You may be familiar with Marc
Randazza, free-speech attorney and
former hero of Jason Jones' Salty Droid blog.
In this February 2016 post, I
wrote about Randazza and his defense of prick-up
"artist" and accused rapist Daryush Valizadeh, more
commonly known as Roosh Vorek or Roosh V or simply Roosh (or
Doosh, on this blog). It's a long post, but to get to the
Randazza/Doosh part, scroll down to the sub-head, "There's
Doosh. I mean, Roosh..." In my post I go to great lengths to
acknowledge that everyone has the right to freedom of speech and
that even someone who has been accused of sexual crimes deserves
a good defense, and that, furthermore, wrongfully accusing
someone of sexual assault (had that been what was going on) is a
very bad thing. But I also acknowledged that there seemed to be
an abundance of evidence that Roosh really is a Doosh, and that
it appeared that Randazza was unfairly going after a blogger who
simply wrote about the rape accusations against his client, and
that... well, you can follow the link and read it yourself. Point
is, I did try to be more than fair to the less than savory.
I'd initially heard of Randazza because, as indicated above, he
was an apparent friend and champion of Jason Jones, whose
muckraking Salty Droid blog has, since its inception, been a
frequent target of legal action, both real and threatened. In
fact I thought of Randazza as sort of a free-speech hero,
especially given his boasts that he does a lot of pro bono work
to defend unpopular speech. Granted, when I got sued by the loathsome fake doctor and cancer fraud
Leonard Coldwell, Randazza seemed
indifferent to my own plight (as did another noteworthy
free-speech attorney who shall remain nameless here but whose
name is mud to me), but Randazza was helping my pal Jason, and
that was good enough for me.
But, to put it charitably, he turned out not to be the champion
of Jason's work that Jason had hoped -- as Jason explained, not
so charitably, in this
April 2016 blog post.
If you already knew this background stuff, I apologize for the
redundancy. In any case, Marc Randazza has been in the news more
recently for some of his other stellar clientele who belong in
the Squall of Shame along with Doosh. For example, there's the
publisher of the Neo-Nazi site Daily Stormer, Andrew Anglin. In
spring of 2017 Anglin was sued for coordinating a terror campaign
of online harassment against a Jewish real estate agent, Tanya
Gersh. Randazza had filed a motion to dismiss the suit based, of
course, on his client's First Amendment rights. But last week
Dana L. Christensen, chief judge for the U.S. District Court in
Missoula, Montana, denied the motion, saying that the real estate agent was
a private citizen and that Anglin had incited his followers to
harass her as part of a personal campaign.
The civil case (there have been no criminal charges) is now
expected to go to trial. From the New York Times article
linked to in the above paragraph:
...It has
taken a long time because it proved impossible to serve Mr.
Anglin with legal papers, Mr. Dinielli said. Mr. Anglin’s
last known address was in Ohio, but his whereabouts
have been unknown for
nearly two years. He is still running the site, possibly from
overseas.
His lawyer, Marc Randazza, said that Judge Christensen’s
decision was dangerous for free speech.
“The rule we lay down for the Nazi applies equally to the
civil rights activist,” Mr. Randazza said in a statement.
“And that ruling, if it stands, is not going to be good for
anyone who engages in common outrage culture. Maybe that’s
a good thing, but I think not.”
Well, Mr.
Randazza, notwithstanding your histrionics, in light of the fact
that Ms. Gersh has faced truly frightening harassment and death
threats as a result of Anglin's blatant incitement, I would say
that defending this form of "free speech" is not a good
thing. From the "Background" section in Judge Christenson's November 14 order:
The
messages received by Gersh and her family, including her son,
were filled with ethnic slurs and misogynistic rants. Many
messages referenced the Holocaust, and some threatened
violence. When Gersh filed her Complaint in the spring of
2017, she and her family had received more than 700
disparaging and/or threatening messages over phone calls,
voicemails, text messages, emails, letters, social media
comments, and Christmas cards.
Mr.
Randazza has appeared on Mr. Jones’s radio show and in
InfoWars videos. In a brief telephone interview, he
acknowledged opinions by First Amendment lawyers not involved
in the cases that the Sandy Hook families have a strong claim
against Mr. Jones. “I think if you look at the allegations
in the complaint, that’s an easy conclusion to make,” Mr.
Randazza said. “But as these cases progress sometimes
things turn in the other direction.”
“We are going to be mounting a strong First Amendment
defense and look forward to this being resolved in a civil
and collegial manner,” he said, asserting that Mr. Jones
has “a great deal of compassion for these parents.”
Randazza, not surprisingly, has vigorously
defended his choice to represent Alex Jones as well as the
Neo-Nazi Anglin, even as he vigorously defended his choice to
represent RooshV back in 2016. In an interview with the Connecticut Law Tribune in July,
as reported on the Law.com site,
Randazza said that when choosing clients he has no social litmus
test or political litmus test; the First Amendment is his only
litmus test. He 'splained that he has also represented
left-leaning clients -- even some who are Muslims, for goodness
sake! -- and that he leans leftward himself. He also says he
took pains to make sure that representing the Neo-Nazi guy,
Anglin, was okay with his Jewish partner, Jay Wolman.
But others have taken issue with his claim about being a First
Amendment purist. F'rinstance, there's Elie Mystal at the Above
The Law site. He has considered himself to be an ally if not
actually a friend of Randazza, but regarding the Jones
representation, even he felt compelled to point out, in this July 3, 2018 post, that Randazza's
moral compass appears to be broken.
...you can defend deplorable people
without adopting and promoting their deplorable logic. There’s
a difference. The legal community does not talk about that
difference very much: lawyers shun deplorable lawyers, and
deplorable lawyers put their heads so far up their own ass
that they think any suggestion of restraint smells bad. But
we can draw a line of demarcation around zealous legal
defense and ridiculous alt-white dogma.
For me, that line is right here:
“We are going to be mounting a strong
First Amendment defense and look forward to this being
resolved in a civil and collegial manner,” [Randazza]
said, asserting that Mr. Jones has “a great deal of
compassion for these parents.”
No, Alex Jones does not have “compassion”
for the families of Sandy Hook victims. Saying he does is a
lie. Alex Jones has argued that the parents of Sandy Hook
victims are FAKING the death of their own children. That
means he has no compassion for their suffering. That’s not
a difference of opinion, that’s not a certain point of
view, that’s a straight lie designed by the alt-right so
that the assholes who support Alex Jones can tell themselves
that they aren’t going to end up in Hell for their terrible
beliefs.
It’s a lie that all lawyers, no matter how steeped they are
in Nazi appeasement, have no duty to repeat. If you are going
to make your career along the lawyerly duty to give the most
disgusting among us a competent legal defense, then stick to
the law. If you have a First Amendment argument, MAKE IT, and
leave the rehabilitation of Alex Jones’s character to
Donald Trump. If you want to argue that Jones’s didn’t
have “actual malice” when flinging his wild conspiracies,
fine, make that case IN COURT where you can be held to a
standard of EVIDENCE for your ridiculous assertions.
The bottom line? Mystal continues:
If you want to represent detestable
clients, fine. But when you go out into the media and don’t
just defend them but actually adopt their logic and moral
arguments, that’s different. Then, it looks like you agree
with them. And if you agree with them, you can no longer
avail yourself of the lawyerly presumption that you are just
doing your job. Instead of being a mere part of the process,
you become part of the problem.
Exactly.
I imagine that Salty Droid has some choice words about Randazza
and his choice of clients. I'll leave that to him to address (again) on
his own blog, should he choose to do so.
As someone who has had her own speech threatened by
ill-intentioned scoundrels, I'm a pretty big fan of free speech.
I took some time to explain my views, which are more nuanced than some might imagine, in a post I wrote back in
August re Alex Jones' whining about being "censored" by
several major social media platforms. Here is that link. Even the
vilest and most loathsome folks have a right to have their say.
They most certainly have the right to legal representation when
sued for civil offenses or charged with crimes. And even the hallowed
ACLU has defended Neo-Nazis. But when Nazis and trolls having
their say crosses the line to harassment and incitement, the
First Amendment doesn't -- or at least shouldn't -- protect them.
I'm no highly-paid First Amendment attorney, but even I can figure
that one out.
* * * * *
Now more than ever, your donation is needed
to help keep this Whirled spinning.
Click here to donate via PayPal or debit/credit
card.
If that link doesn't work, send PayPal payment directly to
scrivener66@hotmail.com
or to cosmic.connie@juno.com
If PayPal, be sure to specify that your contribution is a gift. Thank
you!
