against the ARRL. This supposedly responsible man, supposedly trained man, acted so very irresponsibly; and not only that...but forensically incorrectly, ineptly, and inappropriately. He aided in making my situation even worse, and he did it "on the clock" for the ARRL. So without even knowing that it was happening, the ARRL had now become responsible for something a rogue officer in it's ranks was doing. If he wants to REALLY do the right thing, he should come to me with names and specifics about what was said and who said what, so that I can actually begin to defend myself. I MAY be lenient; but I make no promises. What he did was wrong. Period. He is not in a position to bargain. Without even knowing me or anything about me, he aided in destroying my name and reputation, and in nailing the coffin on a perfectly good storm spotting organization which had done nothing wrong to anyone, and then put his own organization (the ARRL) at risk of a lawsuit, too. I may have a restraining order issued against this guy. He's acting really shady and staying out of contact and isn't willing to share sources of gossip and this means he is out of control, irresponsible, and dangerous.
Chapter 12 UF FACULTY ADVISOR HELPS HACKER ESCAPE ARREST FOR HACKING INTO SERVER DR. JAY GARLITZ / AA4FL
GATOR AMATEUR RADIO CLUB
UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA
Dr. Jay Garlitz / AA4FL, Faculty Advisor of the University of Florida's Gator Amateur Radio Club (GARC), was told multiple times, for many years, about multiple people in the club who were repeatedly harassing and stalking me. He took no action; did nothing. I told them that these people were so bad that for a time I had actually been thinking about suicide. They were destroying everything I had done, destroying my reputation, my credibility, my good name. They were putting my family members at risk, stalking my friends and associations, emailing them, in come cases calling them, trying to make everyone think that if they associated with me, they would come into their crosshairs, too. They were encouraging government agencies such as Alachua County Office of Emergency Management and the National Weather Service to take steps to "protect" themselves from someone the hams were purporting to be a "serious problem". But the loss of my friends was the most devastating thing, and it hurt. In one case, a husband didn't like that his wife were associating with a guy who had not one but MULTIPLE stalkers stalking him, and he wanted her to disassociate with me - in order to protect her. I could not argue with this thinking and people were RIGHT about that, and there was NOTHING that I could do! They were 100-percent CORRECT to be so worried!
Instead of taking it to the authorities, recording it in any documentation, bringing it to the attention of the University - which would have been the prudent and CORRECT thing to do so as to cover his butt and that of the University's, Dr. Garlitz instead threw it back at me, implying that if he reported it that I would be put away. I still have the email. He didn't use those very words, but the implication was there. His lack of concern over something so scary and horrific was a shock to me. He repeatedly refused to believe that his members could do any wrong. He acted like someone deeply in love, who couldn't bear to believe that his lover could do any wrong. He instead made himself believe that I was exaggerating, and it was evident that he had convinced himself that I had some sort of mental problems. And upon seeing that I had gone to him for help, and that he was not going to help me, my harassers were allowed to continue harassing and stalking me, without hindrance. In fact, Dr. Garlitz himself continually did things to cause me even more problems and to even actually block me when I called the University of Florida Police Department on one particular ham operator, my "lead stalker", Jeffrey Donald Capehart, earlier this year.
To this day, Dr. Garlitz actually believes that I betrayed HIM; and I remember how he once mentioned to me that he's going to have to "re-evaluate his friendships." This man is so duped; so out of the loop. He just COULDN'T understand why I was so angry with him and his club. He acted so VERY blind. I cannot help him. I have to proceed regardless of what happens to him or to his club. But one of the things that I am very seriously considering in my mind is actually suing the University of Florida, and seeking the complete and total dissolution of the Gator Amateur Radio Club for being an organization that is a "danger to society" and for "protecting" members whom they were TOLD were a serious problem and making conscious decision to hide it, cover it, and to protect the club rather than investigate and cooperate with a serious complaint that was made about a very serious matter. I truly believe that Jay Garlitz meant well, thinking that his actions were for what was right. But he made the mistake of making a GUT decision, and EMOTIONAL decision on who was telling the truth and who was not. And his choice of actions (or rather, inactions) have not only irreversibly screwed an innocent victim of his name and civil rights, but have placed his club and the University of Florida itself at risk of highly public and very serious lawsuits, and of severely bad Press, with the University being held, defacto, directly responsible for what my attackers have done in an organization that is the responsibility of the University. That man put his ASS, and the UNIVERSITY'S, on the line to protect someone he wanted to be innocent, not someone that he knew was innocent. ...And the Gator Amateur Radio Club's ass. ...And the University of Florida Police Department's ass. ...And his entire dental business. ...His name. ...His reputation. ...For Jeff Capehart. Jeff Capehart owes a LOT of people his entire life in servitude for what they did for him. A LOT of people have put their own names, reputations, their careers, and even their possible loss of FREEDOM on the line for him. ...A LOT of people. Dr. Garlitz convinced people in UPD to drag their feet on a computer crimes investigation into a friend, to help that friend as much as possible, and to cooperate fully and entirely with his friend in the investigation - while blocking me out of that investigation, completely, keeping me in the dark, not allowing me on the property... I want to know where all that paperwork is for this "investigation". Where did it go? It's nowhere. It doesn't exist...because no one did a damned thing...to protect Jeff Capehart's name. I can prove I made the complaint to UPD. UPD can't prove that they did a lick of work. And if they do, it leaves them with some real explaining to do. They're screwed no matter what they say, really. If they say they DID do an investigation, they'll have to show proof...in paperwork, of contact with me and what was discussed with me, in who else they contacted. They won't have anything LIKE that. And if they say they DIDN'T do an investigation after someone came to them and complained of a computer crime...they'll STILL have to explain. No...UPD wants to leave this one alone. So does Michael Metz, the investigating officer.
I went to the club, the Faculty Advisor, for help. He blew me off. I went to the UF PD, and he convinced the PD that I was the problem, and protected Jeff Capehart. UF PD had obligation to do a proper investigation. They ignored me, went to Jeff for all information and treated him like HE was the liaison. In so doing, they contaminated the entire investigation. UF PD as a result, became responsible for screwing it up, and for letting the bad guy go. And this happened because Dr. Jay Garlitz vouched for Jeff, and implied that *I* was a problem. UF PD had obligation to confirm that I was a problem before they just blew me off. They had obligation to handle everything forensically correctly, to handle things in a manner so that contamination could not be introduced, so that the bad guys wouldn't inadvertently be helped, and the innocent harmed. As a result, the crime was concluded with the bad guy getting away with the help of the Gator Amateur Radio Club, and I got no justice. The UF PD was inept and irresponsible in the handling of the entire situation. A UF employee who worked for UF-OIG, broke two or three Florida Statutes regarding computer crimes, and they concluded that he was innocent SOLELY because a Faculty Advisor said so, and NO investigation was truly done.
Jeff Capehart was a simultaneous GARC and GARS officer who admitted to me that he'd hacked and broke into the AC-EMWIN server repeatedly by going into the system registry and swiping usernames and passwords. He GRINNED as he admitted this to me! ...GRINNED! He thought it was SO FUNNY! Jeff D. Capehart/W4UFL, also currently works for the University of Florida's Office of Audit & Compliance Review (OACR) as IT Audit Manager, and handles IT security issues for the UF. When he hacked into the AC-EMWIN server, and began reading logs without authorization or permission, he violated two Florida statutes under Chapter 815, Computer-Related Crimes, regarding downloading, and regarding theft of intellectual property (at least a four-time, repeated theft of passwords taken from the system registry over a two year period), and regarding viewing of Trade Secret information (lists which contained customer information). Under STATE law, using a computer system without authorization is a third degree felony of itself. So I'll repeat it once more: Jeff Capehart stole usernames and passwords from the AC-EMWIN system by remoting in without authorization, and he ADMITTED it to me. Since he did it while on campus, inside the Gator ARC club station, the Gator ARC was responsible, and thus, the University of Florida was responsible. UF PD ignored my logic, listened only to Dr. Jay Garlitz, and UF PD did nothing. Because Dr. Garlitz vouched for him, they ignored me and listened to everything that Jeff had to say. When they asked him if he had broken into the system, he said no, and feigned no knowledge about what had happened. Some time later, when I was up on the roofop of the Dental Science Bldg, removing all of the EMWIN equipment that I had worked so hard on getting placed up there because Dr. Garlitz saw ME as being the problem (he figured that by getting rid of me was to get rid of the problem), THAT'S when Jeff admitted to me what he had done...when no one else was around to hear it. Why were Jeff and I on the rooftop? ...Because we happened to be the only two in the entire club who had actually TAKEN the Environmental Health & Safety Department (EH&S)-required climbing safety classes that Glenn Ketcham had required us to attend.
Apparently Jeff Capehart engaged in hacking computers before. His wife Susan Tipton engaged in hacking computers before. They did it together. They in fact have a criminal HISTORY of it. In 1985, while students at UF, both Jeff (then 20) and Susan (then 23), along with a number of other people, apparently hacked into a UF IFAS computer and were brought under SEVERAL charges and investigated.12 So yup. Looks like he's definitely done this BEFORE. Sad fact is, UPD handled him back THEN, too. Looks like they did a MUCH better job of forensically handling things back then, though. If only they had been as diligent in the handling of my case.
Prior to that, there are some odd records in the Clerk of the Court from when Jeff was just 17, regarding:
But don't take my word for it; look these things up yourself.
Since the information's existence is betrayed by the existence of both Gainesville Sun and Orlando Sentinel archives, these references will remain in here regardless whether or not Jeff and Susan would prefer the information hidden. People have a right to know who they are dealing with.
To me, Jeff Capehart is the textbook example of a psychopath. Everything described in the books that I've read, he's done to me. In fact, to me, he is one of the more dangerous kind because of his deep involvement in so many public service agencies and organizations, and because of his entrenchment in so many public service functions, and because of his insane number of powerful connections everywhere, and because of his employment position - in an important IT security position inside the University of Florida. Thus, he has the potential to do great amounts of damage. He can do whatever he wants, he can view whatever information he wants, manipulate whatever and whoever he wants, people give him whatever information he wants. He knows everybody. Everybody likes him because of all the favors that he does for them. Everybody trusts him. But when he's with me, alone; when he thinks no one else is around or watching; and especially now that he knows that I'm aware of what he truly is, he acts like a monster.
Dr. Garlitz does not at this time know about what happened on the rooftop. I haven't told him. I've given up. It is not possible to get Dr. Garlitz to listen much less come to my aid. He doesn't want to believe that Jeff is bad. He's long gone. Whatever I've tried to tell him in the past was never heard beyond half of the first sentence before he'd tune me out. It's a lost cause. There's no point. The damage has been done. The EMWIN system has been kicked off of the rooftop. My key has been taken from me. I am no longer allowed access to the rooftop, or to the club station unescorted. But really, I don't want anything to do with that club, or with Dr. Garlitz, anymore. There is nothing of interest for me in ham radio anymore. I have no desire to associate with those so very scary people who support these bad people so blindly and without question. I'm scared of them. I don't trust them. I don't want anything to do with them. I see ham radio operators here in Alachua County now as being very dangerous individuals - both in how some will participate in causing everything described above, and how the rest support, cooperate, back then up, and/or decide not to say anything, or do anything, or to help. They are all responsible. Participating with hams in anything now for me only means reminder of the things that they did to me and I can't take that and I see no reason to torture myself. These people are definitely bad. There is something wrong with them. Both ham clubs in this town need suing and dissolution in order to regain their consciences, their sense of morals...to be reminded that there are consequences. Currently, there is no reason for them to stop harassing me. No one has bothered to stop them. Why should they? What consequences are there for the local hams? For this reason, I don't see them as being able to get along with the rest of society. I see them as capable of causing harm, as capable of turning a blind eye when they know some members are causing harm to protect their organizations and putting their victims rights and lives at risk...and thus, they are a very real danger to society.
I am extremely and so painfully disappointed in Dr. Garlitz and how he allowed me to be treated, in how he chose not to believe me, in how his actions only allowed Jeff and some other hams to continue to cause me even more harm over the years by trusting them at every turn, without ANY challenge whatsoever. Dr. Garlitz's excuse to me for why he always chose not to do anything was this: "I just don't want to get involved." Except, by taking a side and vouching for Jeff to UF PD, and implying that there were problems with me, he got involved. What he meant was, he believed in Jeff, and just didn't want to hear what I had to say because he'd made up his mind. He's being very selective in what he wants to see, hear, and believe. I believed in him. I always thought of him as a very good man. I always looked up to and respected him. But Jay allowed his emotions to dictate how this whole thing proceeded. He put me up against Jeff and chose sides, rather than reporting the situation, or to support and encourage a full investigation, or to do the right thing. He put his club and his friends before my complaints. In so doing he caused UPD to embark on the wrong course of investigation and to assume the wrong things and they too blew my case off without much of any investigation whatsoever. Dr. Garlitz encouraged UPD to go straight to Jeff Capehart for any and all information regarding the computers, the network, the investigation - even though I'd told UPD that Jeff has been stalking me and that it was likely HE had broken into the system. UPD ignored me as a direct result of things Dr. Garlitz told them. It was more important to protect the club and it's reputation by putting my own reputation and even my own safety at risk, based on gut feeling and incorrect assumption. Dr. Garlitz had abused his power, and it caused me many problems and great harm. He didn't mean to. I really do believe that, because he was emotionally upset over what was happening and there were things that he didn't want to believe. I truly believe that he thought that he was doing the right thing. But he was duped, as everyone had been duped. And I was labeled. I was put in harm's way. It hurt me so badly because I know Jay's heart means to do good. But he couldn't listen, and in this case he got short-circuited. He didn't want to fully engulf the problem because it was too painful for him. And in the end, it caused me more problems and pain. Because of this, I can no longer trust Jay. I can no longer believe in him. I now know that he is capable of placing his emotions before logic and the right thing. I can't trust him to act responsibly in matters like this, or not to put his club ahead of my own safety. But I will not ever trust another ham radio operator again now. I no longer talk to Jay. I no longer consider him my friend. He puts his heart in front of logic, and in so doing, he gets in the way - by choice, and brings harm to innocent people by allowing those who are using his heart to use him. He did so much for me for so long. He has such an otherwise good heart. But he allowed this to get in the way. He made choices...wrong choices...bad choices...and he brought me harm. He gave me no chance, no choice. He decided my fate for me. I talked to him a lot about what was happening but he never really heard anything I'd said because he did not want to.
Jay told me that this whole thing wasn't because he didn't like me, but because he wanted space for the new satellite radio equipment he wanted to put up there. I knew he was BSing me, though. Jeff of course, while on the rooftop with me, betrayed him yet again, not being able to resist sharing what he knows, and impressing me with how he always knew more than me, and he told me that the reason Jay took my key and had me remove all of the EMWIN equipment was because he saw me as a problem and wanted me gone. Actually, he started the sentence with "That's not what he told ME!...", after which I chuckled and shook my head, because I'd already assumed so much, and because I knew Jeff wasn't going to be able to make it through the afternoon without bragging something like that to put me down. ...And that, he just couldn't resist.
Chapter 13 "...I HAVE NOTHING OFFICIAL TO GIVE YOU" DETECTIVE MICHAEL METZ
UNIVERSITY POLICE DEPARTMENT
UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA
(under construction)
- The day after Capehart hacked into the AC-EMWIN server, I filed complaint with UPD, originally to Detective Baxter.
- Detective Baxter handed me over to Detective Michael Metz.
- Numerous email and phone exchanges between Detective Metz and I.
- Met Detective Metz at station.
- Detective Metz took my station key, preventing me from any further unsupervised access to GARC club station, and thus of any access to my EMWIN equipment, nearly resulting in the loss of my equipment to someone making false claims to it.
- It felt like the Mayo situation. Didn't feel confident with Detective Metz. Metz seemed to be largely ignoring anything that I was saying, and was instead cooperating with the Gator Amateur Radio Club, in particular, paying attention to its Faculty Advisor, Dr. Jay Garlitz, and ONLY the Faculty Advisor and not the victim who had actually filed the complaint.
- Nothing was getting done.
- Told UPD not to include Jeff in any decision-making, not to cooperate with him in investigation of computer or network or anything related to this case.
- UPD ignored me, went to Jeff anyway, gave him full cooperation in fact, allowing for the contamination of ALL evidence by allowing the suspect complete and unsupervised access to the scene and all equipment related to the crime. Left me out of the loop of discussions. Dr. Garlitz vouched for Jeff, causing prejudice in the PD. UPD cooperated with Jeff for all investigating of the hacking, even though they'd been told he was probably the guy who did it. They asked him if the computer or the system had logs. They asked HIM about the computer, the software, the network, how things work. I'd told both Dr. Garlitz and UPD to keep Jeff out and both were not listening to me.
- UPD refused to do an official investigation, citing that even though on UF property, if the equipment belonged to me, then that meant that it was not UF's jurisdiction. So then, whose was it? So there is no record of any interaction between me, GARC, and UPD except for what little I have in email conversations. And usually, they were one way: me...to them. Everything else was handled over the phone, or in person at the station.
- UPD contaminated the situation by cooperating with Jeff and giving him full access to the computer and asking HIM about whether or not there were logs, and left it up to HIM to check. (WHY...does everybody keep going to Jeff? WHY...does everybody keep taking Jeff's word over mine? Would someone explain this?) This meant that I was now no longer able to take any of this into ANY courtroom, or into any "proper" jurisdiction. UPD now joined GPD in fumbling/bungling/interfering with my cases, to the point of now not being able to take ANY action at all due to incompetent contamination of suspect handling, evidence handling, and witness handling. There is now no way that I can bring the bad guy to justice, or for me to receive any justice, because of what UPD - and the Gator Amateur Radio Club - did.
- Along with UPD, Dr. Garlitz inappropriately interfered, refused to heed my advice, ignored the complaints of a victim, put the victim's complaints off to the side, aided in helping a hacker escape arrest, placed the reputation of GARC, the UF, and UPD in jeopardy in so doing. (...Which, ironically, was the exact opposite result of what he was actually trying to do.)
- Contacted Detective Metz by email, requesting information about conversations with Jeff Capehart and Dr. Garlitz. What did they say about Jeff? What did they say about me? Was UPD's attitude towards me prejudiced by anything that the Faculty Advisor had said? I wanted the officer to write down and put it into the official record what Dr. Garlitz had told him about Jeff Capehart, about me. Detective Mayo wanted me to "come to the station to discuss it." The detective refused to discuss it over email or over the phone. He would only discuss it behind the locked doors at the station, sitting in the interrogation room, with no one else around. I asked the detective why he insisted on only talking about it behind closed doors. I asked him why he couldn't just tell me. He responded that there was "nothing to say". Which begs the obvious question: If there's 'nothing to say', then why ask me to come down to the station to 'talk' about it at all, then? The detective was refusing to cooperate, and I think he knew where I intended to go with it. He didn't want any witnesses or any recorded statements (i.e., in email copies, or in possibly recorded telephone conversations) used against him. You ever heard about that, before? ...A COP...not wanting to do the real homework in a HACKING investigation?...actually trying to cover UP it's existence? ...Why?
- Almost a year later, discovered Gainesville Sun archive in Google search engine regarding Jeff Capehart/Susan Tipton hacking of UF/IFAS computer back in 1985, showing propensity for the very thing he'd done to the AC-EMWIN server.12
Jeff Capehart has an uncanny, unbelievable power within UF, within Emergency Management, and within police circles and I'd like an explanation for this. Why am I continually being blown off and ignored?
Here's an interesting "Question of Law" that just popped into my head:
If a man goes to all the proper authorities, has taken all the proper steps, has done everything possible to try to call attention to all of the stalking and harassing and abuse that has been occurring to him; and where at every step he has been ignored and/or sabotaged by same, and the actions of those who ignored or sabotaged him PREVENTED him from taking advantage of the "Statutes of Limitations", and from being able to protect or defend himself; can "Statutes of Limitations" still be held to that person - that victim, regardless...even though to do so would be obviously unfair?
Jeff Capehart encouraged other people to harass and stalk me, including...
Chapter 14 "I WANT WHAT HE'S GOT AND I WANT IT NOW!"
ON MELISSA SHIRES ROYCE / KE4WBQ
GAINESVILLE AMATEUR RADIO SOCIETY
...Veronica Salt. That's who Melissa reminded me of. So Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory this whole thing sort of seemed. ...Everything so upside-down. ...Everything so backwards. ...Everything so surreal. Weird people were all around me. ...And one of the strangest...was Melissa...
Melissa Royce/KE4WBQ (aka "Melissa D Royce" in the FCC amateur radio database, and "Melissa Shires" in some other court-related civil databases, and more recently "Melissa Shires-DeSantis" after moving to Providence Rhode island and apparently remarrying) was a selfish narcissist and wasn't actually interested in public service, but rather in self-serving fame and attention for herself.
BEWARE of this woman! She is very slick, and will become very maliciously sadistic when found out. She seeks power by attempting to get into local emergency management and other public service-related agencies, and has in the past attempted to use this power to cause problems and harm to others.
Feigning friendship at first, she eventually turned on me when I began to realize what she truly was. Then she gradually became more and more of a stalking nightmare. She once put my sick mother's life at risk because she wanted to talk to me on the phone, feigning an emergency. She caused me ever so many greatly disturbing problems with everyone around me. When she and her husband were done, every contact that I had with emergency management and in the NWS was affected so greatly by the things that they had said that those agencies made every effort, officially AND under-the-table, to disassociate themselves with both me AND Alachua County SKYWARN. I'd eventually discovered that local EM and NWS had even held meetings about "the problems with Alachua County SKYWARN", and when I asked to be allowed to attend, they refused to allow me to participate in those meetings. To this day, I have no idea what was discussed; I only know the end results. I was not allowed to be there. I was not allowed to hear any accusations. I was not allowed to know who said what, or to be able to speak up and defend myself. Whatever was said to them was believed, and they thought me that bad. And at the time, I had no idea it was even going on.
She approached me by email just before moving up to Gainesville from West Palm Beach, bragging of being Coordinator of the West Palm Beach SKYWARN group, and of having much previous experience with the SKYWARN spotter program down there. She came at a time when I was really desperately looking for good people to try to help really get things going with Alachua County SKYWARN. I had some bigger ideas. I wanted people who knew their stuff to come help us go to higher places - people who could give educational presentations in addition to the spotter training classes, people to be PIO and handle getting the word out about us, getting classes going, etc; to be Lead NCS for spotter nets (if GARS would stop playing games with us); etc. For example, I really wanted my friend Alisa onboard because she had two degrees in Mathematics and in Env. Engineering, and she was also very well educated in things meteorological and had even chased with the Doppler On Wheels team two years in a row out in the Midwest. She could forecast storms, and knew how to interpret RADAR. She was truly anxious and enthusiastic about SKYWARN and it's mission. And of all the people around me, she was also...normal, and didn't seem to have any problems, or quirks, or any hidden agendas beyond legitimately educating people. She wanted to help people; to teach...and she never, ever exhibited any selfish intentions. That was what she most talked about - how she just wanted to teach. She also eventually became my best friend. But alas, then the United States Navy called her away to train as an officer, and then she served a number of years abroad, and I wasn't able to make the good use of her that I had wanted. :( I was really disappointed about that. People just have no CLUE how CLOSE we came to having such an awe-inspiring program had we been able to make use of her. Then some of the local hams began to actually attack her.
I never was able to bring myself to quite trust Melissa. There was something about her. There was this "air"...something that told me to be wary. Around her I kinda felt like meat about to be dropped through a grinder and with nowhere to run. But was my built-in instinct just being overly paranoid?
She gossiped way too much. She was pushy. She always called at all hours of the day and night, wanting to know the latest gossip about various people, and never, ever had anything really especially important to say. She only seemed to want dirt. She pretended to be really kind and nice at first, and enthusiastic, and energetic, and like she really wanted to get involved. She pretended to be an honorable person, and like she wanted to be my friend. She got me to talk about my personal life, and personal secrets. She was always complimenting me and then trying to get information about me or someone else immediately after. "You put yourself down too much. If I weren't married I'd be interested in dating you!", she'd say. (It kinda made me feel awkward considering that she was married and had kids.) She was very pushy about being my "friend". I had complained that most of my past friends seemed to be my friend only because I held the Coordinator position and because they thought I could increase their popularity or status level somehow and she tried to play into it. I told her about the problems that I had been having with Jeff and how he works people up and gets people upset with me enough to stalk and harass me, and how he sabotages projects and efforts that I start, and she pretended to sympathize. She insisted she'd never share anything with Jeff or anyone else, or to do anything to betray me and that she'd be one of the best friends I'd ever have, and that she'd always be there for me. But it was all just "social engineering", designed to get as much information about someone as possible so that you can use it; and she was very adept at it. Very practiced. She knew exactly what she was doing - as all psychopaths do. She knew exactly how to press all the buttons. Kevin Mitnik, the famous computer hacker, supposedly now reformed, now teaches people about this very tactic. A big thing that really bugged me about Melissa - and very obviously contrary to the supposed "nice person" picture that she was trying so very hard to paint to me and everybody else, was how she was always talking negatively about people, putting people down, trying to make me doubt them, as if she was trying to knock out people who were in her way or something. ...Especially the more she got to know me. ...Information, information, information. She wanted SO much information, all the time, and it never stopped. She could never get enough. She could never be satisfied. She fast became an irritation; a real pain in the ass. I started to think maybe she was trying to set herself up to attack some people. (Little did I know at the time...) I also started to notice how I was always sending her emails and how she was never responding back via email. My "Melissa" folder was always empty. That should have been my first clue...she did not like to leave trail of "evidence" of anything said. It was suspicious. I questioned myself, and asked myself if I was being ridiculous or overly paranoid. I remember wondering what was up with that and if she ever did that to anyone else, or if anyone else ever noticed that about her. Rather, she would only communicate by phone. ...ONLY ON THE PHONE. "I don't like using email", she'd say. "...It's so impersonal. When you talk on the phone it's so much easier than typing." (What she really meant was that by sending emails she was leaving referencable evidence trails behind her and that she didn't like to do that. With phone calls, if you record the conversation without telling someone, then the recording is illegal and it can't be used in court. She knew very well what she was doing.) My gut feelings over time kept falling to lower and lower levels every time we talked. I didn't trust her after a while. She began to seem more and more like someone shady and belligerent; like someone extremely territorial who felt everyone was in her way and like she was looking for ways to knock other "competition" out of the picture. The more you shared, the more power you gave her, the bolder and worse she seemed to get.
Other people complained similarly about her. They just "didn't like" her. People would tell me the same things: that she always complained about others; that she made them feel uncomfortable; that she called them up all the time - even when they'd tell her not to - asking opinions about other people and holding people on the phone for overly long periods of time and not letting anyone go; that she was pushy; that she wanted immediate titles and positions but didn't know what to do once given them and always was in need of help. In an email to me, John Fleming, of the Florida Division of Emergency Management, called her "the little girl in Gainesville who always complained." He verified that lots of people were also complaining about her in official government levels. He said that people have been complaining to him about how she keeps them on the phone, won't let people go, does nothing but complain about other people, and makes demands. ...The same story. Jeff Capehart said that at GARC picnics, she'd bring her entire family, take huge portions, then come back for even more, and end up taking ALL of the leftovers when the events were done. She'd call me while I was working even, and refused to heed repeated requests not to do so, making me very angry. I'm a hundred miles away, driving down I-75, and I'm having to pull over to talk to her, and stop what I'm doing. She just would not stop calling. I'd tell her to stop, and she'd ignore me. She pushed and clamored for me to assign her multiple positions, citing all sorts of previous experience and abilities. She'd show me past business cards that she had, trying to make herself look important. I gave her two positions. One was Lead Net Control Station, and I told her that I was doing this because I wanted more time to myself and that "I don't want to hear from you", that "YOU are in total charge of that stuff, yourself", that she had total control of how she wanted to run the nets, and in getting them operational. I also gave her the position of ACS PIO officer and she was to be in charge of setting up spotter training classes and other weather- and safety-related presentations, and in handling the Press and getting the word out. But when crunch time came, she didn't know how to do anything. I had to explain everything to her. Every time we had a net, she'd call me up and keep me on the phone for the entire net, holding me up and taking up all of my spare time, and keeping me from taking care of my mother. I'd have to hold her hand the entire way, for everything. When it came time to handle spotter training classes and the Press, and set them up, she didn't know what to do. Again, she'd call me up, ask me what she was supposed to do, how to do things, and again...I'd have to hold her hand and I'd end up doing it all myself...doing the research to find the locations to hold the classes, talking to the people who owned the places, talking back and forth between the owners and the NWS, setting up dates and times, creating the posters, the flyers, driving all around the county and putting the posters up. I began to doubt all her bragged about experience, and started to see through her. I wondered what the hell good she was. I started wanting time to myself and I didn't always pick up the phone when the CID would indicate that it was her. Then she began to get condescending and rude, mean, and demanding. She'd call and call, back to back, making the phone ring and ring and ring for LONG periods of time without hanging up, and she began to demand that I always be available, that "this is your DUTY - to be always available at every moment". (Scott West used to do this, too.) She demanded so much of my time, every second of my days, and got upset when I didn't always answer the phone. I pictured that scene in the movie Crush where Alicia Silverstone's character did the same thing to the magazine author. It was scary to be at home and watch happen...that phone ringing, and ringing, and ringing, on and on and on. You stand there, open-mouthed, wondering what the hell is wrong with the person on the other end of that phone. Eventually, Melissa would call other people and try to get them to call me to see if I answered or to see if I was home. Then she began complaining to others about me. One day, I was at home taking care of my mother - again, who had cancer, mind you...and who was bedridden with an O2 mask, and very weak. And she knew this. I went to the bathroom on the other end of the mobile home. The phone rang. It was Melissa.
I was on the john and I wasn't really having a good time of it, to begin with. Melissa calls. I'm busy. Mom picks up the phone. She asks who it is. Melissa identifies herself and asks for me. Mom tells her that I'm busy, and asks if I could call her back later. Melissa says "no." Then she insists that it's an emergency and that she needs to speak with me immediately and that she's not getting off of the phone until she does. Mom was VERY weak, and she was absolutely dependent upon the nearby O2 machine that she was using to breathe. After Melissa insisted that it was an emergency, my mother disconnected herself from the O2 machine, got up, and began a long 60 foot trek - through the kitchen, through the living room, down the long hall, to me in the bathroom - to tell me what Melissa had said. I'm sitting there on the john, and I began to hear my mom approaching. She's gasping and wheezing very heavily. She's crouched over as she walks, slapping her hand on the wall as she walks. She's moving very slowly. I can hear her. I'm worried. I'm asking myself why she's disconnected herself from the O2 machine, and walking over to me. Was she having a heart attack? Did she need medical help? I called out to her and asked her if she was okay. There was no answer...just hand slapping on the wall, and very struggled gasping and wheezing. She finally reached the door, and began to tell me what Melissa had told her.
"...TODD! (gasp!) It's...MELISSA! (gasp!) She says (gasp!) that it's (gasp!) an EMERGENCY and she needs (gasp!) to TALK to you!"
"Did you tell her that I was on the john and that I would call her back"
"YES! (gasp!) I TOLD her that! (gasp!) But she said (gasp!) that it was an EMERGENCY (gasp!), and that she wasn't going to get off of the phone (gasp!) until she TALKED with you! (gasp!)"
I was furious. I knew damned well that Melissa was full of it and that she really had no emergency at all and that she was just telling my mother that so that I would have to answer the phone. I wiped my god-damned ass. I washed my hands quickly. I immediately escorted my mother back to bed while she was bent over the entire way, gasping for each breath, and hooked her back up to the O2 mask, watched her a minute... Then I answered the phone:
"WHAT, Melissa?!", I said.
"Oh nothing. I just wanted to talk to you but I knew that if I didn't say that it was an emergency then you wouldn't have picked up the phone."
I was VERY angry, understandably. I listened to her for a little bit; but she really had nothing at all important to say. Just gossip. She talked and talked and kept talking...about nothing. Just more complaining about other people. God damn it! ...No real business. ...No emergencies. ...Just bitching. After we hung up, I immediately fired off an angry email to her husband, telling him about what his wife had just done - how she had just put my mother's life at risk because she insisted on talking to me on the phone about nothing that was important. I wanted nothing more to do with her at that point. After that, I was sure that Melissa was bad, and evil, and that she was only concerned about herself. Melissa had one child who had cancer, too. She was a teen. When her child eventually died, she showed no sadness or distressed emotion. Her grieving lasted days at best, and then she was right back in business again, laughing, joking, gossiping as before - like nothing had happened. That just isn't normal. Her husband Phil got angry with me, instead, and then went on a campaign to destroy my name, rather than to help.
In 2008, Melissa created an "Alachua County SKYWARN" Yahoo group of her own, username AC_Skywarn. (Our's was called the "Alachua County SKYWARN Email Alert List" , username ac_skywarn, and it had been in existence since 2003.) Apparently, she had convinced Alachua County Office of Emergency Management to create a new SKYWARN group, and to call it "Alachua County SKYWARN" - regardless of the existence of an already existing group by that name. WHY Emergency Management actually followed through with that without first checking with me, I had no clue at the time.13 But I actually had to threaten a lawsuit multiple times before David Donnelly, then Asst. Emergency Manager, finally called a halt to it all. I don't mind them having their own spotter training program. I'm all for it, and always have been. But where I draw the line is when dumbasses in Emergency Management actually allow themselves to be conned by Melissa into using their own power to stalk and harass me, too! I'd had enough, there. So to put the cherry on top, Melissa also created a Yahoo listgroup with a similar name to the one I had already had on Yahoo since 2003, causing great confusion. I have not been able to get Yahoo to remove the list. I have not been able to get Melissa or Emergency Management to remove the list. The list at this time is not used, and is abandoned. But it is still there, and is still causing the confusion. There was no reason for it. It was done solely to bother me, and to cause people to become confused. It was another method of harassment. One that yet again, she had gotten away with.
BE it known though, that yes...for a short time, the Alachua County Office of Emergency Management was abused, was actually taken advantage of, was used to stalk and harass, and Dave Donnelly and Chief William May gave these people the power to do it and backed it up with their own authority. I AM AWARE that Dave and the Chief were duped. But their personal style of handling of the situation, their deliberate ignorance of me and of my complaints, and their refusal to contact me regarding any of this while it was happening, or to cooperate with me, and finally to block me out altogether...is just inexcusable and unethical. It places the blame right back into their own hands...and the County of Alachua's to boot -- even if the County wasn't aware that this was going on under the table. Dave did this while wearing a County uniform and while being on the clock for the County, and in the name of the County. Ergo, the County is responsible, defacto. Whether upper echelon KNEW about it or not is nonsequitor. I mean, you know...."Deep pocket theory" and all. I'm sure that the County doesn't appreciate the position that Dave et al has placed them into without their knowledge, or especially without their conscious approval for that matter. There sure was a LOT of quietly-enacted things going on, there, just to pick on one powerless little guy. This was all done in secret...from not just the victim, but the upper echelon powers who most assuredly would have put a stopper on it before it had gotten out of hand. But upper echelon was denied this opportunity. For this reason, everyone in EM and the NWS who cooperated in this, since it was kept secret, became involved in a technical conspiracy, and are co-conspirators. It is enough to make the County VERY angry when they find out.
It is a totally unbelievable thing to experience, though...to have happen to you. It's a jaw dropper. But there it is. You have no idea what it is like to watch while other people control actual government agencies and use them to stalk and harass you. But it actually happened. It was just Emergency Management being at first duped, but then following through in the end with a conspiracy - all the way - because they thought that Melissa was telling the truth and because they truly believed that what they were doing was the right thing. I mean, it wasn't a conspiracy, and then technically I guess it was, too. At first it wasn't a conspiracy - it was just someone complaining; and then it became one. It became plotted. But it didn't HAVE to be. Melissa duped some people into believing that someone was a seriously harmful individual, and everyone believed it, and then plotted to "take care of" that person...under the table. But I know that there wasn't any maliciousness on the part of EM in the beginning. They were played, used, and abused from the start. They just handled it in the wrong way, and now they're in line for a lawsuit, and everyone else who was connected to them in some way is in line for a lawsuit, or criminal charges, or both. You see, while they all may have been duped, they had the responsibility to make sure that all the information was lock-tight. It was not. As a result, as a result of their negligence in the gathering and the safe-keeping of the truth, some people got hurt. You don't have to be the one to put the knife in someone to be held responsible for a murder, so to speak. Nobody ever realizes that. That's what happens when people get manipulated. People pick up pitchforks and torches. A mob psychology develops, and everyone begins hunting down the monster. When it's finally over, there's much damage, everyone finds out they were wrong, and they all go back into their homes to hide from the judgment over what they did. Everyone wants to pretend it never happened. There was maliciousness on the part of Melissa and Jeff Capehart, who convinced EM that I was relinquishing control of ACS. I can't believe that it happened, really; but it did, nonetheless. And not only that, but when the agencies and organizations caught themselves, they never apologized; never acknowledged it. Nobody did. And if left alone, nobody ever WILL, either. That's what gets me really angry. Once they knew, they had obligation to apologize and to do everything that they could to make it right. They chose not to. Instead, they left me hanging; on my own.
According to Jeff Capehart, recently both the Alachua County Office of Emergency Mgmt and the Alachua County Red Cross, without either knowing that the other was doing it, simultaneously ceased participating with Melissa. At ACOEM, Melissa was attending some sort of Emergency Manager type of class, so that she could become an Emergency Manager. (OMG, are you frakking kidding! Can you imagine what kinds of abuses she might have committed with that kind of power??? I'm not even going to GUESS that she had me and ACS in her thoughts, there; I'm going to just put it out there that I'm sure it was almost assuredly on her mind. The more horrific question becomes: What would have happened to Dave and ACOEM in the aftermath of that? That was just too close, but I'm glad that some people actually finally caught on to her.) But Dave Donnelly apparently cancelled her Emergency Manager application and she was issued a letter and face-to-face notified that she was being let go from that and that they no longer wished to participate with her. Apparently there were complaints about her, including forging business cards, telling people she had titles and positions that she never had, people complaining about her being controlling, etc. (Sound familiar?) As well, The North Central Florida Red Cross simultaneously ALSO sent her a letter actually FIRING her from her volunteer position there as a Communications Officer, supposedly (according to the Master of Information, Jeff Capehart) for forging business cards, assigning herself titles and duties she didn't have, abusing her powers, picking on people...and other such-related things. (Anyone seeing any patterns, here?) Jeff advises that Melissa apparently suspected that this was coming and avoided all admins and any phone calls to come in for a "meeting".
(Sound familiar? Did I not TELL people that my stalkers were PULLING things like that? No one believed me.)
Today Melissa has moved to Providence, RI and has accrued a new name by a new marriage, Melissa Shires-DeSantis. And frighteningly, she is apparently attempting to join up with Emergency Management and the Red Cross up THERE, now! Oh my god! Those poor people! So like, are they going to be the next victims, now?! How do I know all this? Melissa keeps checking my blog every so often - multiple times a year. SO often that it appears strange and actually calls attention to itself in the IP logs. I could see her hits...often from EM facilities and EM-related schools up there. So she's apparently taking the training up there that no one down here would ALLOW her to. She calls attention to herself because she reads and re-reads my blog so often. This blog obviously bugs the crap out of her but she can't do anything about it because if she tried then I'd get those investigations I always so desperately wanted...and she does NOT want any of that. Could lead to lawsuits, or criminal actions against her, her ex, her friends. I wrote this blog to make my stalkers stop stalking and harassing me. It works...VERY well...as you can see. According to Jeff, I'm told that Melissa's face now joins Scott West's on the walls of ACOEM's CCC building as people who are banned from entering the building, and of people whom admin is to be notified about if they ever ARE. Jay Lieberman's used to be up there, too; but he died, alone and ignominiously, and his photo was removed. Interestingly enough, Jeff has hinted vaguely that my own face may be up there, too. If so, it seems to be a deep, dark secret that everyone else is keeping from me. (I should ask officially if it is indeed up. If it is up, I should demand an explanation as to why. And if they SAY why - where there IS really no why, then I would have an angle of attack upon both NWS-JAX and ACOEM. Follow? Thus, nothing is ever mentioned officially, and so, all of this stupidity is allowed to just...continue.) It should also be noted that ACOEM and NWS both kept these facts about Melissa from me. Nobody apologized for what Melissa had caused them to do to me and to Alachua County SKYWARN. No one reinstated anything. I was simply left out of the loop.
On April 24th, 2009, Melissa apparently wrote an email to the Alachua ARES/RACES Yahoo email list advising that she would no longer be involved in ARES/RACES.14 ...Note that she didn't say that she was "fired", but that she would "no longer be involved". She complained of people "going too far" and destroying her name and reputation. (ARGH! Gimme a BREAK! Are you freaking KIDDING me??? UGH!) She also added that there were some hams who were "just plain crazy." Everything that woman ever DID was plagiarism...even right down to her complaints about others! Heh! (sigh) ...Psychopaths who see "crazy". What's the world coming to when a criminal can't make a good living picking on the innocent, anymore? Yup-puh. (stares at the ceiling)
Melissa soon left town after all of that. I understand she went to the Anniston, Alabama area to attend Jacksonville State College - probably for something related to Emergency Management, since she was constantly trying to obtain power by getting "in" with them. Later I started noting hits to my harassment-related pages from someone in "Lincoln, Rhode Island" looking up Melissa. I investigated and discovered that Melissa had moved yet again, this time up there, and was attending more emergency management schooling in Providence. (sigh) So, she's probably trying to pull the exact same stuff on more brand new, unsuspecting emergency managers up there, now. It's really sad just how little research government agencies actually do in considering an applicant. A more thorough search would have revealed this blog, and the publicly available civil stuff in Alachua County and West Palm Beach records which would have been a red flag to them. But they don't know. Nobody ever expects to have to go through THAT much of a search for most applicants. Unfortunately, this is going to mean that someone is going to come across this blog only AFTER Melissa has done more damage and it forced someone to dig deeper. By then though, she will have already caused more damage and it will be too late and she'll be gone again.
Chapter 15 "I SAID EVERYTHING THAT I COULD TO FEED EVERYONE'S WORST FEARS"
ON PHILIP SPOFFARD ROYCE / KE4PWE
ALACHUA COUNTY SHERIFFS OFFICE
...So Phil had said, bragging to Jeff Capehart about what he had done to me and Alachua County SKYWARN. Phil Royce/KE4PWE, Melissa's husband, convinced a number of local government agencies that I was a problem and made them paranoid of me. He worked for the Communications Division of the Alachua County Sheriff's Office. After emailing Phil about the problems with his wife and asking him for his help in stopping her (after that incident where Melissa had nearly cost my mother her life), he became rabid, and went on a frenzied campaign to multiple government agencies attempting to get them to stop working with me and to doubt and fear me. I'm told he made multiple threats about causing me harm - advising people that "he better hope I don't catch him in a dark alley!" He once sent me an email advising that he'd complained about me to the National Weather Service in Jax, and to NWS HQ in DC, to the Alachua County Office of Emergency Management, to the Florida Division of Emergency Management. Jeff Capehart told me at one time that Phil Royce said he deliberately tried to say everything that he thought would take advantage of everyone's worst fears, and to make everyone paranoid about me, and to doubt me. He attacked everyone's fears and gullibilities, preyed upon their worries, made me sound irresponsible, incompetent. He told them I was attempting to take over SKYWARN operations across the entire northern Florida area; that I was preventing other organizations from being able to hold spotter classes, or to form their own spotter groups. He told people that I was trying to claim copyright on the SKYWARN logo. Nothing was true. No one stopped to think how one civilian (me) could have so MUCH supposed power over so many government agencies. But I guess everyone wanted to believe it. And they did. Apparently, his campaign worked...and VERY well. And NO one bothered to ask for proof of anything, verification of anything. Everyone...unbelievably...simply took his word at face value and trusted it to be the truth. How can so many people in so many agencies be SO stupid and SO gullible! I mean...COME ON!!!! And there's something else you did notice while reading the above... Jeff Capehart admitted knowledge that someone was deliberately stalking and harassing me, and DIDN'T take it to the police. This is a continual, REPEATED OFFENSE with Jeffrey Capehart. He gathers important information about other people engaging in stalking and harassing activities, sends me emails, calls me on the phone, gets me all worked up. But does he take his information to the police? NO! It's much more enjoyable to watch Todd squirm. And THIS...is the guy that the world holds up on high, and refuses to believe can do no wrong.
There are public civil records that people can look up about Philip and Melissa Royce...apartment evictions, domestic abuse complaints:
Type in "Royce, P" or "Royce, M" or "Shires, M" (Melissa's maiden name). The "Spoffard" entries are also Phil.
I remember Phil once saying that he wasn't going to let me kick HIM out of town..."again". That sentence struck me as being very odd and made my blood curl; and I'd always wondered what he meant by that. But I knew that it couldn't be good if someone ELSE had tried to "kick him outta town" before.
Again, Jeff always having to be the one with the information, he once told me that when the Royces left WPB, the hams down there had celebratory parties because they were glad they were going. Jeff would not elaborate on the club or clubs that had these supposed parties. But then as usual, Jeff was living up to his character of doing research in something not his business (nobody was causing HIM any problems) and then finding out information, sharing it with me, and withholding the important stuff, like names, so that I could gather witnesses of past problems with these people if I wanted, or even just confirm his BS.
Chapter 16 THE NOT-SO-BRIGHT THUG
ON FREDERICK SCOTT WEST / KF4VWD
GAINESVILLE AMATEUR RADIO SOCIETY
Frederick Scott West/KF4VWD was one of those scary kinds of people. He seems nice and even responsible at first; but as you'd get to know him you'd begin to realize just how oblivious he is about his personality and how he appeared to others. You'd always feel awkward around him and would often want to be anywhere else but near him. He wasn't quite "right". He was a bonafide jerk, and everybody agreed on that. But like Jeff Capehart, he did favors for people and helped with some public service events and this made him "useful" to people and so they tolerated a lot of his oddness and his often embarrassingly awkward personality. It blew me away just how often the hams strange personalities and not-quite-right behaviors would be "forgiven" by people in Emergency Management and the NWS. It was kinda maddening, in fact. It was insane to watch just how MUCH EM and other agencies and organizations - including the Gainesville ARS and the Gator ARC, would put up with just because they didn't want to lose a few people who did some extra "favors" for them. Harassment complaints about the hams didn't matter. The amount of public service that they did for Emergency Management and the local ham clubs did. The public service was alibi to constantly excuse their behavior.
Jeff Capehart used Scott to harass me with. He knew how easily Scott could me made to take a simple complaint and fly way off the handle over it. It was so easy to push Scott's buttons, and Jeff adeptly knew how to do it. Jeff planted the seeds of a few basic "complaints" about me, and then left Scott to take things to extremes all on his own. Jeff basically got Scott to believe that I wasn't doing my "job" with Alachua County SKYWARN, and that someone needed to "explain" to me what I was doing wrong, and to set me on the "right path". (This is actually what Jeff did to me with a LOT of people, in fact - including Jay Leiberman, Phil and Melissa Royce, with Emergency Managers Will May and Dave Donnelly.)
Scott decided that the best way to "handle" me was to use strategies such as email bombing me, pager bombing me, leaving threatening messages on my phone, and to ring my phone off the hook trying to force me to answer it. He attacked friends and associations and tried to use public humiliation to embarrass me into compliance. He tried to strong arm me into making him President of Alachua County SKYWARN and to incorporate it so that he could use the money to buy himself and his buddies "things to keep on a permanent personal loan basis". (In other words, the son of a bitch wanted me to help him engage in "embezzlement".)
He used to actually place TAGLINES in his email-bombings.15 Scott actually thought that if he appended some legal-sounding privacy-related "taglines" in his harassing emails, then his messages would be considered "private" and thus "protected" by the law from being used as evidence against him. As well, he thought that I could actually be prosecuted for showing his emails to anyone, and being thus "illegally used", that they would also be inadmissible in any courtroom as evidence for anything. Ergo, he literally thought that he was legally entitled to stalk me, and that he was legally protected from any backlash harm that might come from harassing me.
These are the kinds of brainless morons that Jeff Capehart sent after me!
For a sample of the emails and pages that Scott used to send me, see Log of Harassments - Frederick Scott West/KG4VWD. Note how in one email, Jeff Capehart is quoted, and actually ENCOURAGES Scott to harass me, citing things that Jeff personally wanted to see done as excuse to do it. Jeff's description of me is NOT "careful" or "prudent" in any way, and is in fact quite condescending - which itself also tends to encourage Scott to be mean, and aggravates and inflames him, and gives him "reason" to attack me, because someone else thinks Todd is stupid too, and inside that group mindset, it makes him feel more justified and encouraged.
Jeff Capehart had a bad habit of consistently giving Scott (and other strange people) information about me - knowing that the information would only work these people up. I'd repeatedly told Jeff NOT to discuss me or Alachua County SKYWARN with him, or with anyone, and he would do it anyway - usually with long emails denying at first that he's talking to him, accusing me of not being a good enough leader, or which contained insults vague and direct, and blaming me for everything that was happening to me. In the same email, he'd suggest that I should harass Scott with insults to embarrass him and show him how stupid he is; and in the next paragraph he'd tell me I should just let it go and that I bring all this upon myself. ...The typical drivel from psychopaths that at first read sounds logical to someone but on the twenty-first read, you scratch your head and wonder how you LISTENED to this guy for so long. In fact I'd be doing nothing at all - which is what authorities would suggest. Jeff isn't offering advice, he's just excusing himself to continue to do what I have repeatedly told him not to do: which is encourage people. Normal people would do what I ask because it is obvious that talking to Scott is causing me problems and harm, and they would not argue with me and bicker with me because most people have something called a "conscience" which tells them not to continue to associate with Scott or give him any kind of information about me for fear that it might cause me further problems. Jeff however, would consistently ignore me, and in fact deliberately FIGHT with me, so that he could continue endangering me.16 That's not something anyone who DOESN'T want harm to come to me would do. There is no argument on what a sane person would do in this situation. Jeff has no excuse; no argument, here. He continually placed me in danger deliberately, not just with Scott, either. No other explanation rings acceptable or logical or justifiable. Jeff was doing this deliberately.
Always having to be the harbinger of information, Jeff Capehart told me that Scott once pulled a gun on some people while on his security job at the Gainesville Regional Airport simply because they wouldn't do what he asked, not because they were breaking any real laws. He was fired immediately. You have to have a REASON, a potentially life threatening situation, to pull a gun. Whenever you pull a gun there are questions, interviews, investigations...paperwork...as a STANDARD. Not obeying an officer's (or a security guard's) commands is NOT an acceptable situation, or life threatening situation, REQUIRING that a gun be drawn. Frederick Scott West is irrational, hot headed, and not someone who can be controlled. I even remember saying to Jeff one day, "God forbid someone ever put a GUN into the hands of that man." Jeff actually chastised me for being ridiculous and overly paranoid, but over the years he'd CONTINUALLY placed me in the way of harm and harassment KNOWING FULL WELL that these people were possibly dangerous and treated it like it was a totally unfounded and overly ridiculous worry. Jeff was EXTREMELY irresponsible like this. I often think Jeff was actually experimenting to see how far he could push people and to see if people might actually go far enough to attack me physically and cause me harm, and to see how I would react. I just...FELT that from the man. And I wanted him to stop working people up. And no matter how much I begged, pleaded, and tried to EXPLAIN things to him in logical and reasonable ways (even though it should not have been necessary and the "STOP!" should have been enough in itself), he would on many occasions outright REFUSE to do as I asked, exclaiming "NO!", and he would continue to work up Jay, Scott, Melissa and Phil, his wife...anyway.
Thing is, Scott was one of those "lower intelligence" ASPD types. The short, mean, grunting ogre. The ones always looking to make it a "mission" to harass people and forcing people into doing what they want. He was a bully. He was a failed leader in everything that he attempted. So he followed those he saw as having power. He buddied up with them at first, for the "in's" that they brought him, the "benefits" he could obtain by being friends with someone. He also liked to follow people who gave him freedom and excuse to harass, threaten, and intimidate others. Jeff definitely gave him reason and excuse. He would have repeated talk sessions with Scott and, like having a "pep rally" or something, REMIND Scott about the stupidity of Todd, psyching him up all over again to go forth and harass him. Scott's not totally alone in this. He didn't come up with this stuff ALL on his own. He didn't act like this ALL on his own. Jeff was the initial spark, the driving force, the ringleader who drove him. Scott was just...of the right weak mindset, and...gullible.
In the beginning, before I knew any of the bad stuff about Scott though, I'd once made Scott an Asst. Coordinator for Alachua County SKYWARN because, at first, like Melissa Royce, he SEEMED quite enthusiastic, like he might be helpful. He WANTED jobs to do, seemed energetic and enthusiastic enough to handle it, so I gave him the position. But then he started throwing the title around a lot, I noticed. At the same time, people began to complain about him. Women complained to me that he'd stare straight at their breasts for really long periods even while talking to them. People complained about his vulgar remarks and language17, and about the vulgar comments he'd make about women, too, right in front of you.18 I heard wind of temper tantrums during Emergency Mgmt/ACFR Reserve training sessions, of throwing books at walls, swearing at leadership. He had screwball ideas which he was very serious about. One of them was purchasing an ambulance, painting it SKYWARN orange, putting a SKYWARN logo on it, and...and...to do WHAT? What the HELL would you do with something like that? Where the hell did he think we'd get the MONEY for something like that? He wanted me to incorporate ACS so that we could afford to GET things like that. Spotters spot. That's it. They don't provide pizza for firefighters. They don't drive fire trucks or ambulances. They don't chase storms. They look up, pick up a phone, and report. Period. We don't need a giant, bright orange vehicle with a flashing light on top to do that. And they don't have to pay DUES to do that, either. Stalking and harassing me because I personally thought the ambulance idea was just a TAD-side ridiculous...was...ridiculous.
One day I met a girl who eventually became my best friend. She was REALLY smart, VERY enthusiastic, and knew a hell of a lot about meteorology, and had even chased with the DOW team (Doppler On Wheels) before under Josh Wurman. She graduated at 24 with two simultaneous degrees: BS's in mathematics and in environmental engineering. She knew how to forecast, how to read RADAR and soundings and other charts. She was anxious and very enthusiastic about SKYWARN and it's mission and she really wanted to get involved. She was someone who really knew what she was doing, and I wanted her on the AC-SKYWARN team and was really proud to have her. I remember being SO happy that we'd finally found someone with enough knowledge to begin to actually have presentations about a multitude of weather-related things, given by someone with knowledge and training and experience. I really wanted to impress her with what we were doing and I really wanted her on the team.
But as soon as Jeff found out, any kind of a friendship with her became unnecessarily stressed and difficult due to interference. It seemed to bother Jeff really badly. Suddenly, he couldn't stop asking me questions about her. He could not put it down. He was always wanting information; always wanting to know the latest about her. It was very obvious and unnatural; obsessive; and it was scaring me. If she were a male he wouldn't be so..."adamant" for all this information. But she was female, and pretty, and she was talking to me; and to him I guess that just wasn't right. I would not give out any information about her to him, though, citing flat out that I didn't any longer trust him with personal information or how he might use it. (This was occurring after I'd fired him as an Asst. Coordinator.)
You know, I was actually afraid that it would be his wife Susan who might try to research her and then try to do something to harm the relationship once she figured out how "important" this girl was to me. It just "fit" her. Susan is nosiness, and then deliberate interference. Susan is obsession, and tunnel vision. I honestly thought that that was going to be where any problems with new friends would came from. And I was completely taken by surprise when my worst nightmare did indeed actually happen...only not from Susan...
After a SKYWARN meeting one day (which had been attended by this girl), Jeff immediately got on his cellphone and, regardless of the fact that I repeatedly told him NOT to, he called Scott West and told him about this "chic" who was talking to me. It REALLY, REALLY bothered Jeff that I was in any way associating with a female, like it was something that needed to be "taken care of" or something.
The girl and I walked off away, and began talking privately among ourselves, alone. I left Jeff to continue on his cellphone by himself.
I don't know what exactly Jeff told Scott, but it must have been pretty condescending. Scott was on his way to work at the time, and actually made himself late by detouring so as to come all the way to the CCC Building to see this "chic" that was "hanging" with Todd. He raced into the parking lot very loudly, and came to a screeching caddy-corner halt into the parking space in front of where we were standing on the sidewalk, leaving a thick white pall of smoke, and almost hitting us! He got out of the car, stood between me and my friend while we were in the middle of a conversation, put his BACK in my face, and immediately began berating and insulting me and trying to convince her that I was stupid and a loser. It didn't work; and she wasn't impressed.
I was SO humiliated and embarrassed. I held up my arms and apologized. "...I am SO SORRY!", I said. This was the first time that I had met this girl face-to-face. And instead of impressing her with a great organization and great ideas, she had to deal with that.
For whatever reason, Scott had it in his mind that this "meet" Todd was having "with a GIRL" needed to be "corrected", and that the girl needed to "understand" what a loser Todd was. ...And he drove out of his way, and made himself late for WORK, putting his job at RISK, and putting both of our lives at risk by nearly RUNNING US DOWN...to do it. The "whatever reason"...was Jeff Capehart.
(This would also become the basic idea that the hams would eventually try to spread repeatedly within Emergency Management and in Weather Service circles about me, too - causing fear and panic in government officials, making them fear that I was irresponsible and to doubt in my leadership abilities. In the end, it worked very, very well.)
Scott at the time was married and at the time he had a child who was 8 years old. I remember CONSTANTLY thinking to myself "GOD, what must it be like to have to be the SON of this guy?!" It was a constant moral battle in my mind: "I NEED to call the police...NO, it might embarrass his family, and they've always been nice to me!" It SUCKED to have to deal with that moral struggle in my mind.
A side comment, if I may: I find it exceedingly scary how these weird people seem to have this consistent low-life propensity to HIDE their wicked/bad behaviors behind "public service" and "family life" pictures in order to throw people off; and it sickens, it REALLY sickens me, how it actually WORKS to protect them, too...EVERY TIME. NOBODY challenges the woman with four kids - one of whom recently died of cancer; and if you SUGGEST that this woman could be bad, you are IMMEDIATELY labeled as a huge asshole without so much as a split-second of thought. Nobody challenges the guy who is married with a toddler son, who volunteers for the Red Cross. Nobody challenges the guy who has Emergency Management connections all over the place, University of Florida connections in IT security and in Auditing, who is a member of two ham radio clubs, CERT, ACFR-Reserves, and who is always there to volunteer time to cut or solder a wire for you, or fix a computer problem that you're having, or clear up a networking problem you're having at home. These people hide behind what I'll call a "'can't do without' usefulness" which makes people strongly "addicted" to them in a way that they're not even aware, unwilling to lose them, and thus, who are willing to turn a blind eye to whatever it is the bad people are doing to other people, and even to AID these people in escaping the law, because their usefulness quotient seems to be high enough to make all their bad qualities unimportant and forgiveable...NO MATTER WHAT THEIR SINS ARE. It is an amazing thing to actually watch happen. It's unbelievable and even inconceivable that it could happen. You wouldn't think humans could be so gullible, so weak-willed, so weak-charactered; but apparently, and I can tell you from repeated first-hand experience...the majority of the public has NO internal defensive ability set up within themselves to notice or catch or stop these people. Worse, they can thus be easily misled to be used as a tool of these bad people to bring further harm to the victims...all the while making them believe that what they're doing is for the "right thing" and with "good reasons". They are genius-level smart at manipulating people, in a way that the public is just not prepared to expect. And they look for people who have a propensity to be easily manipulated, people who are weaker-willed, without strong ability to question every action, or to say no, or to stand up for themselves, and who are willing to believe everything without thought or strength to question. These types are perfect fodder for the psychopath. And for a LONG time...I was one. And when I realized what was happening to me and that I was being manipulated and I slowly learned to distance myself from the psychopaths, they began to see me as a threat, and targeted me. Why so MANY psychopaths/ASPDs? ...Because Jeff hunted them down and manipulated them my way, NOT because I was "seeing things". He saw opportunity in the slower-thinking, hot-fused types. The double-plus for Jeff in this strategy is in how he can say that he didn't touch me, that THEY did; and he can add that he didn't "TELL" them to harm me, that they did that on their OWN, and SO (Jeff believes), his hands are not "bloodied".
Jeff had convinced Scott that I was stupid, and so, now thinking he had public acceptance to do so (implied through Jeff), he began to treat me that way. When Scott began harassing and threatening me after that, I fired him, removing his Asst. Coordinator status, while simultaneously telling him that I'd issue a restraining order against him if he ever so much as even discussed me or Alachua County SKYWARN again, and especially if he engaged in threatening or harassing behavior with me again. Scott was also a member of the local CERT group, and got kicked out of that. He never made it past probation with ACFR Reserves due to his tantrums. He eventually got kicked out of local ARES/RACES. He was prohibited from entry into the CCC Bldg at the Alachua Co. Office of Emergency Mgmt. and they actually had his photo posted around the inside of the building warning people about him, and to deny him entry. Even the Red Cross banned him, where he served a few times as shelter communicator during some hurricanes. Officers in GARS and in ARES/RACES knew of Scott's involvement in harassing me, and of the dangerous, irresponsible ways in which he had done it, and they showed no concern for it, and allowed him to operate near other people regardless.
On Scott's QRZ.com web page, he seems to think that it's very important for people to know that he's "working on (his) class G weapons and concelled weapons license". ("Concelled" is his spelling, not mine.) WHY is this important for the world to know that he has a gun and wants to hide it from everyone? This guy is just scary all around.
Do you know that he actually made it into organizations like the Florida Repeater Council? That's right. He's served as "Vice-Director" for District 7 (our area) from 2005 to today. People like that in positions like this give psychopaths and people with other ASPDs an immense power that they can use to abuse and harass others with. Had the FRC known the problems that we were having with Scott here in Alachua County I seriously doubt that they would have accepted his application or his involvement at all. By the same token, had ACOEM known about the legal history of Phil and Melissa Royce, I doubt they would have cooperated with them in ANY of their suggested endeavors, or given them any of the positions that they had. Did the Royce's LIE on their applications with ACOEM, or withhold information that ACOEM and ACSO has right to know? It looks like this is the case, indeed. Scott gets onboard certainly NOT because he's bragged about all of the illicit things that he's pulled in the past. On the other hand, ACOEM and ACSO have only themselves to blame for not performing a fuller background search and checking with the Clerk of the Court records in West Palm Beach where the Royce's are concerned. They ROYALLY screwed up, there. Look at what Phil and Melissa were able to do with Emergency Management, with the Weather Service, with GPD. I think it is a lesson for everyone, here, though, to note how people of this sort always attempt to find positions of power up on high, and then to abuse that power to cause harm to others. You'd think that in knowing this, that people in powerful positions would be better at combing these people out before they get in. I guess not.
But I'm just a rambling lunatic. What do I know?
In July of 2007, Scott sent an email to the then ARRL NFL Section Manager Joe Bushel/W2DWR, complaining about the police knocking on his door one night because I had called the police after I'd received Melissa's harassing email, (see Chapter 14, above). Only at first we didn't know who had actually sent the harassment email. There were misspellings, and the M.O. was VERY similar to what Scott had pulled about a year-and-a-half before. I told them to check with Scott West and to ask him if he had sent it. After all the things that Scott had done to me two years before - the email bombing, pager bombing, threats on my answering machine, etc., and then ADMITTING that he had indeed done that to the officer who had knocked on his door at that (it's in the initial police record), I found it to be the height of ridiculousness for Scott to complain because I had called the police and had them bother him for something that had happened which had an M.O. very similar to what he himself had pulled before. The man actually wanted an apology from me and his email was complaint to Joe requesting that the ARRL take some action against me.19 (sigh) But there you go. Again, an ARRL SM was notified of a problem where a ham had the cops called on him and it was...handed off...to yet another one of my stalkers, Jeff Capehart, because he didn't want to deal with it. (Yet AGAIN! Jeff Capehart in the middle!) And yet again, no one did anything. (sigh) (THIS...is why Jeff Capehart always knows so much - because EVERYONE shares everything with him; and also why nobody does anything about him, because he is ALSO the invaluable SOURCE of information.)
What a moron, though. Scott engages in stalking and harassing me, leaves threatening messages, etc. THESE things he excuses away vaguely as "the cost of doing business" (while not going into detail on the "specifics" of what those tactics of doing business were). Then he wants the ARRL to take some form of corrective action (presumably against Melissa and Jeff) for covering it up, and (presumably against Melissa) for sending the email. A man who used to sit at a computer for hours while repeatedly tapping SEND to send me harassing emails and pages, and who used to leave so many messages on my machine that it became full, and who used to threaten me...THIS VERY MAN...wants an apology...AND CORRECTIVE ACTION?
At every step I complained to EM, the NWS, and local clubs about Scott and it REALLY bothers me how with all of the troubles that EVERYONE experienced with Scott, every agency blew me off and treated me like I was being totally ridiculous.
At one time I was planning to press charges against Scott. I came SO VERY, very close. But I stopped dead in my tracks because his little son was only ten years old; and I knew his wife, and she was never mean to me. She was always polite. All I could think about were things like...little Gregory getting beat up in school because...I dunno...because someone had heard about his father being "that guy on TV-20 who was arrested and put in jail" (kids are cruel); or of his wife being suddenly without his income - because *I* had taken it away, and I felt so very guilty. So, I never did file charges. Can you believe that? The guy STALKS me, and *I* feel guilty for thinking about calling the cops on him! (sigh!) You'd think he'd have been grateful for someone being so cool after how he treated me, and stopped. No. He kept on for a while. (sigh) I should have never done that. I shouldn't have given him ANY break. I should have pressed charges right then and there, regardless. You don't give these kinds of people any breaks. They just get worse. I didn't know that then. I know it now, though.
This is apparently a common thing among victims. It is well-documented. Victims often never report things because, believe it or not, they don't want to cause harm to the other family of the stalker, or even to the stalker himself/herself. Isn't that amazing? It's because we keep trying to assign normal conscience to someone who has none, and we keep hoping and expecting that these people will eventually come to their senses and realize what they're doing and stop. But it never happens...because they're not normal. They don't think like us. They truly believe that what they're doing to you is justified, and that it's your own fault. And they continue for as long as you'll let them to. But once you realize who they really are, and any leftover spells are gone, they get even worse.
Interesting to note is that my Navy friend was attacked in various ways by Scott, by Jay Lieberman, and by Jeff Capehart. Were they after HER, personally? No. They were attempting to get to ME, by USING her - attacking her for two, no three reasons: 1) to try to embarrass and humiliate me into doing what THEY wanted, 2) to embarrass me by (they hoped) causing her to lose respect for and belief in me and 3) to hurt me by causing her to turn away from me - be it directly through the subterfuge or through her (and her husband's) own fear of the apparent danger involved in associating with me, with the hoped for ultimate intent of leaving me without any friends at all and all alone. (Jeff himself also attacked Angie Enyedi of NWS-JAX in similar ways, and other people that I knew and/or who were important to me in some way or another, too - attempting to scare them, quite successfully, with weird emails and conversations touting supposed problems with me which were always mundane and really petty and nonsequitor if one would just sit back and really listen to what he was saying. And he always attempted to disguise these things under the guise of "helping a friend" so that instead of seeing what he was really doing, people were fooled into thinking he was just such a great guy and trying to do me a "favor". And he is such a pain in the ass in that way! No one ever sees through him and everybody seems to believe in him like he's the Christ Child or something...even when the wrongdoings are done right in front of everyone's noses.)
Chapter 17 THE RACIST, ARSONIST, REPEAT GUN FELON STALKER PREVIOUSLY ABDUCTED BY SPACE ALIENS - TWICE
ON JAY LIEBERMAN / KD4FER
GAINESVILLE AMATEUR RADIO SOCIETY
Jay Lieberman also went after my Asst. Coordinator, who happened to also be my best friend. According to Jeff Capehart, Jay's idea was to destroy her naval career so as to "help get Todd back on track with SKYWARN". ("...Back on TRACK?") Jeff taunted me with knowledge of this...of someone who "hated (me) more than Scott did".20 Jeff tortured me repeatedly with this for a month and a half before finally revealing who it was who it was who was threatening my friend. That's just not the act of a friend. It's the act of someone who enjoys watching you suffer. In person, Jeff actually tried to tell me that he was trying to help me by telling me that there was someone out there who hated me more than Scott and who was after my best friend's Navy career. But if it were anyone ELSE, those people would have told me right away that someone was threatening the career of a naval officer and then revealed immediately who had said that. ...But not Jeff. What kind of friend WITHHOLDS information about a THREAT from someone whom he claims to be his "friend?" Not just that, but this was also a threat to a MILITARY OFFICER. He said Jay was attempting to get personal information about my best friend out of him. I'd just assigned her the job of Asst. Coordinator at the time. She was an officer in the United States Navy, then an Ensign just out of OCS. (She's now a Lt.) Jeff refused to give me the greater important details over email or over the phone, and he kept insisting that we meet personally whenever he had any new "news". He told me that Jay intended to call up the Navy and tell her superiors that she was "associating with a known security risk" so that she would be "taken care of, leaving Todd more time to spend on his SKYWARN duties." Thank GOD Jeff didn't actually GIVE him any kind of PII information (at least, so he told me); but... (sigh) ...The fact that he knew about it and then deliberately WITHHELD important identifying information from me for a month-and-a-half - so that he could watch me squirm and suffer while trying to find out who had threatened my friend and deliberately preventing me from doing anything about it - proves what kind of an serious, stalking, and truly exasperating monster Jeff really is. He wanted to watch me squirm. He wanted to have a good laugh. It proved that he is capable of withholding important threatening information with total disregard for another's safety and well-being. Whenever I'd confront him about it publicly, he'd deny it with lines like "YOU'RE a piece of WORK!" And he used to continually put me in the way of harm and problems like that. Jay was not someone to be toyed with. He had a very real criminal history, including arms violations and threats to police and others of gun violence. He was unstable and a diabetic who often flew off the handle during diabetic frenzies. Jeff used to say to me, "Has he SHOT or STABBED you yet? Do you have any reason to THINK he might shoot or stab you? Do you have any REASON to believe that he could cause you harm? Call me when he shoots you, then you can worry." He's also said, "So I withheld it. Just let it GO! Nothing HAPPENED! You worry too much!" That's a very DANGEROUS way of looking at things and I don't know of ANY so-called "friends" who continually put people at risk like that. Jeff is a dangerous man and a danger to society.
I have to rant on Jeff about this point a bit, here...
Jeff CONTINUALLY plays with me and my life like that. He PUTS me in the way of problems and danger, then tells me I'm being ridiculous. He says things to the more volatile hams which makes them think I'm not doing my job, not doing my duty, and CONTINUES TO REMIND them too, which is key. I put Jeff up against the wall on the Jay thing. I asked him WHY Jay was so upset with me. I asked him why Jay would feel like he needed to GO that far. I asked him repeatedly if he was working Jay up and he wouldn't at first answer. I'd push him on it and push him on it and finally he admitted that yes, he keeps talking to Jay and Scott. He'd say that they approach HIM (which I doubted) and ask about me. To which, he would say yes, he'd answer all their questions.
"But you KNOW they're volatile. Right?"
"Yes."
"And you know that they're only going to attack me. Right?"
"Yah, but what am I supposed to do. They're asking about you. What am I supposed to say? '...Fuck off?!'"
"YES, JEFF! That's EXACTLY what you're supposed to say, DAMMIT!!!!"
"...Yah, but then they'd come after ME!"
ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH!!!!! I frakking HATE this guy!!!
The LOGIC that this man uses is just crazy-fucked. He UNDERSTANDS he's causing me problems, but thinks it's okay because it's "just Todd", and he seriously thinks that it's okay because, as he's told me before, "I knew you'd be able to deal with it." But if it means they'd attack HIM, NOW he understands the DANGER in it all. This man is a freaking psychopath. There's something seriously wrong with him.
What really bothered me so was the fact that I had Jeff and other people stalking and harassing me in these very SERIOUS ways and yet ACOEM and NWS thought I was the problem. That broke my heart. You have no idea how that tortured me in itself. SKYWARN here was laid waste by psychopaths and ASPD types and they had everybody believing that I was PICKING on them. Wow. I must be a MONSTER.
Jeff is always behind things. If Scott or Jay or Phil or Melissa are harassing you, it's because Jeff gave them IDEAS to attack you; because he worked them up. He doesn't VOLUNTEER to anyone that he worked them up. He won't bring it up and tell you unless you CATCH him, or you figure it out and PRESS him. Thus, no one knows to ask him if he DID work them up. Thus, if you didn't ask, it's your own fault; but he didn't LIE to you (as far as he's concerned). He doesn't know the term "white lie." Understand how Jeff thinks, now? When you ask him if he did something, he won't say no. He'll change the subject and try to implicate fault for what is happening to you back to you. And he'll say the same thing to everyone else. "If only he was a better leader, he wouldn't get himself into these things." See? Then all the gullible morons standing around him always shake their heads up and down in agreement because they're weak-willed and have no strength of character. In my case, Jeff always said that everything that happened to me happened because it was MY fault, not his.
"If only you were a better leader, this wouldn't happen to you" He would say.
I'd say, "But you're the one who brings UP these 'problems' and GETS everyone upset. Otherwise, they would not have even THOUGHT about it, and nothing would have happened to me."
"Yah so? That's not important."
"Jeff, STOP talking to these people. I don't want you talking about ME, or Alisa, or Alachua County SKYWARN to Jeff, Scott, Phil or Melissa, your WIFE, or ANYONE...ANYMORE!!! You are NOT ALLOWED to discuss these things with anyone, anymore...because you are a PROBLEM. EVERY time you talk to people, they come AFTER me. And the thing is that you KNOW that they're gonna come after me. You're THE MAIN REASON WHY harm is always coming to me, because you're working them up. So STAY AWAY from me! STOP....TALKING about me and Alachua County SKYWARN! ...PERIOD!"
I have many emails of similar conversations from Jeff. I'm trying to find the one where we had that conversation again, and after throwing blame for everything again back at me, he actually said, "NO!"
Jeff often didn't like that I didn't pay attention to all of his ideas and incorporate them. I always had to have my management hat on with him. Some of his ideas were impossible due to cost. Some were impossible due to the sheer manpower he KNEW could never be had. Some I rejected because I knew it would mean that I would have to do all of the work, in the end. Some were just ridiculous, period. He had to have things his way, or he would give me a hard time. When I wouldn't cave, he would encourage others to come to the aid of his causes and try to convince them to convince me of the "errors" of my ways. He would attempt to sabotage everyone's belief in me. It was a very common tactic with him. He was always getting me into trouble with people because he would make them doubt me, or think that I was stupid or irrational. He was always causing confusion in people over me. ...Except that he would always go to the people that he KNEW were volatile and unpredictable and who could become a problem for me. Either that, or he'd go to people he knew meant something important to me, and he'd attack their faith and trust in me. In Jay's case, he knew that he was gullible and easily manipulated. Jay paid attention to him. ...Jay died alone in his apartment and no one noticed for months because he didn't have any friends. Can you imagine that happening to you? He was exceptionally paranoid, extremely rude, an open, slurring racist, believed he'd been abducted by aliens, and that Big Brother was watching him and after him. He didn't list his real name in the phone book. He used "Robert Raven". His QRZ.com web page reflects this paranoia. Jay also had diabetes and he didn't take care of himself and he often flew into diabetic rages and threatened people - including to shoot them. He had a LONG, LONG criminal history dealing with bad check writing and threatening officers, and gun violations. It's open to the public and can be viewed online at the Alachua County Clerk of the Court going all the way back to 1979. There was rumor that back when he was in the Air Force, he was starting brush fires and calling them in, and he would never deny it; but would never TALK about it, either.
I remembered that Jay had once told me something about some woman he had been accused of stalking somewhere down in Hillsborough County. I checked Hillsborough Clerk of the Court records and all I could find on Jay down there were two not-very-descriptive entries - one dealing with filing a false criminal report, for which he was arrested and served some short jail time. But neither report goes into what specifically the crimes had to do with. Still... This man got in trouble everywhere he went.
These are the kinds of very weird people whom Jeff had no qualms about pointing my way.
Chapter 18 "I DON'T LIKE HIM...HE STEALS ALL THE ATTENTION AWAY FROM YOU"
ON SUSAN ANN TIPTON / K9PDL
GAINESVILLE AMATEUR RADIO SOCIETY
Jeff even would tag-team me with his own wife, Susan Tipton/K9PDL.
Jeff would pick on me and get me in trouble with others, and then when he'd think he was going too far and getting too close to getting into trouble, he'd stop and hand me off to his wife and she'd take over the harassment. And the cycle would continually repeat. Susan Tipton is a narcissist...someone with an extreme superiority complex. She believes herself smarter and better than everyone around her. She enjoys being mean and cruel to people, pushing things to the limits, right up to the point where you're ready to call the cops if she doesn't stop, and THEN she disappears for a while. That's her M.O. She sits back quietly while you're raving mad, complaining about her while SCREAMING at the top of your lungs demanding people DO something about her, while she makes what I call a "frozen shock" face. That is, as she's making these faces, she holds her face perfectly still. She never animates. It's like she saw the reaction in a photo in a magazine and she practiced it...but forgot that she needs to animate the look. And that's the thing. In the magazine, there's no animation to help her fine tune it. So all she knows is the frozen look. I notice these things. Just me, though. LOL. Nobody else. But I promise you this: EVERYONE who has ever experienced Susan Tipton's sadism will read this sentence and say to themselves, "You KNOW?...He's right damn dead ON! Sh#&! He's exactly RIGHT! I never caught on to that before; but now that I think back on my experiences with her...he's RIGHT!"
Jeff would tell me stories about her. ...How she would sit up in bed with him at night, and BITCH about me. ...How she HATED me without end. ...How she didn't want him cooperating with me in any public service-related things because, Jeff quoted, "(Todd) takes all the spotlight and attention from you". He'd tell me how she'd torture him... She'd withhold sex from him, withhold dinner from him or refuse to cook for him, make him do chores, keep him busy with stupid little things if he spent time any with me. ...Or she'd do the same to get him to harass me. I always thought it was kind of sick how Jeff would complain to me about how she'd "force" him to be mean to me. ...FORCE him? There's a word which is real good in situations like that. It's called "no." But, as I've personally experienced with Susan, there is no "no" allowed. If you try it, she targets you, vengefully. And I've told her "no" many times before. I've also told her to knock it off, before. To be quite honest, I've even told her to go find a long sword and jump on it, before. She doesn't like men like that. Men aren't supposed to talk back and challenge her. Men are to be controlled. They're puppies; and if they disobey, they get punished. Period.
She's domineering. He told me that she would ENCOURAGE him to harass me, and then get mad at him if he didn't do what she said. And he'd put it to me in this way like...like I should feel SORRY for him or something. He'd tell me things like this and feign complaint, and then he'd show NO understanding for MY situation, and explain it to me in a manner which made it sound like he HAD to do the things that he did, and like it was OKAY to sacrifice me..."because I knew you could take it." Listening to him was always a jaw dropper, because in one sentence he'd complain about the things Susan would do to him, rant and complain about how she TORTURES him; and in the next, he'd just as easily throw me off the cliff and think nothing of it. One second, he's trying to show how he understands what it's like when someone tortures you; and in the next, he couldn't understand what you were seeing wrong with him when he'd torture YOU, and he'd feign being taken aback by your anger. It wasn't any problem to him as he saw it, and I was just being ridiculous to complain about all the things he was causing to happen to me. And when nailed to the wall, he'd always blame Susan - as if this was the standing order or something.
Jeff told me about how she once came home in 2004 with the brightest smile, happier than a clam, and bragging: "I know something you don't know! I know something you don't know!" He asked her what was up, and she's say "I know a secret! After some torture of Jeff she eventually revealed that she'd received a copy of the Winter 2004 edition of the Florida Engineer, wherein my best friend Alisa was mentioned. It had her full name - which I had been trying to keep secret from them, her picture, and various other information about her in it. I'm standing there listening to Jeff describe Susan's excitement (remember we're talking about a woman I always believed to be incapable of feeling anything...at least anything good), and I became ill. Jeff thought this funny. I didn't. Remember...we're talking about a woman who hates my guts, here; who can't stand me. And yet, she has this inexplicable obsessive compulsive NEED to know EVERYTHING about me and what's going on in my life. And I was NOT particularly excited about that fact that a woman like this was so strangely interested in who my other friends were - and especially in showing such a deep particular interest in my FEMALE friend. Why did this matter so much? Why was it so exciting to Susan? Nobody else who is normal reacts this way over information such as this. I didn't think it was funny at all. I thought it not the least bit normal and quite scary, in fact. Jesus! What the hell IS it with narcissistic assholes being so damned interested in not just my friends but my FEMALE friends? Why is everyone so interested in going after her? What is going after HER supposed to do? First they went after Angie Enyedi. Now they want to know information about Alisa. With all of the stuff that I was going through at the hands of the local hams, and all of the bad things that I had experienced...finding out that one of the people who hated me so very much was VERY excited to find out who my best friend was and who thought it was such an exciting thing was to me reason to worry and be very afraid.
I was always scared around Susan. Everyone I've asked says the same thing. She's weird. She's odd. At first GLANCE, people don't like her. The description that I most often get is "I just didn't LIKE her. First time I SAW her I got shivers. She just LOOKS like she's mean." They get this REALLY uncomfortable feeling around her. You feel REALLY intimidated. For some, they'd say that the hairs on the back of their neck would crawl. I'd feel the exact same thing. She is EXTREMELY intimidating. She's very domineering. She interrupts. She takes over conversations. Over the years, in person, and during ham club meetings and get-togethers, various people have described to me the relationship dynamic that they too have observed between Jeff and Susan:
"She treats him like he's one of the dogs."
"She treats the DOGS better then HIM!"
"You notice how she berates him all the time?"
"You notice how she COMMANDS him all the time?"
"Ever notice how he rarely talks back; and when he does, she gets meaner?"
The dogs obey her, too. ...Poodles. ...Always poodles. They can be trained. They can be dominated, controlled, commanded. This is what she wants from people. When people don't obey, they must be taught to cower to her. When she commands the dogs, they ALWAYS cower...ALWAYS. ...Like they're deathly afraid of getting hit. I witnessed her smack the SHIT out of her cat, Pixie, years ago - if only because the poor cat decided to sit on a barstool in the kitchen. That's all. It was a REALLY hard smack, too. The cat didn't deserve that. It wasn't doing anything to WARRANT that kind of a reaction. It just wasn't right. But she hit the cat without hesitation in front of me, showing that she felt that what she was doing to the cat was justified and that she thought I would think so, too, or something. I wondered "What if that was her KID? Would she smack the KID like that for sitting on the barstool without permission?" Jeezus. Once you get to see how this woman is around her animals, and you witness first-hand how her animals react around her, the walls fall down. You begin to realize some things about her.
When she doesn't like you, she cuts you off and won't let you finish sentences or thoughts. She'll make jokes about you in front of your peers and try to get other people to laugh at you. During a presentation that I was making about the Alachua County EMWIN Project at a meeting of the Gainesville Amateur Radio Society, she constantly interrupted me and would throw a barrage of insults at me. She put down my ideas in front of everyone. She'd stop me in mid sentence and say "I think it's stupid!", "I think it's ridiculous!", "I think it's a waste of time!", "I think it's a waste of money!" And when she wasn't busy insulting me, she was flirting deliberately loudly with David Price/WA4ET, who was sitting behind her, snickering very loudly, and making sure that everyone could hear the further insults she was making to him about my project idea. And rather than reprimand her or try to make her stop, instead members would laugh. No one bothered to do anything to shut her up. They were too afraid of retribution if they tried. She was ruthlessly mean and sadistically cruel. I guarantee you, though...had I tried to do that to her or anyone else in that club, I would have been reprimanded immediately. This is the power that psychopaths have over others. They get to do whatever they want, ruling with intimidation and fear of retribution.
Ever the narcissist, she's constantly bragging about her IQ, and about how smart she is. She can't stay away from the on-screen word games at Kazbor's, and she's always trying to encourage everybody else to join in so that she can compare her levels with yours and make herself feel superior. I remember there was one occasion - during a restaurant lunch together with other people - where she bragged about how in HER job she could look up information about ANYONE she wanted. I was like "...ANYONE?" She said "...AN-Y-BOD-Y," not immediately recognizing what I was actually getting at. She said she worked with some UF database called "C.H.R.I.S.", and that she could look up "whatever information that I want" off of it. Jeff corrected her with "...Yah, but that's only with STUDENTS, though!" Whereupon she corrected back that that "didn't matter", she had access to "other things." Jeff did not correct her any further. (sigh) And she boasted about this in quite an unusually proud way, like her access to this information made her God or something, and you and everybody else were nothing. In actuality, such bragging of this sort is a serious violation of policy for a worker working with databases which utilizes "Personally Identifiable Information" (PII). I work for the Census Bureau and we're instructed NOT to tell people what software we use, or to discuss anything about our software or databases in any way, so as to prevent unscrupulous types from targeting you and possibly attempting to glean information off of you, or worse. It's part of our IT security training! I am *sure* that EVERY place that deals with computers and data (Information Technology) and PII in this manner has a similar policy and I am SURE that this bragging...was in violation of that policy. That was something I am SURE I was not supposed to KNOW - I don't care WHAT the venue, what the situation, WHO we were. This was spoken in the open in a RESTAURANT! ...The Chili's on Archer Road, to be specific. Things like that just don't concern her. I wonder...if her boss had discovered that she had said that, would she have been fired? Between Jeff and Susan, BOTH...these two are a highly irresponsible IT security risk whenever their egos come online.
...Egotistical people and computers are NOT two things that you want to put together in the same room. I mean REALLY. No. It's a dangerous combination. It's like putting a psychopath in charge of a very important secret military mission. They may be able to do the job very well...but you can't count on them to always carry it out to the intended mission objective. They tend to be out of control and to do what they want and at some point it will be inevitable that they'll fail you. You can try to train them to be ace pilots. But when crunch time comes, they get so focused on causing one thing harm that they fail to watch what is going on around them...right into the ground. This tends to also be how people like this get caught.
When you make Susan mad, she targets you. She attacks your intelligence, your good standing, your credibility. She tries to make you look stupid and inconsequential in front of your peers. And she laughs - like she thinks everyone in the room is so proud of her for pointing out these things, when actually, the entire room is sneaking stares back and forth at each other and shaking their heads, widening their eyes in inquisition and disbelief, wondering why this woman is going so FAR to beat this person to a pulp and why she seems to know NO place to stop and how she actually seems to be enjoying what she is doing. This is the difference between you and me, and people with an APD. And when you try to complain, and to make it stop, to defend yourself, she makes this practiced look of "shock", deliberately posed, and deliberately held for some long seconds for effect. It's quite weird to see. It's as if the look was taken from some magazine she once perused - frozen; immovable; lacking the normal continual animation that is seen in normal people. It's as if she stood in front of a mirror and practiced the look over and over until she thought she had it just right. When she makes it, it's somehow "fake" and seems "forced", like she was LOOKING for or WAITING for the opportunity to make that face so as to make everyone notice and think that you were a horrifically bad person being so unnecessarily cruel to her. I actually have a photo of this look, somewhere. When around Susan, I always had this super bad feeling of darkness and evil while in her presence. I always had this feeling like...like I was some kind of "prey" and she was a dark "predator". Like I was some mouse and she was the cat, pawing me around for no good reason except for the fun of it. Over the years, many people have related similar stories about her to me.
When she's trying to put someone down, or trying to belittle a situation, she's very flirty, bubbly, and seemingly all around happy...the LIFE of the party. ...Conversational. ...Upbeat. ...Seemingly the NICEST person in the whole wide world. She's trying to put on the impression of someone docile, incapable of harm. But there are "things" about her that you won't notice until you've been around her a little longer - because you weren't paying attention the first time. She constantly belittles others. All the TIME, actually. On first meet, it's there, but it's veiled, disguised, not easily noticeable. She's looking for the way in to you...to put you in the chair with the cut off legs. She always has a better story than you. She has to be the most important thing at the table. You're just about the dumbest, but she's tolerating you. When people complain about her, she minimalizes the horror stories that people tell about her. It's never her fault. The other person was being ridiculous, over-reacting, PICKING on her. The other person was making a mountain out of a mole-hill and she...why SHE was just this innocent little doe-eyed deer being chased by the awful hunters for NO reason. And she's SO VERY, REALLY GOOD at it. I've watched time and again as she convinced otherwise REALLY smart people (whom you'd think would be smarter) that she was just some innocent little thing. She does most of the talking. Everybody else shakes their heads in agreement. She is a master at charming people, persuading people, convincing very intelligent people that she's the innocent victim and that YOU are the evil bad guy who is picking on her for no reason. It blows me away to watch it happen. And she does a VERY good "help me! help me! they're picking on me!" act. She's better than Jeff in charm and persuasiveness. In fact, she usually tells Jeff to shut up and SHE intervenes and takes over whenever Jeff gets into trouble with me.
But if only people would interview around a little, ask questions...DEEPER questions...and be just a LITTLE more observant, and pay attention a LITTLE more closely...the spells would be broken with Susan, and she would lose her power. It's all right there in front of them. They just have to look harder.
Even her mother fled...
Jeff once told me that Susan's mother was going to move here to Gainesville to be closer to her but that Susan was so MEAN and CRUEL with her that she actually changed her mind and now (or at least as of a few years ago)...they don't talk much. He also told me that Susan came home actually crying and upset one day because apparently her boss had called her to the office and reprimanded her and told her that multiple co-workers had filed complaints against her because she was very rude, mean, condescending, cruel and vindictive; and her employer told her to knock it off or she'd be fired. He told me she "couldn't understand" why her boss had been so mean to her. HAH! SHIT! Holy COW! What?...she thinks she should be ALLOWED to treat people that way? and that her boss was just being...what?...OBLIVIOUS and just didn't UNDERSTAND??? Let me guess: it's all everybody ELSE'S fault. Right? I've been hearing that from those two for YEARS. Even JEFF has admitted to me that she is mean and vindictive and he's told me that even HE has told her that she needs to chill out or else something is going to happen. But he says she doesn't listen.
Jeff also told me that the University of Florida's Dean of Veterinary Medicine even had words with her, for the exact same reasons. ...People had been complaining about her rudeness and condescensions and vindictive, mean behavior, and according to Jeff, the Dean gave her an ultimatum and said that if she didn't stop it then she would be permanently banned from ever putting foot on the UF Livestock Pavilion, and Veterinary School property, and from attending dogs shows, or bringing her dogs ever again.
Back in 1985/1986, my ex-wife and I used to live in a little loft apartment somewhere back behind the Burger King on University Avenue. (The BK no longer exists, now. It's a Target Copy.) It was just after Susan and her husband and about three other people had been caught hacking into the University of Florida's IFAS computer, back then. Susan had lost her original job because of the computer crime conviction and now she was working as a Manager at the Burger King. My wife was a greeter/cashier, there. She was constantly coming home very worked up and upset and even crying because of the way that Susan used to treat her. She'd complain about how difficult Susan was to work with, and how monstrously overbearing she was, and cruel, sometimes to the point of making her mad, or making her cry. She often told me that she wanted to quit. And in fact, one day...she actually did. ...Because of Susan's condescending behavior and unnecessarily cruel attitude. Interestingly, this was some years before I'd actually personally met Jeff and Susan in ham radio circles. That didn't actually occur until sometime around 1992 or so. (Yah. I've got a MINIMUM 18 years worth of experience behind me with these two. You can consider me the expert witness, by now.)
Susan thinks of herself as smarter than everyone else. She sees everyone else as being lower than her. She's rude and smart to people. She feigns not seeing it, but she knows very well what she is doing. She thinks the world should be subservient to her, agree with her, obey her. When people object, she harasses them, and becomes even meaner and more vindictive. She convinces herself that the people she's mean to actually deserve it. When people tell her to knock it off, she sees this as an attack against her for no reason. She believes that it's okay to berate and belittle others at their expense, and that people should put up with it because it's no big deal. When you try to make her stop, this is considered being rude and mean to her, and from that point on, she sees nothing wrong with being mean to you. From personal experience, she seems to actually delude herself into believing that the whole world agrees with her when she's being publicly abusive. I sometimes wondered if she imagined the world actually applauding her in her mind or something - raising their arms towards her in admiration, glorification and affection, thinking herself somewhat akin to Jesus Christ or something. I've tried to figure out what would make someone so openly and publicly mean and cruel and not SEE what they were doing, or even so much as be concerned what other people thought. I am continually amazed by how MANY people there are out there like this...who don't seem to have an understanding of "tact", or to know where the "limits" are, and who seem so tunnel-visioned on going ON and ON and ON in picking on people - even to the point of discovery, or losing their "fan base", if you want to go so far as to call it that. Susan is one of those. At first meet, she seems really smart, and really personable, and maybe even helpful. But when you continually make the mistake of not giving her the attention she's so badly wanting, or of contradicting something she's said, or correcting her, or of putting her in her place and telling her to stop being rude to you... Well, then you get on her shit list, and she becomes your worst nightmare...your worst enemy. Oh and...AUTHORITY level often dictates how well she listens to you, and how much you get to see. If you're somebody important, you may NEVER notice any of these things. She's too busy kissing your butt and trying to add another important figure in her repertoire of "friends".
There are more weird things about her...
Years ago, Susan was acting very strange. She normally hated my guts. But then suddenly she flipped. She was actually reacting with me in a manner which can only be described as a very obvious "flirting" type of behavior - getting close, giggly, touching. (Not quite a sexual kind of touching, but putting hands on my shoulders, gently poking my side, etc. - things that weren't natural for her considering how much she hated me and that she knew I did not like her. But touching in ANY way between us was NOT any time EVER understood to be any KIND of an acceptable thing.) I wondered what happened to this woman who hated me so much, and what had made her flip her lid. Was she on some sort of MEDS or something? I DIDN'T like her and I wanted NOTHING to do with her and I was assuming that she was doing it to harass me and to deliberately make me feel uncomfortable - or maybe she was using me to punish Jeff for some unknown infraction that I was not privy to. I've seen her react this way with a few other guys, too, before. Jeff would even see this going on at times and he would do nothing. But when four different ham radio operators came up to me and then accused me of FLIRTING with Jeff's wife, I got upset. I told Jeff to tell her to knock it off, and to tell her that FOUR HAMS had now come to me complaining and accusing me of flirting with HER, not the other way around, and that I wanted it to stop. (The hams included Scott West himself, Steve King, Ed Amsbury, Walt Johnson, Shannon Boal, John Warne - all off whom were giving me incredulous looks every time they saw it.) Rather than go to her and give her all of these VERY important details, I think Jeff instead went to her and said something very close to "Guess what? Todd thinks you LIKE him!", because immediately after that, she got set off and became an even worse an enemy towards me than she had been before. It took Jeff SO long to tell her ANYTHING about it, though. I told him REPEATEDLY to say something to her about it, and he would NOT; and he acted like a man in DENIAL. He refused to do anything about it at all.21
So yah...they tag team. Jeff works Susan up. Susan works Jeff up. You end up pissed off and screaming, and looking like a lunatic. Then when people ask questions, they feign not knowing anything about it, they leave important information out, say bare minimal, and allow people to draw their own (incorrect) assumptive conclusions. The both of them think that this strategy, used on people that they target, is just way funny. "Just don't let them GET to you!", you say. Heh. If you're saying that, you DON'T know these people. If only it were so simple. These people hunt you down and seek you out. And if you're not around, they cause you trouble with other people behind your back. It's in their genetic and psychological makeup to do this.
Unfortunately, in the case of Susan, singing "A Morning After" backwards does NOT make her implode and force her to get sucked back into the depths of Hell through flaming cracks in the earth as it does in Southpark.
"light the for looking on keep Let's
sunshine the find to chance a have We
night the to on hold can we If
after morning a be to got There's
Warm and safe that's..."
Oh and...offering tree fitty doesn't work, either.
I'd appreciate hearing from other people who may have been affected by either or both of these two. It would be nice to know that I wasn't the ONLY one that they picked on. I know that sounds weird to say, but...I think you know what I mean.
Dealing with these people - Jeff, Susan...EVERYBODY involved...has been extremely difficult, humiliating, embarrassing, and horrifically scary - not to mention physically, mentally, and emotionally painful and draining.
Chapter 19 THE ONE COMMON PERSON TO IT ALL...
ON JEFFREY DONALD CAPEHART / W4UFL
GAINESVILLE AMATEUR RADIO SOCIETY
The one commonality among all these people harassing me, in case no one has noticed yet...is Jeff Capehart. He was the key to everything. He was behind everything. He ALWAYS knows the details. He's ALWAYS in the middle of the "know". He had to have information. He cannot survive without it. It is his entire existence; his entire life. It is his tool. He is the Devil's Advocate. He takes information from one person, and hands it to the other side to work them up, and vice-versa. Then he sits back and watches the fireworks fly - because to him it's FUN.
For example, he'd get Scott West upset with me, implying to Scott that I wasn't doing my "proper job" as a SKYWARN Coordinator, and encourage him to do things to harass me. (He was actually successful at making a good, great many people upset with me over this, while at the same time, not a single person could actually point out just exactly what, specifically, it was that I wasn't properly doing.) Then he'd tell me that he knows someone who wants to make my life difficult, while withholding his name, so that I couldn't go to the police with any useful information to try to protect myself, and making me even more angry. Then he'd tell Scott how I want to know who is talking about him. This would just make Scott laugh and get him worked up even more. And Jeff would take that back to me. And this cycle would repeat while they both had a good laugh. Scott, who felt invincible because Jeff was helping him and withholding his name from me, became emboldened and would go too far. He'd email bomb me, pager bomb me, leave so many messages - some of them threatening - that my machine would fill up and would no longer be able to answer calls. I'd get upset and tell Jeff to stop talking to Scott about me and to stop working him up. Jeff would refuse, actually say "NO!, and put the blame on me saying "If only you were a better LEADER, then this wouldn't HAPPEN to you."
He got Jay Lieberman worked up about me in similar fashion. I'd become Jay's new "mission" and now Jay would attack me. Jeff would then torture me with "I know someone who hates you worse than Scott West", and how this individual wanted to attack my best friend's Navy career "...so that Todd will have more time to concentrate on my SKYWARN duties." He withheld his name from me for two months. Jeff had a good laugh while I worried about what this stupid individual was going to do to my friend, much less my friendship with her.
He handed information about me to Paul Eakin, who was running for the position of Northern Florida Section Manager in the ARRL. Paul gave Jeff information about things he's heard about me from other sources in Tallahassee and in Jacksonville. (Word was slowly spreading now of how "the guy who ran the Alachua County SKYWARN program" was a "problem".) Again with the quid pro quo bullshit (he was like Hannibal Lecter with that M.O.), Jeff would share what he knew with Paul, while leaving out how he was actively manipulating much of the problems that I was experiencing. Jeff then took Paul's information back to me (unbeknownst to Paul) and told me how there's this guy who is on this political campaign for the ARRL and taking gossip that he'd heard about me out in public, spreading it all over north Florida. So again, in typical Capehart modus operandi, he withheld Paul's name from me at first while I'd get worked up and upset at how my name is apparently being trashed all around Florida. He watched and laughed while the mayhem happened, out of my control. And when I'd complain about what he was doing, again he'd tell me how this was all my own fault, and how if I'd only done things the way he'd wanted, then things would be just fine for me, right now. And of course, he'd also throw in how I was just being ridiculous to worry about it all because there was nothing that I could do about it and I should just accept it and "move on". That man was a son of a bitch.
I wasn't trained in the psychological profiling of psychopaths back then, so it never occurred to me that - especially near the climax - Jeff was "graduating". He was getting worse and worse the braver he got. With each new thing that he pulled, and got away with, he got more and more confident, and the problems that he caused for me got worse and worse, culminating up to the point where I finally published this blog...where then most of it all stopped quite suddenly. Had I not published this blog, just how far would this have gone? Jeff seemed to be actually getting off on what he was doing to me. The more he saw me suffer, and the more he saw that the people who were supposed to be protecting me (i.e., the police) were actually sabotaging my cases, the things he'd pull were becoming more and more dangerous. He was getting worse and worse, and there wasn't anything I could do about it because even the police were protecting him because dumbasses like Dave Donnelly, and some other people in high places - all of whom had been duped - were telling the police that *I* was the problem, not the people that I was filing the complaints about.
I also never realized this until after...until just now; but now that I think about it, it occurs to me that Jeff never seemed to have any normal friends - that he went out of his way to "hang out" with, that is. Of the people he "hung out" with the most, I can't help but now notice that they were always people who had a hard time finding friends; people who were the outcasts of society; people who were considered "misfits", and who had some form of mental or criminal background, or problems, or who had bullying personalities, or who were narcissistic, or self-serving, or who had some sort of a personal agenda, or, as in my own case...who had very low confidence.
Scott West was a low-browed, low-intelligence bully type who was gullible to gossip and slander and all too easily manipulated into causing someone else problems. He wanted up the ladder in the easiest ways possible. He did favors only if he could get something off of you. He talked about other people behind their backs, made fun of people, and was sometimes manipulated by Jeff into harassment and stalking behavior. He was angered easily, and prone to threats when angered. He loved gossip, always needed more information about people, and chronically complained about everything and everybody around him.
Jay was racist, who hated people who were black. He was paranoid and delusional. He believed that he'd been abducted by aliens - a few times. He believed that the government was watching him, and always out to get him. Jay was always seeing the conspiracies. His phone book entry wasn't under "Jay Leiberman", but rather..."Robert Raven." He was a diabetic. He didn't always take good care of himself. Sometimes when his levels were off he would fly into angry raging tirades in front of club members during meetings of the Gainesville Amateur Radio Society, and threaten to shoot them with a gun he bragged he kept in the glove compartment of his car. He flew into angry tirades, easily. He talked about other people behind their backs, made fun of people, and was sometimes manipulated by Jeff into harassment and stalking behavior. He loved gossip, always needed more information about people, and chronically complained about everything and everyone around him.
Melissa Royce was a self-serving narcissist who had ulterior motives of being a leader and who had delusions of being famous and looked up to and in control of big programs while having little or no real honest experience to back up such wants. She wanted to be in control of the local SKYWARN program, having come from one that she used to run down in West Palm Beach, she said. She pretended to be everyone's friend in order to glean personal information from people, and shared this information with other people, and friended people in high places to help herself get up to the tops of ladders more quickly. And as I said, she forged business cards, gave herself titles she didn't have, and used them to fake out the gullible leaders of the National Weather Service, the local Office of Emergency Management, and the local Red Cross. She used the power that she had in these agencies, at least until she was discovered, to cause problems for others - and especially for me. She talked about other people behind their backs, made fun of people, and was sometimes manipulated by Jeff into harassment and stalking behavior. When angered she was prone to come up with her own ideas about causing harm to others and would actually act them out, rather than simply talk about them, in order to "get them back". She loved gossip, always needed more information about people, and chronically complained about everything and everyone around her.
Her husband Philip Royce, was also extremely narcissistic, overly obsessed with and proud with himself. He bragged about himself, often. He also had a short fuse. He worked for the Alachua County Sheriff's Office, and used his relationships there to gather information about, and to cause problems for those that he did not like...especially those, like me, who had told his wife to go to hell and get lost whenever she became a serious problem. He talked about other people behind their backs, made fun of people, and was sometimes manipulated by Jeff into harassment and stalking behavior. He angered easily, and was prone to threats when angered. He loved gossip, and always needed more information about people, and chronically complained about everything and everyone else around him.
Years later, I am finally noticing these...commonalities among everyone. These are the types of people with whom Jeff would surround himself. These are not good types. Everyone in Jeff's circle of more intimate friends was someone that he could use and manipulate in some way to his own benefit or enjoyment. With me however, he humiliated, insulted, made fun, sabotaged projects, friendships, and contacts... Jeff liked keeping me on my toes; keeping me feeling low and down; making me feel like I was worthless, and nothing - while at the same time disguising this by using sentences such as "I'm just doing this to try to help you - to make you see, because others aren't willing to tell you to your face." He tried to keep me..."dependent" upon him. He always kept me thinking that people were constantly talking about me, constantly complaining about me. And they were...because he was telling them that I was a problem, apparently, behind my back, and I didn't know it.
Everything with Jeff is "What do you know?/Here's what I'll give you in return, my gullible little mouse. Well done! You've just been conditioned by me...and you're in my control." Every time someone got upset with me, it was Jeff who had worked someone up, encouraged people to doubt me, and/or to be angry with me, or to take some action against me. It took me a long time to figure it out. ...A very long time. And once I did, he turned on me and got worse.
I had to work SO...VERY...VERY...HARRRRD...to get rid of that man! ...So very hard! (sigh!) He would not go away when told to. I'd tell him to stop bothering me, threaten getting a restraining order against him, and he'd stay away for maybe a couple of weeks, then regain his courage, and then email me again, or try to call me again. Maybe if I was lucky and really mad at him, he'd stay away for two months. But then he'd still try to email me or call me again. I could NOT make him stop. I could not make him go away. And when confronted with it, and finally told to stay away or else I'd get a restraining order against him, he outright refused with a "NO!"
This repetitive cycle went on for years. As he saw it, it was his mission to "fix" the problems that he perceived in me. He was going to "correct" me and make a better person of me. He was going to make me "more responsible" and make me more of a "leader". He was fixated on this. He could not put it down. And he did this by going to my friends, my ham associations, my Emergency Management associations, my Weather Service associations, and pointing out to everyone I personally knew what he considered to be "flaws" in me, so as to try to make people doubt me, paranoid, and to think me stupid, so that I would eventually be forced to "see" how he was right, and then I would be forced to go through him to get these people to like me again. Jeff had a very twisted view of the world, and all I wanted was to get away from this sick, sick man.
But Jeff did a lot of "favors" for a lot of people, and he had volunteered for a lot of public service, and getting people to see him for what he really was just not possible. Everyone believed in him too much. I could not make him leave me alone. And at the same time, I could not convince others of what he was doing to me.
This is a very scary feeling to experience. I don't know how many other people in the world have to go through experiencing people like this, but I'd sure like to know how they cope with it. You have NO idea what it's like to have someone stalking you and to not be able to do anything about it because not only do people believe in the bad guy too much, but they actually believe in him SO much that they end up going out of their way to help the bad guy stay out of trouble, truly being made to believe that the real problem isn't the bad guy, but the stalked victim, instead. To wit: University of Florida's Dr. Jay Garlitz, GPD Detective Joseph Mayo, and UPD Detective Michael Metz...all of whom were led to believe that the bad guy was the good guy, and that the victim was actually the bad guy - and in so doing each and every one of them was convinced to do things to actually erase evidence and/or to otherwise help my stalker.
I went everywhere and to everyone to try to get help; and everywhere I went, I was blown off...most often in condescension and rudeness. Jeff would intercede, because he knew everyone, and he'd convince them that I was exaggerating things, blowing things way out of proportion, even being outright ridiculous...and he'd be believed. No one ever challenged Jeff's opinion. He was extremely intelligent and charismatic, involved in every public service organization, every government agency - ACFR Reserves, Explorers, CERT, ARRL, GARC, GARS, Red Cross, Emergency Mgmt. He would participate in communications aid for March of Dimes, bike-a-thons, other walk-a-thons, etc. He volunteered for MANY things, knew a lot of people, had friends everywhere. He worked for the UF's Office of Inspector General, was involved in IT security, and in the Auditing Dept. He was quick to come to your aid with a little soldering, perhaps the cutting of a wire here and there, helping to get someone's computer back up and running, fixing a problem with a repeater. When you look at this and then put it next to my complaints...I lost every time. No one challenged him. No one would ever look at his titles and still proceed with an investigation. He was untouchable. And everyone else? ...Conditioned dogs. "We NEED Jeff!" To not turn a blind eye to the things he was doing would mean to lose someone who was...valuable...to every-one. He could make the most intelligent person believe even the most ridiculous stuff. He was good at sounding very confident, very knowledgeable, and very innocent. No one ever acted on my complaints because he would convince them that it was just me being ridiculous.
Chapter 20 PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS ON JEFF CAPEHART OVER TIME
For a long time, I never knew; but Jeff had a criminal history, and kept it secret from everyone. Along with his wife (then girlfriend), Susan Tipton, he'd hacked into the UF's IFAS computer system before, and no one knew about it for very many years. He had many friends, too, who apparently also knew, and who apparently tried to help keep it quiet for him in order to "protect" him because they thought of him as "rehabilitated" and someone who was "just trying to make his life better".
As the years went on, I often remember wondering if he had had some prior history of some sort of psychiatric history or problems, and/or if his parents knew of them and were hiding them so as to protect their son.
He was also extremely intelligent...much more so than most normal people.
His wife Susan was extremely narcissistic - exaggeratedly proud not only of herself but especially proud of Jeff. (I sometimes felt she saw him as something of a "prize" AND a "puppet", often treating as a possession rather than a human being - something often noted by others, too.) According to Jeff, she repeatedly tried to convince him that he was better than I was, and that I was detracting from attention that was rightfully owed him.. Susan would repeatedly bolster this in him...almost as if "training" him or "brainwashing" him. "Susan thinks you're stupid and thinks that I do all the work and that you take away all my spotlight!" was a comment Jeff once made to me.
After a while, I started to notice how Susan very often tended to use "operant conditioning" methods on Jeff to get him to obey her. Everything was reward and punishment. If he didn't do something her way, she made him work around the house, gave him lots of chores or duties so as to deliberately hinder or prevent him from doing any of the things that he especially wanted to do. Jeff often complained that she'd yell at him, berate him, and even actually withhold sex from him...especially if she found out that he was hanging around with me. (I suspected possible physical abuse, and asked him if that was indeed occurring; but I could never get a confirmation OR a denial out of him. Though, I HAVE personally witnessed Susan to slap her own cat unnecessarily hard simply for jumping upon and sitting on a barstool.) The psychological abuse from Susan was definite and observed by everyone. Most everyone else would look the other way; blow it off. When Jeff and I WERE friends I used to try to convince him to stand up to her and tell her where to go. I was the only one in the entire ham club who was like this with her. I wouldn't let her boss me around, and would spit back with just as much fire as her, and put her in her place whenever she went too far. Jeff would not ever dare do that. As he put it to me, "YOU know how she gets with YOU! Think of what *I* have to go through! It's WORSE! I have to LIVE with her!" She was one mean woman, and tried to be charming with everyone else so as to hide it.
Before the downfall in our friendship, Jeff's wife once bragged during a lunch get-together with other office employees and myself that in her job at the University, she had access to the "CHRIS database", a database which apparently allowed her access to much personal information about all students and faculty at the University of Florida, and, apparently, "more." Jeff and Susan even argued about this as I remember. Jeff corrected, "...Yah, but only for people in the University." Susan corrected him: "...AN-NEE-BOH-DEE!" I was confused as to why someone would feel this point something so important to brag. "Surely", I thought to myself, "there are rules and regulations AGAINST bragging about such things so as to prevent unscrupulous other people from trying to approach you to use you in some way." (The Census Bureau definitely warns it's employees about such things. I'm sure her office did, too.) I did not think this bragging session on Susan's part to be normal, or something that was likely sanctioned. And I was almost SURE that if her employer knew about it, she would be fired immediately. Why was she so obsessed with having access to this "database"? Why was it so important to her? ...To Jeff, too; and what was he doing knowing so much about that database he supposedly didn't have anything to do with? Obviously, they were discussing work at home between the two of them. This is also inappropriate. Marriage or cohabitation status does not equate to automatic "trustworthiness". This is also discussed in the Census Bureau. And again, I'm sure it's discussed in her own job. Again, what was she doing discussing it publicly, and then why was it important for her to BRAG about it at that?
Jeff seemed to have a dependent type personality. He needed to do everything WITH me present, and commonly tried to get me to come along with him to do things which I had no want or experience to do. There was no reason for me to be present, but he would insist often to the point of illogical, unreasonableness. When I would object or refuse he would resort to insulting and demeaning me. He would get upset if I didn't want to go someplace or do something with him. That always bugged the crap out of me - how he always did that to me.
As our relationship slowly worsened, and he began to feel more confident with admitting darker things to me about himself, he admitted to tracking my activities and whereabouts on the web often, using things such as IP address tracking and web counters, and checking logs on the GARC server, and admit that the reason that he did this was so that he could tell when I was at home and thus, could answer the phone. And if I did not answer, then he "knew" that I was "avoiding" him. When I admonished that this was not normal behavior that most anyone else resorted to, he balked that it was not against the law and that I was being ridiculous and getting upset for no reason.
When on vacation, he would gather unsolicited "gifts" (unwanted gifts) for me and give them to me. I didn't like it when he did these things because eventually he would always use them to make me feel guilty later whenever we'd have a disagreement about something. As well, his wife would also try to make me feel like an ingrate if I did not accept them, or if I objected to it.
Often he would insist I take on project ideas which were often not logical or reasonable; and when I would object or balk, or otherwise put on my "management hat" and really "think" about his ideas, again he would resort to insulting and demeaning behavior, and even go as far as to start the project anyway secretly behind my back, and then blame me when it did not work the way that he had thought it would. It often contradicted his extreme intelligence; and witnessing this effect was very confusing for someone of a logical mind like me to understand. (It threw me off for so long until I read some books on psychopathy and sociopathy and other "anti-social personality disorders". To me, it seems to put himself at risk of being caught by proceeding in that manner, and that didn't make sense to me. A LOT never made sense tome about Jeff.) Sometimes this behavior would involve interfering with other projects that I was involved with, and/or interfering with the relationships with other project managers so as to hinder and/or stress my relationships with them and to cause distrust and disillusionment, and ultimately, a failure to be able to reach project fruition or conclusion, such as what happened with the EMWIN Pager Project and the paging service contact with Shands Communications, and with the Gator Amateur Radio Club and the University of Florida and the EMWIN Project.
To defend himself from any fault in the things which would happen to me as a result of his actions, Jeff used "denial", "minimalization", "devaluation", and projection of blame onto the victim (me). It was very common to hear Jeff say things like...
"Susan thinks you're stupid."
"That's not what everybody else is saying."
"That's not what *I* heard!"
"It's your OWN fault that all of this is happening to you!"
"If only you had been a better leader!..."
"If you'd just let them go, things wouldn't be so bad for you! You make these things worse for YOURSELF!"
"Why do you HARP on these things? Why can't you just let them go?"
"I SAID I was sorry! What do you want me to DO?...ADMIT WHAT I DID??? WHY? Then I'd get in trouble! It's already been done! What more do you WANT of me? Why can't you just let things GO? JEEZE!"
(This would be akin to a murderer telling the father of his victim that he's being ridiculous to not want to let what he did to his daughter go or to move on, or like the vandal who destroys someone's car with a bat who then apologizes and admonishes the victim that he's just harping on things, and that things would be so much better for him if he'd just shut up and deal with it - with no promise for recompense, remunerations, or admissions of the crime done. But it is absolutely amazing how many people listen to Jeff talk like this and who actually become entranced in HOW he says it and they actually end up shaking their heads in agreement due to his charm and charisma, and then turn around and end up blaming the victim, too. It was sick and twisted listening to this guy reason himself out of fault at every turn, and in fact turn around and blame everything that he did on ME, as if it was NECESSARY for him to do what he did. Often, he'd even try to tell me that he was doing it all to HELP me, trying to make himself actually appear as if was my hero or SAVIOUR or something!
He was incapable of admitting fault for anything, and always blamed me or others for his own mistakes. (...Usually me, publicly.)
I could never get him to admit to the authorities the things that he did to me, or what he overheard Phil and Melissa say about the GPD cop and how he sabotaged my harassment case, etc. He would feign ignorance of the law, or claim that his information was third party and not valid, or find some other excuse not to take what he knew to the police, or to Emergency Management, or to the NWS.)
In the latter part of the relationship, during the period of time when I was beginning to recognize what Jeff was, and after I had repeated on more than one occasion that I wanted Jeff to cease contact with me and that I wanted him to leave me alone, not to contact me anymore, not to speak ABOUT me anymore to others, and that I was no longer anything that he was to be concerned about, Jeff would reject my demands and deliberately continue to try to contact me. Often he would send insulting, berating emails, try to arrange face-to face meets, suggest WHERE to have these meets, insist he had information that I wanted to hear and would refuse to give me this information UNLESS I met with him face-to-face. After a while, he began to get wise to the fact that I was letting other people know about the things he was doing and saying, and he would refuse to discuss anything incriminating via email or the phone. If I wanted anything important from him, he would only agree to face-to-face meets. If I tried to get him to admit to anything in email or over the phone, he would feign no knowledge and even feign that I was crazy and delusional out of fear that I was making keeping copies of our conversations.
Jeff was NOT ABLE to take rejection or a no. He would be insistent. He would outright refuse to stop bothering me with a definite "no." He was persistent in his harassments to the point of not making sense. Most people would know when to stop. Jeff's persistence would surpass all normal logic and venture into the inexplicable. He would threaten to go to others and try to convince them to make me see what I'm doing wrong. (Threatening behavior.) He would often DO so, carrying OUT his threats. He would go behind my back and try to collect information about my friends, acquaintances, and professional contacts, and would email them, or call them, and try to explain what he saw as my fallacies to them, and then try to convince them that he was only trying to "help" me and to "convince (me) to do the right thing." (Defamation.) Sometimes...no...OFTEN, this tactic would work. Sometimes it would frighten the victim instead...and sometimes it would make the victim afraid of ME, instead, which ALSO served Jeff's purpose.
Jeff would try to convince more low-browed, low-brained types to harass and stalk me, while keeping out of the picture, himself, so that he could feign uninvolvement. (Exhibit manipulative behavior.) These included people like Jay Leiberman, Frederick Scott West, Melissa Royce, Philip Royce, and even his own wife. His wife especially was easily encouraged to get angry over me. Jeff would twist and exaggerate words, try to get her upset with me. Often they would insult and harass me in tag team style. So would Phil and Melissa Royce.
Jeff is also adept himself at using "operant conditioning" to "condition" people into giving him what he wants...something I think he learned from Susan. Jeff craves information, about everything, and especially about people he is stalking and harassing. Jeff would try to get gossip and rumor-type information out of people by using favors. He'd fix somebody's computer and then this would make them feel obligated to answer questions about someone. He'd fix someone's network problems. ("Conditioning" and "reward".) He'd engage in lots of public service activities to obtain the highest possible number of allies and people who think highly of him. He'd take leadership positions in clubs and take charge of activities no one else wanted to put forth the effort to do because it was too tedious. In this way, he'd make people extremely dependent upon him, and obligated. He would make people feel like if they LOST him, the entire operation or club would fail. So people were more willing to ignore any transgressions that they might witness. In fact it was almost as if people had been conditioned to "not see" anything he was doing wrong when he was obviously doing things wrong. No one would then challenge his seeming good intentions, or his seeming good heart, and anyone who dared challenge this usually ended up with a hoard of cultish, angry followers defending him vehemently, even where reason and logic are used. I have personally experienced emergency managers, federal government workers, and police officers go above and beyond to try to sabotage investigations and cases for him.
Up until a year and a half ago, I would have said that Jeff had no criminal history. But he does. He is an ex computer hacking criminal.
I am not aware if there is any mental history or not. If so, I suspect that family members would likely attempt to hide it.
As far as I am aware, neither he nor Susan drink - at least not on a regular basis. Perhaps socially.
I am not aware of any substance abuse or history.
I am not aware of any prior stalking or criminal history other than Jeff's hacking history. (Although this can be publicly expunged on request.)
I am not aware of any sexual dysfunctions, mood disorders, paranoias, or schizophrenia.
I am almost definite that I am seeing evidence of antisocial personality disorders, and very possibly psychopathy. I do not see Jeff as "redeemable", however. He is quite sure of himself and that I am in need of his "help". Complete separation, and publication of his deeds in a public forum have been the ONLY methods by which I have been able to get Jeff and my other stalkers to cease and go away...and even that took quite some time, only very slowly.
I have noted no fascination with assassins or assassinations, nor with death, suicide, obsessive love (although obsessive dependency could be going on here), with a special or common destiny, or with weapons.
Jeff's fascinations lay more with electronics and gadgets, information and information gathering, methods of information gathering (scanners, ham radio, associations with emergency management, fire/rescue, and police personnel), and employment in key central I.T. positions enabling him with access to pretty much any method of information gathering as he could want.
There does not appear to be any religious beliefs or adherence practices, or belief of "cosmic connection" with me.
He holds a pretty well-paying job within the IT Services Department of the University of Florida, making currently approximately $75,000 a year, according to online public resources available off the UF website.
Jeff's stalking behavior appears to be "obsessional based", not an erotomania or love obsession. Seems to exhibit extreme jealousy - half brought on by his wife's complaints, and some insecurity over what people think of me vs. him. We had a previous relationship as friends and this relationship deteriorated and ended. Jeff seemed unable to let the relationship go or to end. Unable to restore that tie, Jeff turned and resorted to more forceful methods to regain control of me. He attempted retribution by various means, and tried to make sure that if he could not have a friendship with me, then I would not be able to have friendships or any KIND of a relationship, personal or professional, with anyone else. He not only attacked me, but sought after my friends and professional contacts, and encouraged other low-browed types to attack me, my friends, and even family members as well as professional contacts. They were all quite successful. Jeff attacked my competence, credibility, and trustworthiness very successfully. He was willing to do whatever was necessary to achieve his goals, and was not able to *stop* once he engaged on a path. He became fixated - as did some of the others he had convinced to also stalk me - on disrupting and destroying my entire life.
Unlike most stalkers who do not go as far as to act on their threats if made, Jeff has actually acted on many of his threats.
Jeff seemed emotionally void. He could understand anger and jealously, and sadistic enjoyment of causing me suffering; but he did not seem to understand concepts such as kindness, fairness, understanding, compassion, or other good-related feelings, emotions, and ideas. I've seen him chuckle at someone else's mistakes and pains, but I've never seen him smile or definitively rejoice when something good happened to someone. His apparent reactions towards such things were always rather..."bland" and nonremarkable. In nearly 20 years of knowing this man, I have never seen him cry. I have never seen him laugh out of control. I've experienced him when he gets angry, when he threatens, when he tries to assert dominance and control. I have seen his dark emotions more than I have seen his brighter ones, which seem to be nonexistent. He laughs and chuckles, but not wholeheartedly or with a whole lot of forcefulness; and usually it's when someone screws up or makes a mistake or says something he thinks is ridiculous. It's usually a sarcastic reaction more often. Or else, it just seems somewhat half-hearted and fake; half-assed.
That being said, he is exceptionally charismatic and charming-sounding. All his words always sound reasonable, but fall apart if scrutinized...and no one ever scrutinizes him because no one ever thinks to. When you listen closely, a lot of what he says is complete bullshit. But if you listen only to the sound of his voice and the confidence in his voice, then you are doomed to never realize that he's just touting BS. I have personally witnessed people do some very stupid and unbelievable things solely from listening to this man.
He has exhibited tendency to attack from afar by encouraging others of lesser intelligence to attack FOR him, often by duping them by overly exaggerating descriptions of my mistakes, what he considers to be my fallacies and downsides, and encouraging these types to formulate their OWN strategies of "taking care of Todd", such as what happened with Scott West, Jay Leiberman, and Phil and Melissa Royce - as well as with his wife, at times. These people were encouraged to either attack me personally, my mother, my friends, or my professional contacts in manners directly and indirectly threatening, and/or in attempt to frighten, or intimidate.
There are, however, no known current or previous possession of weapons, past incidences of violence or hostage taking. However, there does in Jeff seem to be a definite, deliberate disregard of infinitely repeated instructions to stay away, or to stop encouraging others. Through the use of others, he HAS attempted access to me and/or to my family, friends, and associations. As far as I know, he does not have any suicidal or depression tendencies. On the other hand, as a result of this man's harassments, I cannot any longer say the same for myself. As I said before, I am not AWARE of any prior stalking victimizations, mental illness, or drug use. He has not made any attempt to threaten to kill me or others that I am aware. However, he does exhibit a high degree of some form of obsession, a seeming kind of possessiveness over me, and I think a definite kind of jealousy over my work and what I have done with SKYWARN and to some small degree with ham radio in the past, and apparent fear over how others might elevate me. I got this sense from him when someone (Charles Sacco) once asked me for my autograph after a spotter training class, one day, in May 2005. It was in the way that he looked at me and smiled, and his comment that "I think I finally understand you now." ...All I did was sign my name on a stupid piece of paper. It was quite scary the look on his face. It was like a switch had been flipped or something, and the WAY that he said it... Something in me...I got this feeling...it made the hairs on the back of my neck crawl. I remember thinking, like..."This isn't good...something dreadful is about to happen, now." It wasn't long after this at all, in fact, that things really DID start to happen.
Chapter 21 NO HAPPY ENDING...
In the end, there is no happy ending. There is no help. Nobody came to the rescue. Nobody came out of the blue at the last minute and saved the day. The bad guys won. The good guy came close to committing suicide, lost most of his friends, and lost an organization that had done a tremendous amount of good and which had done nothing at all to anyone. And all...for no good reason.
The things which have happened to me are shocking and unbelievable, and that is exactly what allowed Jeff and five other ham radio operators to continue doing what they did to me (and to Alachua County SKYWARN) for years...because no one wanted to believe it, and no one wanted to hear it, and no one wanted to "get involved" in it. My favorite was how people always seemed to blame me. Everyone assumed that it was all my fault because (they'd say) I was "encouraging" these people. (People would say this without any knowledge whatsoever to confirm whether or not that was even happening, and it wasn't.) Then there were the people who believe that when bad things happen to you, it's because it's your fault. You did something to bring this bad karma upon yourself, and thereby, everything that happens to you is your own fault. I always seem to get the people who believe in metaphysical bullshit such as that, and things like, "You must have done something in the past to deserve this." People make up all SORTS of BS reasons why things are happening when they don't understand. Then there are the people who believe that some people are just "destined" to have to suffer, and THIS is why things always happen to you. Then there are those who believe that I should be patient because the Lord will only "get" these people in the end. Oh, GIMME a break! Everybody always has some reason to not get involved, some reason to not accept responsibility for doing the right thing; some reason to blame the innocent victim, or blame someone else. It's just..."easier" to handle things in their minds and consciences, that way.
The even worse thing is this... A lot of the people in government and public organizations who took some form of action against me have over time come to realize that all along I was telling the truth. They discovered things. Some came from complaints from people. Some came by actual witnessing. But I will NEVER see any apology or admission from anyone. Want to know why? Because what these people did, while they tried to do it under the table, while they may have thought they were doing it for a good reason, it was still done nonetheless, and some of it unmistakably visible, and there are by now many witnesses out there who would probably come forward if this got out. As well, if they apologized to me, they would be admitting what they did. If they admitted what they did, they would most probably lose their careers, and their homes, and their assets, and their benefits, and their retirement pensions. ...Everything. No government agency would back them up in what they did because even though they did it in uniform in the NAME of their agencies, their upper echelon was not officially made aware of it and they did not know, and upper echelon would NOT back them up or come to their rescue because everything that they did was done without official authorization or even any official communication to upper echelon. Upper echelon would only DISTANCE themselves from their actions, in fact. As well, these people - be they the stalkers or the duped attackers, would be doomed to excessively HUGE Press attention because this whole thing IS huge. It's 'Big Brother', picking on 'Joe Innocent Little Guy', under false pretenses and false accusations, whose civil rights were stomped on and denied at every turn, taking actions against him, blackballing an innocent man, and an innocent organization, and an entire spotter program across Florida and Georgia, too. It's just WAY too huge. It got out of control for them. The attackers won't know how to defend themselves beyond making their lies even bigger and making the stories even more exaggerated in an effort to protect themselves, and thus getting themselves deeper and deeper into the mess that they themselves created. I DOUBT though, that anyone will be HONEST, and come forward, and do the RIGHT thing. I've lived here too long. I know too much. That's not going to happen.
So no. This will not be admitted to. There are people who know. There are people who weren't directly involved who knew but said nothing. There were people who were told, and who didn't want to get involved, and who let harm come to their brother. There were people who were duped, who participated in the harm. There were people who realized, but still kept their mouths shut, and who tried to slink away. There were innocent people who were not involved at all who were also harmed. There were many civilian spotter groups across northern Florida and southern Georgia whose groups are no longer recognized as a result of the actions of the Alachua County hams, because NWS-JAX sent a memo to all County Warning Area Emergency Management offices advising them to no longer recognize any civilian agencies, and to take on the task of forming their own spotter groups. But the one in Alachua County failed. they didn't want the job. They didn't have the time or the manpower to handle what NWS-JAX had forced upon them. There is no longer any spotter training or organization within Alachua County, and NWS-JAX employees are too afraid to come down here to give one. This is not a good situation for anyone involved. People made mistakes all around. And in the end, masses of innocent people AND organizations were affected and harmed...unfairly.
NWS-JAX seriously believed that I was a problem, based on the rumors from the hams here in Gainesville. Everyone believed the next level below them. No one asked any serious questions. No one verified or bothered to make any attempt to refute any of the rumors. People would have been fine if they hadn't taken any real actions. But they did. I tried to get information out of NWS-JAX about when the next spotter training class could be held. They said that there was a hold on spotter training classes while they figured out what to do. My stalkers were bringing me information - to torture me, really - about conversations within NWS-JAX, and Emergency Mgmt. JAX would talk to Melissa Royce and tell her all their thoughts and plans. Melissa would take this information and pass it to Jeff Capehart, who would pass it to me to torture me. I always knew what NWS JAX was thinking because Melissa couldn't keep her mouth shut, and because Jeff just couldn't resist torturing me. So he'd have to email me, or call me, with the latest that he'd "heard" because it was obsessive compulsively important for him to have to do that. I knew that they thought I was a problem, but I didn't know anything other than that. I didn't know how I was supposed to be a problem, or what specifically I was being accused of. This was being kept a secret. Every time I tried to call them to arrange a spotter training class, they had Caller ID and no one would answer the phone. If I sent an email there would be no reply. They were definitely avoiding contact with me. I wanted to know why they were reacting this way to me. I needed intelligence.
I knew what they were doing, so I developed a plan. What I needed was a pretty-sounding, really attractive voice. I went to my Assistant Coordinator, who was also my best friend, and asked her to call NWS-JAX and try to find out what she could. It's mean. It's devious. It's sneaky. It's underhanded. It was just as underhanded as what they were doing to me, so I really don't care. In war you do whatever you have to do. Period. Sun Tzu teaches that.
She got ahold of Steve Letro. Steve had NO PROBLEM with sharing everything that he wasn't supposed to tell us to this pretty-sounding voice. (stares at ceiling) I'd had a suspicion that if the voice sounded really cute enough, that they would open right up. I told her to avoid Al and to focus on Steve. Al is kinda weird - naturally suspicious and extremely prejudiced in nature. He jumps to conclusions about people based on body language alone, I'd noted. By comparison, I knew that Steve didn't think in the paranoid way that Al did, although he can be influenced by it. Steve was kinder and easier to talk to. He would be the better choice to try. That strategy actually worked.
I know the following from emails from and conversations held immediately afterwards with my Assistant Coordinator.[see] She asked about a spotter training class, and Steve told her that there would be no more classes until after they and Dave Donnelly had a meeting with "City government officials" about "the problems with Todd and Alachua County SKYWARN," and until they could figure out what to do. When she attempted to get the specifics about the "problems", she said his demeanor changed to irritation, and he wouldn't tell her anything else. She asked him specifically if we could participate in this "meeting." Steve flat out said "NO!" That's important. You can't do that - keep the accused out of the process like that. But at least I now have a witness that indeed Jax had a meeting with ACOEM about "problems" with me AND Alachua County SKYWARN, and that he denied me my civil right to participate in the meeting, to know what was being said about me and Alachua County SKYWARN, and who was saying it, and to defend myself. That is a serious no-no. Had they ALLOWED me in that meeting, maybe all of this could have been avoided, and maybe no harm might have come to me. But now the damage has been done, and EVERYTHING has been done, and they can't take it back, or change it, and they're doomed. My witness is a devastating thing for them, because JAX and ACOEM have been trying to hide this, to blame it on other spotter groups that did "unauthorized damage assessment." But my witness proves otherwise, and that it was indeed SPECIFICALLY about me and ACS. After that, actions were taken by NWS, ACOEM, and GPD, and UPD - in cascading chain reaction.
The proper way to handle it would have been to allow me to participate, to allow me the opportunity to answer for myself, and to know who was saying what. But they denied me that.
I asked many people and agencies and organizations and even the police for help. I got blown off and ignored at every step. There IS no one else, no one better I could have gone to. You decide, here. Who did I MISS? I went to the Gainesville Amateur Radio Society's Executive Board and asked them for a hearing and I was ignored. They chose to withhold my complaint and my request from the General Membership in violation of Robert's Rules, and the General Membership was never even made aware. I went to the Gator Amateur Radio Club and was repeatedly ignored, even sabotaged by the Faculty Advisor, who helped keep Jeff Capehart out of trouble with the police by vouching for him. I had a lunch meeting with Dave Donnelly of ACOEM and he recommended that if people were stalking and harassing me that I needed to go to the police. I went to the police, and when the police called him to verify the story that I had given them, he told the police that I was a problem and in so doing, he sabotaged the police department's attitude towards me and DIRECTLY played a role in causing that cop to sabotage my case. My other stalkers, specifically Phil Royce - who according to many hams bragged threats of physical harm to me in "dark alleys" or if "alone" with me, and Melissa Royce, convinced many good people that there were problems with me. Melissa herself forged unauthorized business cards to both ACOEM and to the Alachua County Red Cross, and gave herself titles and positions and experiences that she didn't actually have, convinced ACOEM that I was relinquishing control of Alachua County SKYWRN to them, and that I was placing her in charge, and convinced ACOEM to create a new SOP manual and documents using Alachua County SKYWARN's name; and when they submitted copies of the SOP for my approval, I got mad, and complained to both Dave Donnelly AND Chief William May. Dave Donnelly and I corresponded by email and every time I tried to set up a meeting with him, it ended up being put off or cancelled.22 Chief May, not understanding what was going on, insisted that no one was attempting to "take over" Alachua County SKYWARN, and wanted to work out a "deal" with me and to come to an "agreement" with my stalkers.6 I was livid. When I did not agree to "coming to an agreement" with people who were stalking me, he TOO blew me off. See, he was led to believe that I was doing this with full knowledge, and in full agreement. It didn't occur to me until a LONG time later that he probably thought I was changing my mind, and that I was nuts. Meanwhile, Phil and Melissa and the Alachua County Office of Emergency Management continued to proceed with creating a spotter group which took over the use of the Alachua County SKYWARN name, despite my demands to cease and desist. At the same time, Melissa Royce sent me a harassing email and I went to GPD with it and filed a complaint, and requested them to subpoena IP logs from Bellsouth and Yahoo for confirmation and something to go to court with to try to STOP all of this insane stuff going on. GPD then sabotaged the case. I even complained to Spencer Mann at the State Atty's Office. He was rude to me and condescending and treated me like I was being completely irrational and like i was an irritation and some kind of a lunatic. The tone in his voice was...accusatory. I tried to complain to NWS-JAX. They weren't concerned, either. In fact, they were the ones who had started this whole mess.
So who did I MISS folks? Who did I miss? I went to all of the proper places. I notified all of the proper people. I begged for help and no one would act unless I had proof.
If I was female, wore tight jeans, boo-hoo'd a lot, and complained that people were stalking and harassing me...think they'd ask me for proof? No. They wouldn't. They'd be all over it. ...Immediately. They'd take it seriously, and act right away, without hesitation. ...But I'm a male, and I'm just being a cry-baby. Right?
Meanwhile, the stalking behavior only got worse and worse, until most recently in February of this year, when I called UF PD on Jeff Capehart for breaking into the AC-EMWIN server. He still got off, because Dr. Garlitz vouched for him and also implied that I was a problem. But I think everyone finally began to see that I had had enough, and things have at the moment become peaceful. But I know this is only temporary. It always is. They go into hiding for a while, until they think the coast is clear again; and they always come back again.
You know? Many times, I'll watch a movie, and I can appreciate the research done into the bad characters. Many a book and movie is based upon real research into their darker characters, based upon real, actual happenings, and they're incorporated into the movie. And many a time, I'll be watching these movies, and see parallels in my own harassers, in the ways that I've been treated by these whacko people...
Have you ever watched movies like Basic Instinct, Cape Fear, Copycat, Fatal Attraction, Fear, Misery, Pacific Heights, Play Misty For Me?, Single White Female, Sleeping With The Enemy, Swimfan, The Crush, The Fan, The Vanishing, Unlawful Entry, When A Stranger Calls Back (the original with Carol Kane)? Every one of those movies has some scene or sentence spoken in it which rivets me, which chills me and scares me deeply because of the haunting similarity, obviously or even slightly, in the same apparent mindset, thinking, and/or actions noted in my own stalkers...
Fear dealt with a guy who stalked a girl he liked, who feigned being a nice guy at first, who then turned on her and tried to destroy her life and manipulate her family and friends when she began to realize what he really was. Misery dealt with a psychopathic female fan who pretended to be nice at first and who took her idol hostage, and physically harmed him to make him write a book the way SHE wanted. Pacific Heights was about a man who intruded into an innocent couple's lives and moved into a rental room they owned and wouldn't pay rent, destroyed their property, stalked them, got the owners into a lot of trouble, while the police protected the bad guy. Play Misty For Me was about a woman who had a crush on a radio personality who wormed her way into his life and then became a stalking nightmare who in the end tried to kill him because she couldn't handle that he wasn't able to return feelings and give her the relationship that she wanted. Single White Female was about a woman who had just ended a relationship with a boyfriend and who searched for a new roommate. The roommate feigned being really nice and they developed a good friendship. But when the boyfriend came back, the roommate turned on her friend and began doing things to destroy her relationship with him - including killing her puppy, erasing answering machine messages, imitating her looks, pretending to be her, beating and attempting to kill her best friend in the apartment upstairs, having sex with her boyfriend, killing her boyfriend. When the woman began to realize who her roommate really was and what she was doing, the roommate turned on her and tried to kill her. The roommate turned out to be someone mentally ill who had killed her twin sister when she was young, and assumed her twin's identity. The roommate tried to explain that everything that she did to her landlord friend she was doing for her own good. Sleeping With The Enemy was about a married couple. The husband was a psychologically and physically abusive, controlling, psychopath who happened to also have an obsessive compulsive disorder about orderliness and cleanliness, who made his wife keep the entire house spotless, and who had to have everything done his specific, perfect way - else she'd be abusively punished. In public, he put on the face of being a very nice man to everyone. One day she feigned her death and ran away to another state to get away from him and his control, and to try to change her life and find some peace. When he found out that she wasn't dead, he investigated and found her, and attacked her and her newfound friend.
Each one of these movies reminds me in some way or another of the way that Jeff Capehart and/or his minions has treated me in the past. In each case, these people didn't see the wrong in what they did. They in fact enjoyed what they did. ...And they even convinced themselves that they were justified in doing what they did. Often, they were able to convince OTHERS that what they were doing was justified, and to convince other people to aid them - without even any hard thinking about it. In my case, even cops and emergency managers were convinced to play along! In every case, the main plot is usually narrowed down to feelings of helplessness, hopelessness, someone else having complete control over your life and it's outcome, inability to defend one's self, and the victim being mistakenly blamed as the bad guy by the rest of the community. The movies usually have some form of a happy ending. Real life, however...often doesn't.
I tend to like movies which show characters who endure great suffering and hardship and who in the midst of that show great strength of character, great patience and endurance throughout the suffering, and ability to stay true to one's self no matter what; who no matter how hard people and/or life may try to hit them and bring them down, they still remain anyway. They stay strong and gold and come through.23 These kinds of movies inspire me and give me hope, and give me the idea to keep going regardless of how bad people make things for me. It's up there with having really good friends you can trust, respect, admire, and believe in. Good friends are very important. A good ATTITUDE is next, but again that has to be supported by good friends. And I guess that must be why my stalkers try to attack my friends so much, because they know that. They knew that part of my strength came from the unbelievably strong friends I kept, so they tried to destroy that at every opportunity. Attack, attack, attack. Get RID of the friends, you get rid of his strength. In many cases they were successful. A good many caved, being afraid that they too would become a target. But the best ones...they remained. Friends like that bring the most important thing: trust and faith and belief in one's self. ...And if you have that - barring somebody actually shooting you in the head - you can get through anything. ...And the bad guys can't STAND it when the good guys remain standing after all the smoke has cleared away. No. They can't stand that.
I'm done running from these people, these idiots, these...ASS-holes. I'm done being stalked and harassed. I'm done being attacked. I'm coming back out from hiding and the stalking and harassment had better stop because this time I'm going to fight to the max of the law. I will not be ruled and controlled by psychopaths and people with other similar anti-social personality disorders, which the local ham clubs seem to be full of, lately.
Everyone be warned. I'm thinking lawsuits. I'm thinking Press. I'm thinking going after GARS, GARC, suing those clubs, dissolving them for being a danger to society. I'm thinking of suing those in the NWS who attacked me irresponsibly, in Emergency Mgmt who attacked me without question or proof that I was indeed even a real problem, and in the police department. I WILL get my name back. I WILL make people own up to what they did.
I am EXTREMELY hurt and saddened especially by the GPD Detective's decision to act based not on careful and diligent forensic thinking or protocol, but instead upon gut feeling, guesswork, and unproven opinions rather than facts, and in the end causing so much additional and unnecessary pain and suffering to another human being as a result. I CANNOT believe that that happened to me. GOD! That happens only in the movies, on TV...not in real life. ...Or so I thought. But now I know better. I am SO disheartened now in ALL police everywhere as a result and, in fact, I am now afraid of them as a whole. I see favors. I see lies. I see making things disappear. I see hiding things. I see innocent people being put in jail, or accused of things they didn't do, or labeled by improper, non-diligent police work. I no longer trust them to be intelligent, to know what they are doing, to do the job correctly without ineptness and irresponsibility, be it deliberate or careless. I cannot any longer look at anyone in uniform and think to myself..."that uniform means trustworthiness, honesty, honor, and goodness." This is something I have to fight every day, now. It is very difficult to stay on the path of believing in humans as a whole when even our guardians cannot be trusted to protect us the way they are supposed to. I am so disappointed. ...So disappointed. :( In the end, I am sure that the detective will claim that he thought he was only doing the right thing to help what he thought were innocent victims. He had become Judge Dredd. But the innocent victims in this case were the bad guys and, regardless of the fact that the detective made an error in judgment, his irresponsibility in letting himself get emotionally involved in the case ended up in the end causing great harm to the wrong person. And now, his entire organization is at risk of a lawsuit as a result. An innocent person's life's work is destroyed, his name in ruins, and an entire spotter program is no more...because he, and people like him, went too far, did favors without asking why, didn't follow proper procedures or laws, and took justice into their own hands.
In all of my life I have only wanted to do good by people. I come from a background of pain and suffering and great bad luck, and in all of my life I have always known just exactly how I never wanted to be treated by others and thus I always treated others the exact opposite of the way that I had been, by design. I know right and I know wrong, and I would never bring harm to anyone on purpose. Alachua County SKYWARN did no wrong to anyone. I did no wrong to anyone. All I ever did was try to defend myself from assholes, and I never tried to cause other people pain. But it seems all anyone in public service circles here in Alachua County ever wanted to do was cause me great trouble, and NONE of them can explain why if asked. In 1997, I created Alachua County SKYWARN largely by myself, and I put all of my heart and soul into it, and it became one of the best spotter programs in the entire nation. I've always been proud of this. The program did no harm. It was there for the people. It was there to protect lives. It did that. I did that. Some people didn't like that. But I'm not going to apologize for it. I am in fact extremely proud of it.
...And if anyone doesn't appreciate that then they can go to hell.
I didn't deserve this. I didn't do anything to anyone. I simply tried to run a program in the best way. And I did that. My program helped people. It did so well that some may have thought it overshadowed some of their other programs. And for that, some people hated me, and they took their hatred out on me. They wanted me "out of the way". I'm not ASHAMED that ACS did so well...without incorporating, without begging for any funds from people, and yet still accomplishing it's task most excellently. I'm PROUD of that! I did it RIGHT! I did it PERFECTLY! People hated me for that.
But... I'm still here!
I have been SO strong. I have put up with SO much! But I have a RIGHT to be upset with what these people have done and with all of the irresponsibility shown regarding all of this at the hands of many people, and multiple organizations (GARS, GARC, ARRL) and government agencies (police, emergency management, NWS, University of Florida). The things that have been done to me are incredible and border on disbelief. It is INCREDIBLE that so many were so easily duped to do the things that they did. But they happened nonetheless. I deserve to be heard, and I have been repeatedly denied. I asked for help, and I was repeatedly denied. Authorities which were supposed to help me did not. I was completely ignored at every step. I deserve to be able to take everyone to court and get my name and reputation and credibility back, and to punish those who went too far, and who took advantage, and who broke laws, ignored laws, and bent laws.
I can't believe that all of this happened because a few ham radio operators disagreed over the operation of a spotter group that...if they didn't like it...they could have easily have started their own. But instead, they took this ridiculous route of convincing agencies and organizations to pick up torches. Now everyone has engaged in some way or another in this and now they have to explain, or RUN. And I have to ask: ...WHY? Why couldn't anyone use their heads in the handling of all of this? Who convinced all of these people that logic was not the way to handle it; but rather, to completely and utterly destroy Todd and Alachua County SKYWARN was the ONLY way to go? In what WAY was I so BAD? Somebody please EXPLAIN this? What WAS it that I DID? You all took real ACTIONS against me and ACS, both. So...WHAT WAS THE JUSTIFICATION??? ...WHAT? Do you all REALIZE how BAD you look? How AWFUL the things that all of you did were? ...Especially you who hold important political positions in government? Do you realize that you have now placed your entire agencies at risk of lawsuit because of how you handled this? WHY? I want to know WHY? Do you even KNOW what it was that I supposedly did? ANY of you? Jesus CHRIST, people! What the hell have you DONE to yourselves, now?!!! Your CAREERS are at risk! Your lifestyles! Your families! What's going to happen to your wives, husbands, and children after you get sued and your homes and cars and assets and benefits...everything that you own and worked so hard for...are taken away and handed over to me? How could you be so STUPID, so BLIND, so CARRIED AWAY?!!! Was all of this WORTH it? WAS it? What the hell is WRONG with you people?!!! What have you done to the agencies you work for? ...the National Weather Service? ...the Alachua County Office of Emergency Management? ...The University of Florida? ...the UF Police Department? ...the Gainesville Police Department? ...the City of Gainesville? ...the County of Alachua? What are the City and County Commissioners going to say when THEY hear about what happened here? What are your Regional Supervisors going to say when THEY find out you all acted out of place, unofficially, under the table, without knowledge, warning to, or permission from your superiors - who had no clue? How are you going to explain all of this to them? How are THEY going to explain all of this when the Press microphones and cameras are shoved in their faces, and/or when they get served with a summons? Are you even AWARE of what it is that you've DONE? Did you even THINK about the possible CONSEQUENCES of your actions? Well........I'll bet you're thinking about them NOW.
You know what REALLY gets me? Anyone could have had their own spotter training classes within their own groups at any time...with GARS, GARC, ACOEM, CERT, ACFR Reserves, Red Cross, or whatever. Can anyone tell me why Alachua County SKYWARN had to be DESTROYED in order to have any spotter training classes in this town? ...Anyone? Did anyone ever stop to ASK themselves that? What was SO BAD about Todd Sherman and Alachua County SKYWARN? Everyone picked up these torches. Does anyone know WHY they're holding them, by any chance? ...Anyone? ...ANYone? No volunteers, eh? Nobody knows?... Nobody has any answer?... Anyone have ONE story about the horrible things that Todd Sherman actually did to THEM...PERSONALLY? ...No? ...No one?
Hmm.
Chapter 22 MY "DELIVERANCE"
In his poem "Marmion", Sir Walter Scott once wrote, "Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive." Sir Scott was attempting to convey to the reader how habitual liars often get caught by dealing out so many lies that it becomes difficult to keep track of them all. ...How when you involve so many people, very often the people themselves become too difficult to control, as well. ...Someone gets drunk, or overconfident, or feels betrayed. Someone talks. Someone brags. Maybe one person even gets caught. Now they want to talk. Now they want a "deal". That person spews and names more names. Those people get caught. They spew more names. ...And so on. So how loyal ARE you? Are you willing to go down with the SHIP for your "captain"? Are you willing to take the HEAT for your captain? Willing to lose your home, your paycheck, your job, your assets, your benefits? Are these idiots THAT worth it to you? This very effect, this very fear of a very volatile thing that CANNOT be controlled...is what now keeps most everyone in line. They're all liable now and they know it and they're just praying and HOPING that everybody ELSE in the line is able to stand fast and not screw it all up for the rest of them. LOL. Believe it or not, there IS some INCREDIBLE satisfaction in knowing that so MANY people and even entire agencies are controlled by this. Heh. ..."Chinese handcuffs." That's what this is. Everybody relaxes and plays it cool, and everybody is okay. But if just one joker PLAYS AROUND...the noose tightens for EVERYONE. Talk about being caught between a rock and a hard place.
Words about "living with one's self" don't work, here. Fear of getting caughtdoes, however.
Jeff wouldn't leave me alone by simply asking. Then I actually called the police on him. The fact that I actually DID that...that actually made him STOP (or at least to hide better). So I've learned that he DOES understand FEAR.
I threatened putting this blog up for years to try to get Jeff to stop what he was doing to me and Jeff repeatedly told me that to do so would do no good. I think that's what he WANTED me to believe. In actuality, in real live practice however, just the opposite seems to be occurring.
This blog is my "Declaration of Independence", if you will.
The existence of this blog guarantees me a few things:
While it won't stop everything, it stops most of the more obvious harassers and harassments.
It calls ATTENTION to everything - attention my harassers don't want. Whether people believe it or not doesn't matter. The people who caused the problems now know that they're on notice and in the spotlight and they have to ACT good to in order to try to make me LOOK wrong; and if I can't at least bring these people to justice in a courtroom, then this is the next best thing, because while they're ACTING good, they're not causing me, or my friends, or my family any harm.
Of those who did cause me problems: people in NWS, FDEM, ACOEM, GPD, UPD, UF, ACSO, GARS, GARC, the ARRL... The same applies.
I complained to everyone and got nowhere. If something ever HAPPENS to me now, this blog is OUT there and someone can FIND it, and someone COULD ask questions. Like...someone in the Press, perhaps? There will forevermore be the possibility of inquiries, investigations. My harassers don't want that, and again, this guarantees they'll be on their best behavior as long as the blog exists. They'll be too busy trying to appear and actually BE ever so nice and to make me look like I'm the nutcase complainer than to dare causing me any more actual problems while THIS thing exists. So AGAIN, I win. (Unless you're Melissa Royce, in which case, you'll see this as a challenge, and actually try to cause MORE harm just because I said that this document guarantees that no one CAN cause me harm...which actually, I didn't say. But Melissa is Melissa and Forrest Gump said it best: "Stupid is as Stupid does." Everybody else at least has the brains enough to KNOW better.)
The cop in GPD who deliberately sabotaged my harassment case based upon gossip and rumor rather than any actual investigating is scared stiff and on notice and on his best behavior and doesn't want this to get out. Jeff Capehart knew everything that this man said to Phil and Melissa and he parroted it all back to me and this cop will forever have to live in fear that Jeff Capehart knows something about what he did and that's just fine with me. The cop was TOLD who the bad guys were. The cop made a personal guess rather than a fact-based conclusion, and he guessed wrong and caused me harm. He's going to have to live with the consequences of that, now, and forever be on his guard to not accidentally admit or say the wrong thing someday. I'm fine with that. Someday I will have this man's home for what he did to me.
The cops in UPD who keystone-copped the investigation of the AC-EMWIN server hacking by Jeff Capehart are scared stiff and on notice and on their best behavior and THEY don't want this to get out. They're already denying that they and I had ANY interaction regarding the case at all, or even that the case existed. The fact that they missed the Gainesville Sun article archive about how Jeff and his wife once hacked into the UF IFAS computer in their past, showing a propensity for doing just what I had said he did, is testimony to how irresponsible that agency is. And so, the entire University Police Department is on notice, too, and open to possible investigation if they make big enough waves.
Dave Donnelly, who denied me access to a meeting held about me and Alachua County SKYWARN, and who took sanctions against me without allowing me to hear who my accusers were or to be heard myself, and who used Alachua County Office of Emergency Management to try to take over another organization that did not belong to him, and to dictate how it was run, and who attempted to use his power and authority to take equipment that did not belong to him...is scared stiff and on notice.
Chief William May, who was told that people in his agency were harassing and stalking me and who blew me off, and where those people later caused me even more problems even using the NAME of the Alachua Co. Office of Emergency Management...could lose his home to me because of what he did and is on notice.
Angie Enyedi, Al Sandrik, Steve Letro, of NWS-JAX, took gossip and rumor and slander from local hams as fact without first checking to VERIFY what they were hearing and then took some very serious actions which caused other agencies to take their OWN actions and sanctions against me and Alachua County SKYWARN, all of which caused me, my friends, and my family very serious harm...and THEY'RE scared stiff and on notice.
Everywhere, people screwed up...badly...and by everyone's irresponsible actions, harm came to me, and to my friends, and my family. Everyone is linked, one to the next in responsibility...in a long chain of word, and then action, resulting in harm. The hams spread gossip. The NWS took it seriously. The NWS convinced other agencies to stand with them in taking actions. ACOEM convinced GPD that I was a problem. GPD sabotaged a case. The ham who was in CONTROL of all of the gossip and slander himself hacked into the EMWIN server, and then caused UPD to believe that I was the problem, not him. Various hams stalked and harassed me and I went to many organizations and agencies and complained and none of them did a THING and my harassers caused MORE harm, and THOSE agencies are responsible now. But at the ROOT of it all is NWS-JAX. Without their root actions none of the other agencies would have been made to believe that I was the problem and not my harassers. NWS-JAX guessed wrong, and had real meetings, denied me access and denied me chance to defend myself, which violated my civil rights, and as a result, the National Weather Service itself is MOST responsible in all of this and NWS Headquarters in DC doesn't even have a CLUE that they are because their employees in JAX didn't tell anyone higher up about it! The NWS is going to be hit with QUITE a surprise at some point in time here. You can apply this same thing with Alachua County Office of Emergency Management. Does Steve Abrams in Tallahassee know? Does DC know? Is ACOEM hiding this from these people? If they DO know, why haven't I had any phone calls? So, ACOEM is keeping it's mouth shut. Same for NWS-JAX. As for what happened with UPD and how they screwed up the hacking investigation and then tried to hide it...what's gonna happen when Dr. James Bernard Machen (current UF President), finds out? Think he'll be HAPPY? UPD has so many IAD problems already going on right now, and this is just ONE more...and it's pretty huge. It's...a HACKING...and UPD is covering it up. How is Dr. Machen supposed to answer to that? I think he'll be embarrassed. I think he'll be angry. I think he'll want heads. This is all a ticking time bomb just waiting to go off, now. A LOT of people are responsible and don't want to be found out. A lot of HUGE mistakes were made...irresponsible and inexplicable mistakes...which brings each of their agencies under scrutiny, and their reputations under attack. These people will eventually have to ANSWER for what they did, and to EXPLAIN it all. They won't be able to. Not reasonably. Not logically. Not in any way that shows prudent care for my civil rights at all steps. A lot of really bad stuff has happened, now. Things which cannot be taken back and which commits everyone to unmistakable responsibility for what they did. Things which a lot of these people who truly MEANT well in the beginning are now having to turn dark side in order to cover their asses over. Their upper echelons had no clue what they were doing, and they took the actions that they did on their OWN, with NO signatures, NO paperwork, and NWS, and FDEM, will want to KNOW how all of this could have happened without any paperwork to back it up, no complaints filed against Todd, or against Alachua County SKYWARN. Why was this man persecuted, and roped, and hung, and an ENTIRE County Warning Area's innocent civilian spotter program unfairly held HOSTAGE in punishment, and yet...there is NOTHING to back it up, and all queries about it only result in "That's official NWS/Emergency Management business ONLY!" The agencies that these people are a part of are now open to lawsuit and attack, and while caught in the middle of all of the fireworks, those agencies will want to know why it's all happening, and what the heck is going on.
For these reasons, no. NO one will ever challenge this blog. This blog will REMAIN. It will NEVER come down.
There will be NO court appearances. There will be NO orders from Judges to remove this blog because to GET one means to drag this whole thing into a courtroom where by it's NATURE a court appearance MEANS bringing it out into open public record. And AGAIN, these people DON'T want that.
So again, I win.
Trust me. I know VERY DAMNED WELL just EXACTLY what I'm doing here with this blog. This blog is in effect my Bill of Rights, and guarantees me my life back in at least SOME semblance. If people don't LIKE that, they can go to hell. I really don't give a rats ass what anyone thinks anymore. My entire LIFE has been turned upside-down; my name, and my entire reputation have been DESTROYED by these assholes. What makes you think I'd still CARE what anyone really THINKS of me anymore at this point? Huh? I mean, SERIOUSLY, people! GET REAL! Aside from PHYSICALLY HARMING me or any of the people in my circle next, what the hell ELSE can these people DO to me? They've already DONE it all! I've LEARNED to stop caring about certain things that people say, and do. You have to. To keep your sanity, you have no choice. With this blog, I can stop talking, I can stop complaining, because the blog does it FOR me. All someone has to do is type in my name, or any one of my harasser's names, and there it is...risk of it ALL being found out. And this guarantees everyone stays under CONTROL. Meanwhile, I'm here at home, resting peacefully, living out my life happily, enjoying the world and everything in it and around me...which is just exactly what these people DIDN'T want me to do. They wanted me to cave, to crumble, to cower, to run, to hide, to scurry away, to shrivel up and die. ...And I didn't. I'm sure that pisses them off to no end, and that pleases ME to no end. If they wanted me to CRY, repeatedly, over and over, endlessly...well, kudos to them there because that DID happen for quite the long while; and now and then it STILL happens. But I'm learning now how to get control back, and how to deal with it all, and to survive through it regardless. And that's exactly what I'm doing with this blog.
It's not the victory that I want. The bad guys at this point in time AREN'T being brought to justice. They, up to this point, do indeed get AWAY with everything that they did. And in that sense, they did indeed win. But, at least for NOW, finally, I am on top, and have SOME semblance of control of my life again.
Psychopaths rule by intimidation, and fear of humiliation and embarrassment, and by convincing you that you are worthless, and by controlling your whole world - everything around you...how you react to everything, how people react to YOU. Until you realize this, and try to stand up for yourself, they will always be in your life, always there, continuing to cause you problems. They don't have mercy. They don't know what that word means. They consider us humans with conscience and merciful ideas to be WEAK, and gullible, and actually DESERVING of the problems that end up happening to us by their hands. So it then becomes up to you. If you don't do anything to intervene, then they will continue to attack you, to interfere in your personal life, and to destroy everything in your world. To stop them, you have to call attention to them. Even then, they still don't stop. They just go into the next mode, volunteering, and doing kind things for people, and making people believe that they're good, so as to contradict everything that you say about them. But then again, at least, while they're busy doing good things, then they're doing good things, and not attacking you. These are but some of the really weird things that you'll have to think about, and some of the really weird choices and compromises that you'll have to end up making when dealing with these kinds of people.
My life has always been hard. I was born to a family that didn't make a whole lot of money. I had some relatives who were often cruel. I've been bullied many times before in my life. I never took the dark path, though. I knew what it was like to be treated badly and I never wished ill will on anyone else, or tried to bring same to anyone. I'd often been treated unfairly by people and so I knew how I would not like to be treated and I never treated others badly or unfairly. I've always tried to be fair, understanding, to give people chances, and to forgive where possible. It's not in me to treat other people badly...for whatever reason. I've always wanted to believe that even though the bad may number in the higher percentages around us, that the few good who remained actually mattered. For this reason, I have always endeavored to do good things, however insignificant, to try to help people. The things I've done never usually made the news, but I've done a lot, quietly, to try to help people in my own small ways. I had always hoped that what I did mattered, anyway. I'd always hoped that history would remember me in a good way. What I never counted on...was that it would depend upon whose version of history was written, and that my history could be rewritten by the bad people to actually make everything that I'd worked so hard to do for people actually seem villainous and evil. When others have so much power, what reason then is there to keep trying, or even to continue on?
"Theirs not to make reply
Theirs not to reason why
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the Valley of Death rode the 600."
Writing a summary in high school on Alfred, Lord Tennyson's poem, The Charge of the Light Brigade, football player Michael Oher, recently made famous in the movie The Blind Side wrote the following:
"Courage is a hard thing to figure. You can have courage based on a dumb idea, or a mistake; but you're not supposed to question adults, or your coach, or your teacher because they make the rules. Maybe they know best, but maybe they don't. It all depends on who you are, where you come from. Didn't at least one of the 600 guys think about giving up and joining with the other side? I mean, 'Valley of Death', that's pretty salty stuff. That's why courage is tricky. Should you always do what others tell you to do? Sometimes, you might not even know *why* you're doing something. I mean, any fool can have courage. But honor, that's the real reason you either do something or you don't. It's who you are, and maybe who you want to be. If you die trying for something important, then you have both honor and courage, and that's pretty good. I think that's what the writer was saying. ...That you should hope for courage and try for honor; and maybe even pray that the people telling you what to do have some, too."
A lot of these words made perfect sense to me.
I had a good idea. It was just a FEW people in the ham radio corps who didn't like it. They went out of their way to try to force me to do things THEIR way by trying to convince other people - through persistent antagonization - that I was being unreasonable and stupid, and to try to persuade them to convince me to come to their way of thinking. Where they could never win with me, they always tried to attack my friends and/or associations. Most of the time it didn't work (with the civilians). But when they went to people in government - in emergency management, the NWS, and even in the local police - for some odd reason, logic and reason, and all the safeguards failed, and the whole world became backwards and upside-down. After being conned by the bad hams, a lot of people around me misjudged me and made some pretty damned stupid mistakes which cost me dearly. These are people who are supposed to be responsible, who are supposed to be careful, and who are supposed to know what they're doing. Instead, guesswork and inaccurate gut feeling, and gossip and slander and rumor, and jumping to conclusions, and taking serious action without the slightest proof of guilt or crime committed, or even any opportunity to give the accused chance to SPEAK or DEFEND himself became the preferential modus operandi. They won't come forward and admit what they did, or apologize for what they did. The cowards ended up hiding, instead. In the end, I and an honorable organization ended up being taken down by something which very much reminds me of a bunch of vicious little girls in high school who were jealous over some guy or some thing that another girl had, and who spread malicious lies and rumors and used torture to destroy her and get her out of the way. It's like some sick mirror of Mean Girls...only between guys. (Mostly.) But I'm not going to let their stupidity slow me down. As my friend Alisa can attest, I indeed wanted to jump ship many times; but in the end I kept my faith in myself, and my reason, and character and honor prevailed.
Steve Jobs once said, "Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become."
I have no idea what tomorrow will bring, or what lies in front of me. I don't care. It's the point. I've decided to move forward; to keep going. I've always wanted to do good things...FOR people, and I'm not going to allow anyone to prevent me from doing that. It's for the honor that I do what I do. Sick people took my name for no reason, made me sacrifice for some brand new idea they had for a whole new "race" of SKYWARN people, and it failed. And when they realized what they'd done to me, they never apologized, never owned up, never tried to make it better. This is depressing, and disheartening...but still I move onwards...for the honor. And don't SPEAK to me about courage. Don't EVEN do it! I had more. I ALWAYS had more. Those people who went out of their way to destroy my name, and to try to TAKE Alachua County SKYWARN's, and who tried to TAKE equipment that didn't belong to them, and who convinced whole police agencies that I was the problem...THOSE people...had no courage, nor honor.
Todd L. Sherman / KB4MHH
Coordinator, Alachua County SKYWARN
Project Mgr., Alachua County EMWIN Project
Favorite Quotes:
"Never, ever give up. Never quit." - Our own parents
"The only thing necessary for the triumph [of evil] is for good men to do nothing." -Edmund Burke
"The world is an evil place, not because of people who do evil, but people who look on and do nothing." -Albert Einstein
"It is easier to denature plutonium than to denature the evil spirit of man." -Albert Einstein
"The greater the power that individuals have, the greater their responsibility for the moral and material welfare of the people who depend on them." -Christine de Pisan
"Rank does not confer privilege or give power. It imposes responsibility." —Louis Armstrong
"And the high destiny of the individual is to serve rather than to rule, or to impose himself in any other way."" -Albert Einstein
"Only a life lived for others is worth living." -Albert Einstein
"To whom much is given, much is required." -John F. Kennedy [...Who, sadly enough, happened to be assassinated...and I can't help but feel like I was, too - by people whom I was supposed to be able to trust and depend upon to always do the right thing, and to stand for justice; who instead caused nothing but deliberate harm while convincing themselves that they were doing the right thing to the wrong person. I've always tried to to do good things in my life. I've always tried to be kind and fair to people. I've always tried to do things to give back to people. But I can't help but notice that the harder I tried to do anything to help people, the more that jealous people did things to get in my way or to harm me. -Todd]
"If you cannot win, make the one ahead of you break the record." -Steve Prefontaine [I have always held to this one in my public service activities. Not to win any races, but to make myself feel proud that whatever I did was apparently so great that other people felt so threatened that they had to invent stories about me in order to win. And in the face of that, I STILL made people have to keep pace while I moved onwards in the FACE of the harsh realities all around me.]
"You have never really lived until you have done something for someone who can never repay you." -John Bunyan
"He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day. ...But THESE dumbasses just didn't know well enough to leave a bad thing alone!" - Todd L. Sherman
![[ Alisa spent two years, from 2001-2002, with the Doppler On Wheels team driving the scout jeep. ]](http://www.fireline.org/skywarn/images/photos/totable-tornado-observatory-4.jpg)
degrees in Mathematics and in Env. Engineering, and she was also very well educated in things meteorological and had even chased with the Doppler On Wheels team two years in a row out in the Midwest. She could forecast storms, and knew how to interpret RADAR. She was truly anxious and enthusiastic about SKYWARN and it's mission. And of all the people around me, she was also...normal, and didn't seem to have any problems, or quirks, or any hidden agendas beyond legitimately educating people. She wanted to help people; to teach...and she never, ever exhibited any selfish intentions. That was what she most talked about - how she just wanted to teach. She also eventually became my best friend. But alas, then the United States Navy called her away to train as an officer, and then she served a number of years abroad, and I wasn't able to make the good use of her that I had wanted. :( I was really disappointed about that. People just have no CLUE how CLOSE we came to having such an awe-inspiring program had we been able to make use of her. Then some of the local hams began to actually attack her.