My Pathetic Anniversary

Today is four years since the shit hit the fan. I no longer dread going online. I no longer think of my attack every day. But some of the lies are still online and will probably stay there for as long as the Internet exists.

To make the lies go away I have to sue Google -- the company that hosts an attack blog -- and win the suit.

I can't afford to sue Google. 

It's over (at least over enough)

I've decided to finish Internet HELL, a book I started years ago. It's the story of a horrible false attack on me that started on Facebook in 2010. The story finally has a conclusion -- and so does the book. It's not the conclusion I hoped for, but it's good enough. "Justice is served" and I can write the epilogue.

The book is a factual account of the attack, preceded by a fictional back story about my likely attacker.

I've been writing professionally for over 40 years, but this is my first attempt at fiction. I am enjoying the liberty of having almost no limits. What I write must be believable, even if it's not entirely true. It should be on sale in a few days.

Amazing. Two years have gone by.

Nothing has changed. No one has been caught, tried or incarcerated. I'm still pissed off, but living with the situation. The lies are still online.

First anniversary

Today is one year since the shit hit the fan. Some of the shit is still online.

I'm still alive. My attacker probably is, too. The crime is unsolved.

I want to thank my good friends -- and the good strangers -- who came to my support.


...

I'm over it (almost)

As readers of this blog know, last summer my mostly happy life turned upside-down when I was falsely accused of some terrible crimes by an anonymous and skilled online attacker.

Neither the police nor the FBI were able to identify the perp (but I'm pretty sure I know who he is).

My life was disrupted in many ways. Friends, family and strangers provided great comfort and support. (But one person whom I regarded as a friend deserted me because he was afraid of associating with me.)

I suspended publicity for one book and delayed publication of others.

It's now nearly nine months since the shit hit the fan. I can't change the past, but it's time to look ahead. I am starting to promote the book again. Of course, I highly recommend it -- and so do others. It has received excellent reviews and I hope there will be more.

The $15.95 print version is available at Amazon and B&N. A $4.99 "PDF" eBook is available from Lulu. There's even a $1.99 eBook sampler. $4.99 eBooks formatted for the Kindle and other readers will be available soon.

The book is now available

Frightening, Intriguing, Important.

Internet HELL is an account of an elaborate, skillful and vicious Internet harassment attack by a lying paranoid psychopath. He accused the author of a huge number of horrible crimes including child molestation, child pornography, wife-burning and even dog rape. Despite strong suspicions about the perpetrator, the police and the FBI could not solve the case.

This book includes a novelized backstory about the life of the attacker, and a true account of the attacks, the aftermath and the investigation. There are recommendations for others who are victims of similar cybercrime, and for minimizing those crimes and their effects.

The $1.99 preview edition is now available as an eBook download in PDF form for easy reading on PCs and e-readers. CLICK to order from Lulu.com. A printed version will be available in the future. CLICK for more info.

Progress report

(1) No new material has been posted by my attacker or his fans since the beginning of July.

(2) Most of the garbage has been removed from the web, but there are still search links that point to non-existent pages.

(3) Google still refuses to remove the original hate-blog without a court order--which they could challenge.

(4) The police and FBI have not been able to identify the perp, despite strong suspicions.

(5) My printer and booksellers have not caved into the threats by my attacker.

(6) My neighbors still talk to me and let their kids talk to me.

(7) My wife and dog still love me.

(8) I temporarily suspended publicity for my books until the bad publicity died down a bit, but I know the remnants will be online forever.

(9) I decided to remove the "Dirty parts easy to find" from the bottom of the front cover on my funny memoir. That line gave my attacker something to use in his campaign, and I also realize that it may make some readers uncomfortable. I may sell more books without the line on the cover. I'm also making some updates and corrections. The new version should be available mid-October.  Here's the new cover:

An important newspaper believes me

The Connecticut Post is Southwestern Connecticut's largest daily newspaper.

In Sunday's printed paper and now online, reporter Frank Juliano presents an extensive analysis of my attack, and concludes that I am not guilty of the ridiculous charges.

In the interest of accuracy, I must point out that (1) I am only 64 years old, not 65, and (2) I lost my virginity while in college, not in high school (but not for lack of desire or objects of desire).

While it's extremely satisfying to be investigated and vindicated by an important newspaper that's read by most of my neighbors who had been warned to keep their children away from me, my attacker is still free, as the police and FBI continue to investigate two months after the attacks began.

Photobucket did the right thing, promptly

Last week I noticed that my attacker had posted photos of me without permission on Photobucket, and the photos were linked to the original attack blog.

I complained to Photobucket on Saturday, and today the photos were gone from both Photobucket and Blogger.

I've been waiting for over a month for Google to cooperate.

My attacker put my photos on Photobucket

Photobucket is a very useful and easy-to-use free online service for storing, displaying and distributing photographs.

My attacker, using the name "Federaltorch," is using the site to display photos of me, my dog and my house. Two of the photos are displayed in violation of my copyrights, one violates the copyright of the Hartford Courant, and one violates a Google copyright.

My attacker has violated the Photobucket Terms of Use Agreement:

• 6.2 You represent and warrant that: (i) you own the Content posted by you on or through the Photobucket Services or otherwise have the right to grant the license set forth in this section, (ii) the posting and use of your Content on or through the Photobucket Services does not violate the privacy rights, publicity rights, copyrights, contract rights, intellectual property rights or any other rights of any person, and (iii) the posting of your Content on the Site does not result in a breach of contract between you and a third party. You agree to pay for all royalties, fees, and any other monies owing any person by reason of Content you post on or through the Photobucket Services.

An idiot commented about me

The New York Times website recently published "Ask the Experts: Managing Your Online Reputation" where Michael Fertik, founder of ReputationDefender, and Paul Ohm, a law professor at the University of Colorado, took reader questions about Internet privacy.

I explained my online ordeal, and at the end I mentioned that I was writing a book about it. It's quite common for authors to mention relevant books in online postings. There were 312 words in my posting, and just 17 dealt with the book.

Unfortunately, I received no useful advice from either Fertik or Ohm--but ignorant and belligerent "W. Smith" thinks that I wrote the book and then was harassed online.

HEY IDIOT: the book is being written about my attack. I had no reason to write it before I was attacked.

"Smith," in an effort to emphasize his intellect, says he "wasn't born yesterday."  He acts like he was born with anencephaly.

After over a month, Facebook did the right thing

On June 25, Facebook published a phony and dangerous petition aimed at having me put on the Connecticut registry of sex offenders. The petition was signed by a non-existent Mike Josephs and signed by seven non-existent supporters, and two real human beings who were scammed into supporting the cause.

"People" signing the petition called for my caging, castration and killing; and my Facebook friends were notified of the petition.

I complained to Facebook immediately--and frequently--pointing out that false identities were used in violation of Facebook policy, as well as copyright violation, libel, lies and calls for violence.

Today I received the following email:

Thank you for bringing this matter to our attention. We have removed or disabled access to the third-party or user-generated content you have reported to us for violating our Statement of Rights & Responsibilities.

I am certainly pleased and relieved that the Facebook attack has been removed. I'd be even more pleased if Facebook apologized for its unconscionable delay and told me how the company will stop similar attacks from happening again.

For the moment, lead petitioner "Mike Josephs" and his phantom flunkies Kendra, Johnathan, Melinda, Alice, Victoria, Billy and Harry are gone from Facebook.

I hope the real people on Facebook who were suckered into becoming their "friends" and aiding my harassment won't miss them, and they'll find some real live human beings to replace them

The young geniuses at Google have no common sense and no sense of decency. Google stupidly refused to remove a lying, harassing blog. Now I am fighting back, using Google, of course.

Left-click to enlarge for easier reading. Brin, Page and Schmidt are the three big bosses at Google.

Don't get mad, get even write a book

Starting on 6/25/10, my small book publishing company, Silver Sands Books, and I became the targets of an elaborate online smear campaign.

I was unjustly portrayed as being a pornographer, dog rapist, child rapist, pedophile, wife burner, member of an international child porn ring, drunk driver, being listed on the California registry of sex offenders, using the Internet to "groom" children for sex, being investigated by the FBI, a threat to my neighbors...and more. The attacker's apparent supporters publicly called for my caging, castration and killing.

The attacker published two online petitions directed to Connecticut Governor Rell to try to get me put on the Connecticut list of sex offenders. Silver Sands Books was accused of publishing books for pedophiles. The attacker tried to get printer Lightning Source to stop printing and distributing my books, accused the printer of breaking the law, and threatened to sue them. My attacker falsely claimed that Amazon.com had stopped selling my books because I am a pedophile, My friends on Facebook and neighbors received messages accusing me of horrible crimes above.

The attack pointedly demonstrated how our cherished first amendment can be easily misused.

• Anyone can say anything about anyone.
• Some of the biggest and most successful online companies (e.g., Google) shield vicious, dangerous, libelous, lying criminals who use their services--and make it extremely difficult for victims to have the attacks terminated.
• People will believe anything they read online or on paper.
• Anyone can be an attacker--or a victim.

I responded by reporting the crime to the FBI and police, contacting my friends. contacting the website operators who published the lying harassment, blogging and--of course--starting to write a book about the ordeal.

Since I was attacked for my writing, it's only natural that I write about the attacks.

I hope the last chapter will be about my attacker going to jail.

The book's working title: "Internet Hell: how false accusations almost destroyed me, and could destroy you"

There is no way to know how long it will take for the case against the attacker to be completed. The book will probably be published in late 2010 or early 2011.

Tentative Contents:

Part 1: Prelude to the attacks (attacker's background)
Part 2: The attacks
Part 3: The crimes
Part 4: The investigation
Part 5: The arrest
Part 6: The trial
Part 7: The aftermath
Part 8: Recommendations
Part 9: Thanks
Part 10: An appropriate joke

I'm not sure why, but my attack is considered news in Indonesia

Fortunately, the site links to MY commentary on the story--not merely to lies told by my attacker.

A few comments to the person who wants my books banned

If the freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter. --George Washington

The only valid censorship of ideas is the right of people not to listen. --Tommy Smothers

The dirtiest book of all is the expurgated book. --Walt Whitman

The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error. --John Stuart Mill

Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. --Alfred Whitney Griswold

What progress we are making. In the Middle Ages they would have burned me. Now they are content with burning my books. --Sigmund Freud

Wherever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings. --Heinrich Heine

Censorship feeds the dirty mind more than the four-letter word itself. --Dick Cavett

The test of democracy is freedom of criticism. --David Ben-Gurion

Every human being has a right to hear what other wise human beings have spoken to him. It is one of the Rights of Men; a very cruel injustice if you deny it to a man! --Thomas Carlyle

Books won't stay banned. Ideas won't go to jail. --Alfred Whitney Griswold

You can cage the singer but not the song. --Harry Belafonte
The free press is the mother of all our liberties and of our progress under liberty. --Adlai E. Stevenson

Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost. --Thomas Jefferson

The press is not only free, it is powerful. That power is ours. It is the proudest that man can enjoy. --Benjamin Disraeli

Woe to that nation whose literature is cut short by the intrusion of force. This is not merely interference with freedom of the press but the sealing up of a nation's heart, the excision of its memory. --Aleksander Solzhenitsyn

Free speech is the whole thing, the whole ball game. Free speech is life itself. --Salman Rushdie

The first principle of a free society is an untrammeled flow of words in an open forum. --Adlai E. Stevenson

No work today. I need a laugh. It's time for a joke.

I have been impressed by my attacker's intelligence as well as his craziness. This combination reminds me of a joke.

A driver hears a thumping sound from the right rear of his car, pulls over to the side of the road, walks around the car and discovers that he has a flat tire. He opens the trunk, removes his spare tire and jack, and starts setting up the jack to raise the car. At this point he notices that he is parked alongside a tall fence topped with barbed wire. There is a sign on the fence that says, "DANGER! Do Not Enter. County Home for the Criminally Insane." He looks through the fence and sees some obviously agitated people in orange jumpsuits approaching him. He assumes they will not be able to go over the fence but is nervous, anyway. He jacks up the car, removes the lug nuts and the tire, puts the good tire onto the car, and sees the four lug nuts rolling down a slight hill and then vanish into a sewer. Now he starts to panic.It's getting dark out. He is in the middle of nowhere. This is before cellphones were available. A crowd of crazies has assembled a few feet away from him, jumping, flailing and chanting incoherently. The driver feels doomed. Suddenly one of the inmates stops chanting and jumping and signals the driver to follow him along the fence beyond the other inmates to a spot where they can speak in quiet. The driver follows him and the inmate then says, "Hey mister, I have a suggestion. Each of the other three tires has four lug nuts. If you remove one lug nut from each tire and put it where you had the flat, each tire will be held on with three lug nuts and you'll be able to drive into town and go to the auto parts store to replace what you lost." The driver is very impressed, starts working on the other tires and when he finally secures the spare tire and puts the flat and the jack into the trunk, he walks over to his helper and touches his fingers through the fence to express his gratitude. He thanks him profusely, and also expressed his amazement. He says, "I just don't understand how an inmate of an insane asylum could come up with such a good idea." The man in orange said, "I'm glad to help. Remember -- just because I'm crazy, doesn't mean I'm stupid."

And that applies to my attacker. I hope he, too, is soon behind barbed wire and in an orange jumpsuit.

(Photo from http://www.onlinecourses.org/. I thank them.)

Why does my attacker care about my beard?

(left-click to enlarge image)

My attacker seems strangely obsessed with my appearance -- particularly my beard. Under his various fake names he has said that I am a "revolting beast" and a "sick hairy freak" with a "hairy beard" and I "look like a pervert."

Actually, I don' t look at all like Jeffrey Dahmer or the Marquis de Sade.

I haven't been a hairy freak in about 40 years, and I'm probably much less sick than my attacker is.

Perhaps he skipped biology class on the day his teacher revealed this, but BEARDS ARE MADE OF HAIR, so they are supposed to be hairy.

Some beards, of course, are hairier than others. My present beard, while hairier than the beards worn by Jobs, Lincoln and Lenin, is definitely mid-range -- about the same as Sigmund Freud's beard.

In addition to his obviously diminished mental capacity, perhaps my attacker also has low testosterone. Maybe he can't engage in sex and can't grow a beard -- so he's obsessed with my sex life and my beard. Maybe my attacker secretly wishes that he could rape dogs, little boys and teenage girls as he falsely accused me of doing. I guess we'll find out at the trial.

Clockwise from top left: Steve Jobs, Metropolitan Kirill -- Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, Dusty Hill of ZZ Top, Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Schneerson, Osama bin Laden, Me-recently, Me in the early 1970s, Me at Halloween in 2008, Abe Lincoln. As far as I know, there are no perverts in the group.

Now my attacker wants to stop my books from being printed and has accused my printer Lightning Source of distributing pedophile books

My attacker sent the following emails to Lightning Source, the company that prints and distributes most of my books:

Sent using BlackBerry
From: Johnathan Hawking BULLSHIT
johnathanhawking@yahoo.com

To: Inquiry
Sent: Sun Jun 27 07:14:36 2010

Subject: Pedophile at Lightning Source

Dear Lightning Source,

Lightning Source is aiding and abetting a known convicted Pedophile BULLSHIT Michael N Marcus, and allowing him and his company Silver Sands Books to use LSI as a weapon and recruiting organization BULLSHIT for an international pedophilia ring. BULLSHIT

1. Why are you allowing a convicted Pedophile BULLSHIT (Michael N Marcus) to distribute books to Amazon and Barnes & Noble using Lightning Source, Inc?

2. Michael N Marcus (AKA Silver Sands Books) is a Milford, CT resident and registered child sex offender BULLSHIT who has distributed books using your company LSI to booksellers under Silver Sands Books.

3. Legal Background on Marcus: http://michael-marcus-pedophile.blogspot.com/  BULLSHIT

4. We BULLSHIT are campaigning BULLSHIT for a change in Megan's Law, so pedophiles BULLSHIT like Michael N Marcus can't move State to hide their crimes and/or publish books with Lightning Source, Inc to groom children on the internet. BULLSHIT

5. Read Facebook Petition To Connecticut Governor To Review Pedophile Michael N Marcus: BULLSHIT http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=118772574833939 &v=wall ALMOST EVERY "PERSON" WHO SIGNED IS A FAKE

6. Earlier this year, he published a book defaming Outskirts Press using Lightning Source: ACTUALLY IT WAS NOT PUBLISHED BY LIGHTNING SOURCE, AND WAS COMPLETELY TRUE. OUTSKIRTS HAS NEVER CHALLENGED THE BOOK.

Yours sincerely,

Johnathan Hawking BULLSHIT
Secretary, Petition to Connecticut Governor BULLSHIT

-------------------------

From: Harold Bishop BULLSHIT [harold.bishop80@yahoo.com]

Sent: Friday, June 25, 2010 5:21 PM

Subject: Pedophile BULLSHIT using Lightning Source, Inc.

Dear Kelly Guy and Natalie Mozingo,

Re: Silver Sands Books - Registered Sex Offender BULLSHIT Michael N Marcus (http://michael-marcus-pedophile.blogspot.com)

We are writing to LSI on behalf of a group of concerned parents, BULLSHIT regarding the above named 'Silver Sands Books' which is a Lightning Source Publisher, and is currently distributing pedophilia-related material BULLSHIT to Amazon and well known online booksellers under an LSI contract.

Silver Sands is owned by a single convicted pedophile BULLSHIT, Michael N Marcus (http://michael-marcus-pedophile.blogspot.com/), who has devastating convictions BULLSHIT for raping a young boy in California. BULLSHIT This man is a registered child molester BULLSHIT and sexual predator BULLSHIT who has served jail time BULLSHIT for extremely serious sexual offences against children. BULLSHIT He has destroyed a young boy's childhood and ruined a family's life. BULLSHIT

SUMMARY OF COMPLAINT BULLSHIT

1. Why is Lightning Source, Inc. allowing Marcus, who is a lone-author, not a company, BULLSHIT to publish sexually horrific material BULLSHIT using LSI materials and/or digital facilities?

2. If Lightning Source claims not to work directly with authors; why have you allowed a pedophile BULLSHIT (i.e. Silver Sands Books) to distribute questionable materials BULLSHIT and slip through the net? BULLSHIT

2. For your information, Michael N. Marcus used LSI to publish a disturbing sexual book BULLSHIT involving school children BULLSHIT, with the tagline - "DIRTY PARTS ARE EASY TO FIND" in capital letters embedded on the cover file. Why is LSI distributing this book on Amazon? This is a demonstrable outrage that LSI is distributing this book. BULLSHIT

3. Please join us today by signing our petition to Connecticut Governor M. Jodi Rell asking that this pedophile BULLSHIT, Michael N. Marcus, be immediately put on the Sexual Offenders Register in CT, where he lives near schools and children's play areas.

LIGHTNING SOURCE SHOULD NOT BE DISTRIBUTING PEDOPHILIA / CONVICTED PEDOPHILE'S BULLSHIT BOOKS AND IS COMMITTING A CRIME UNDER BOTH STATES OF TENNESSEE AND CALIFORNIA LAW BY DOING SO. BULLSHIT

Please remove Mr Marcus's evil and sick works of pedophilia BULLSHIT from circulation forthwith or face the consequences in a lawsuit BULLSHIT that our organization is planning against this pedophile's self publishing website, Silver Sands Books.

Harold Bishop BULLSHIT and Susan Fisher BULLSHIT

Protect America's Children

Is this a dirty picture that will incite lust in a pedophile?Would I really want to have sex with little boys and teenage girls and men and lesbians and a dog?

My online attacker, who uses multiple fake names including "Mike Josephs" and "Jonah Ark," wants people to believe that I put "half-naked images of children on the homepage" of one of my websites.

At the left is the photo he refers to. As you can see, the children are wearing modest bathing suits and are standing in a swimming pool.

The dog standing with them, however, is completely naked.

According to "Mike," a book I wrote "contains a disturbing account of bestial obscenity which contexts [sic] anal sex and sodomizing a dog called Hunter with a vibrating dildo."

That's my dog, Hunter, in the picture. I love him -- but not that way.

"Mike" also write that I contemplated sex with a "horny heterosexual male and lesbians."
 
So, here's the official tally of my lust objects: little boys, teenage girls, a heterosexual male, lesbians, and a Golden Retriever. What's next: a parakeet, a trout, or the tailpipe of a Honda Civic? Apparently no orifice is safe from me. Grand Canyon, watch out! 
 
I've also been accused of "grooming" children online for future sexual encounters, downloading child porn, and trying to attract other pedophiles.

My neighbors have been warned and the cops are watching my house. If you have a sexy parakeet or Honda, guard them carefully. A hot gerbil or lobster could be in jeopardy, too.

Have a good weekend. I won't.