Jan. 8, 2011, was a horrifying day in U.S. history. It’s the day Jared Lee Loughner shot then-U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in the head. Grievously wounded, Giffords, remarkably, survived. Six others died in the Tucson attack, including U.S. District Judge John Roll of Arizona.
In this Jan. 9, 2011, story, the Washington Post remembers Christina-Taylor Green, a 9-year-old slain by Loughner, a conspiracy theorist who opened fire at an outdoor constituent event hosted by Giffords in the parking lot of a supermarket. Christina’s granddad, Dallas Green, once was the manager of the Philadelphia Phillies and led the team to a World Series title in 1980.
News circulated yesterday that Loughner had just sued Giffords for $25 million, bizarrely alleging emotional distress. The document painted incredibly wild conspiracy theories. Example: The congresswoman hadn’t really been shot. Instead, she was playing a role she learned by watching Ronald Reagan movies.
Today, however, the filing docketed in Arizona federal court appears to be a hoax. For starters, it had a Philadelphia postmark, according to Tucson News Now. Loughner is detained in Minnesota. Beyond that, the envelope sent to the Arizona court was strikingly similar to one sent earlier this month to federal court in the Eastern District of Michigan.
The Michigan document also had a Philadelphia postmark. It purported to be a lawsuit filed against Uber by Jason Brian Dalton, a former Uber driver accused of a mass shooting in Kalamazoo. This was a hoax carried out by Jonathan Lee Riches, posing as Dalton, according to the Smoking Gun.
If this name seems familiar to you, perhaps it’s because you read it on the PP Blog — on Jan. 28, 2009. Riches, now listed by the Bureau of Prisons as a resident of a Philadelphia halfway house with a May 10 release date from federal custody, is a fraudster and notorious pro se litigant who once tried to enter the Bernard Madoff Ponzi fray.
As a federal prisoner, Riches eventually tried to sue Loughner, alleging that Loughner might “try to kill me for being a moderate Democrat,” according to Above The Law. Now, it seems possible that the man who once filed against Loughner now is posing as the convicted mass murderer.
Judge Roll is memorialized in this bust at the federal courthouse in Tucson. The courthouse in Yuma is named after him and also includes a bust. Image source: Ninth Circuit Public Information Office.
The attack on Giffords, Judge Roll, little Christina and the others was one of the most notorious in recent U.S. history. It is sickening to contemplate that they have been subjected to a hoax in which Loughner may be a victim.
If Riches pulled this off, he’d better lay low if he attends any Phillies games this summer. The Philadelphia fans aren’t apt to take kindly to someone who serves up even more pain for the Green family while using Giffords, an American hero, as his target-in-chief.
Jared Lee Loughner, the Arizona man who advanced conspiracy theories and babbled about gold and currency prior to opening fire at a Saturday morning constituents’ event sponsored by former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson, has been sentenced to life in federal prison.
A news conference with federal prosecutors in the office of U.S. Attorney John S. Leonardo is under way in Arizona. (More details later.)
Loughner’s murderous assault in January 2011 claimed the lives of U.S. District Judge John Roll and five others, including a nine-year-old girl, three senior citizens in their seventies and a 30-year-old Congressional aide engaged to be married. Rep. Giffords was shot in the head and nearly died. Her district director, Ron Barber, also was seriously injured. Barber later replaced Giffords, who still is recovering from her wounds and is living a life turned upside down, in Congress.
The incident sparked a national outrage. President Obama issued a special statement from the White House and flew to Arizona, assuming the role of comforter-in-chief to a community overcome by grief.
“I plead the Fifth,” Loughner reportedly said after being subdued by heroic bystanders and taken into police custody.
Just last week, Barber attended an event to honor Christina-Taylor Green, the nine-year-old killed in the attack.
This backpack, which contained an explosive device, was found along the route of the Martin Luther King Jr. parade in Spokane on Monday. Articles of clothing (pictured below) helped conceal the bomb, the FBI said.
On Monday, America celebrated the national holiday commemorating the life and legacy of community service of slain civil-rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. with events in city after city. King, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, was assassinated in Memphis in 1968.
He had become an international figure in 1963, the year hundreds of thousands of Americans streamed to Washington in late August and heard what became known as the “I Have a Dream” speech. The speech was delivered from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character,” King intoned. “I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.”
In Washington on Monday, President Obama encouraged Americans to give back to their communities to honor King’s legacy.
“Martin Luther King Jr. lived his life for others, dedicating his work to ensuring equal opportunity, freedom, and justice for all,” Obama said. “I encourage every American to observe this holiday in honor of Dr. King’s selfless legacy by volunteering in their own communities and by dedicating time each day to bettering the lives of those around us.”
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, speaking at the King Center in Atlanta on Monday, recalled King’s “Mountantop” speech delivered on the eve of his death. King’s speech proved to be prophetic.
“And then I got to Memphis,” King intoned more than 40 years ago. “And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers?
“Well, I don’t know what will happen now,” King continued. “We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn’t matter with me now. Because I’ve been to the mountaintop. And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live — a long life; longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land. So I’m happy, tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”
King was shot and killed the next day.
Holder told the Atlanta gathering that “our long struggle to end suffering and to eradicate violence goes on.”
And the attorney general referenced the Jan. 8 shootings in Arizona that killed U.S. District Judge John Roll and five others, including a nine-year-old girl. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was critically wounded in the attack. She was shot in the head at close range. Eighteen others also were shot.
“As we continue to mourn those recently lost, and to pray for those now in need of healing and comfort, let us also recommit ourselves to carrying on Dr. King’s work and to honoring the values that were at the center of his life: tolerance; nonviolence; compassion; love; and – above all – justice,” Holder remarked in Atlanta.
The attorney general delivered his remarks on Monday morning in the Eastern time zone of the United States.
On the same day — in the Pacific Northwest, the FBI now says — someone planted a bomb in a backpack along the Martin Luther King Jr. parade route in Spokane, Wash.
These articles of clothing were found inside the backpack, which contained a bomb, the FBI said.
“At approximately 9:25 a.m. PST on Monday, 1/17/2011, a suspicious backpack was discovered on a bench at the southeast corner of N. Washington Street and W. Main Avenue in downtown Spokane,” the FBI said. “The Spokane Explosives Disposal Unit was notified and safely neutralized the device. Subsequent preliminary analysis revealed the backpack contained a potentially deadly destructive device, likely capable of inflicting multiple casualties.”
The agency is treating the incident as a case of domestic terrorism. It noted that the suspect should be considered armed and dangerous.
“As a part of this ongoing investigation, the FBI is seeking any information regarding the identity of the person or persons that may have been seen with this backpack from approximately 8:00 a.m. to 9:25 a.m. on Monday, 1/17/2011,” the FBI said. “If anyone has any information regarding this incident, they are requested to immediately contact the FBI. In addition, if anyone took photographs or video in the area of N. Washington Street and W. Main Avenue from approximately 8:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m., they are also requested to contact the FBI as soon as possible.”
Here is the phone number: 206-622-0460.
A bomb was found outside a federal courthouse in Spokane in March 2010.
Earlier this month — on Jan. 12, six days prior to the Tucson shootings — federal prosecutors charged a California man with threatening to kill Rep. Jim McDermott of Washington state.
Charles Turner Habermann, 32, of Palm Springs, was charged with making “two expletive-laden, threatening phone calls” to McDermott’s Seattle office on Dec. 9, 2010.
“In the first call recorded on the office answering system, Habermann threatens to kill Congressman McDermott, his friends and family,” the FBI said. “In the second call Habermann says he will hire someone to put Congressman McDermott ‘in the trash.’”
Last week, the FBI arrested a New Jersey man amid allegations he threatened to kill 47 federal regulators. Vincent P. McCrudden, 49, was accused of creating an “execution list.”
Yesterday in suburban Los Angeles, two students were shot when a gun concealed in a backpack discharged inside Gardena High School.
A federal judge was shot and killed in Arizona yesterday in an attack apparently aimed at a member of Congress who was holding a constituent event outside a supermarket in Tucson, an official said.
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot in the head at close range. President Obama said she was battling for her life after undergoing emergency surgery. The president announced the death of U.S. District Judge John Roll in a special statement at the White House.
Roll had just attended Mass and had stopped by the supermarket on his way home. The Wall Street Journal reported that he stopped at the event to thank Giffords for signing a letter to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that a judicial emergency existed in Arizona because of a high number of immigration cases and a lack of judges to hear them.
Also killed in the attack were a nine-year-old girl, three senior citizens in their seventies and a 30-year-old Congressional aide engaged to be married.
In 2009, Roll was under the 24-hour protection of the U.S. Marshals Service for about a month because of threats made against him, the Washington Post reported.
The alleged shooter used a semiautomatic handgun, authorities said. He was identified as Jared Loughner, 22, of the Tucson region. This is believed to be his YouTube site.
Obama dispatched FBI Director Robert Mueller to Arizona to coordinate the investigation.
“We are going to get to the bottom of this,” the President pledged.
Judge Roll was appointed to the federal bench by President George H.W. Bush in 1991.
Giffords, a Democrat, was serving as the host of the constituent event, which was dubbed “Congress On Your Corner.”
She is the wife of Capt. Mark Kelly, a naval officer, U.S. astronaut and Space Shuttle commander. Kelly’s brother, Scott Kelly, also is an astronaut. He is currently aboard the International Space Station in a mission that began in October.
A disturbing portrait of Loughner was emerging in the early hours. The YouTube site and remarks attributed to him elsewhere suggest he was a burgeoning conspiracy theorist who authored or uttered incoherent ramblings on subjects such as the gold standard, government trickery and how one properly defines terrorism.
“If I define terrorist then a terrorist is a person who employs terror or terrorism, especially as a political weapon. I define terrorist,” Loughner appears to have written. “If you call me a terrorist then the argument to call me a terrorist is ad hominem. You call me a terrorist.”
Loughner also appears to have pondered the fractured thoughts that college was “illegal” under the U.S. Constitution and that people should be provided “accurate information of a new currency.”
