UPDATED 12:44 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) A person purporting to be “Bob Guenther” referenced the 6-year-old daughter of Jack Arons in a post at the ASD-Biz Forum yesterday. The reference was beyond the pale and easily could become yet another matter sprouting from the AdSurfDaily case for law enforcement to investigate.
The language from the posting is reproduced verbatim below. We took a screen shot and reduced its size to fit into the border of this column.
“Rookie,” the poster wrote in a message directed at Arons. “Look around you, the Fat Ladies have been singing all day,, See you in court dude, and how old ios that adopted daughter, Texas Court my friend, welcome to the real world…”
Here is the screen shot:
A poster purporting to be Guenther has a history of making menacing comments, including threats to visit people at their homes.
In an odd twist yesterday, a self-described, purported “30 something female” began to post under the “Bob Guenther” account at the ASD-Biz forum. The purported female appeared to champion “Bob Guenther.”
Like “Bob Guenther,” though, the purported female couldn’t resist including a passive-aggressive rant, saying the female posters at the forum needed to watch their diets, start working out “and find a man…. You obviously don’t get out much and need a lot more than a computer can provide…”
Owing to what we view as an implicit threat against the family of Jack Arons and others, we have made the decision to publish an IP address we have associated with a poster who identified himself as Bob Guenther in January. The comment to this Blog was submitted and published on Jan. 16.
Here is the IP address: 72.165.15.198. It resolves to Dana Park Office Center in Tucson, Arizona. Over the weekend, the person at the ASD-Biz forum purporting to be Guenther suggested he was near Mexico and planned to travel there. The geographic location to which the IP resolves is near Mexico.
Meanwhile, this Blog received an email — as distinguished from a comment left on the Blog — from a person who identified himself as “the ‘infamous’ Bob Guenther” yesterday. Given recent developments and a pattern that suggests Bob Guenther routinely engages in menacing behavior, we have made the decision not to respond to the email.
ASD-Biz members reacted with anger at the post referencing Arons’ daughter. Dallas attorney Larry Friedman sued Arons last week, asserting libel and slander for comments Arons allegedly had made on the Internet.
The person purporting to be Guenther in the forum announced the Friedman lawsuit in two threads and provided links to PDFs of the documents.
Friedman is an attorney for the ASD Members Business Association (ASDMBA) Trust. Bob Guenther is the de facto head of the Trust. Posters at ASD-Biz viewed the lawsuit as an attempt to chill speech. Prior to the lawsuit, some ASDMBA members said they had filed complaints against Friedman with the Texas Bar and Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott.
The lawsuit against Arons followed. Posters at the ASD-Biz forum say Guenther appears to be trying to spread the chill. Forum posters said they would not be silenced by threats.
Some posters said they intended to file complaints today.
After threatening additional lawsuits at the ASD-Biz forum — and after an editorial that ran on this Blog appeared over the weekend — the poster purporting to be Guenther at the ASD-Biz forum then appeared at least briefly to switch courses.
Instead of threatening lawsuits, the person purporting to be Guenther appeared actually to encourage members to file complaints with authorities.
In one post, the person purporting to be Guenther provided a link to Abbott’s office, the office of Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum and the Internet Crime Complaint Center. At the same time, in an apparent jibe, the poster also provided a link to PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
The poster then provided a link to the office of Sen. John Cornyn, and then implied he had inside connections in Abbott’s office.
“By the way if you want to call Greg Abbott, I have his direct line and that of his assistant, would you like that too,” the purported Guenther wrote.