He hasn’t changed a bit. He’s posting on alt.atheism under a new name, “prophetofrevengerXX”, with “XX” a couple of random digits to help avoid searches. Then how do we know it’s Markuze? Take a look at one example of a post. Classic.
He harassed me for a couple of decades. I’m just mentioning this because, while he’s not pestering me now (I don’t think…but I have so many email filters to block him), his usual pattern is one of rising obsession and increasingly lunatic lashing out at the people he hates.
I guess his probation just ran out.
Isn’t it a violation of his probation for Markuze to be on the internet?
Markuze asks:
“Did you spot the loonie? ”
why yes… right away. it wasn’t hard at all.
Artor@2, Yes, but he was given a 3-year sentence (suspended, I believe) with strict conditions — including the prohibition — in June 2015. Three years ago. Which suggests his sentence has now expired, which in turn also suggests the conditions / prohibitions no longer apply…
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Please keep in mind he was determined to mentally ill by trained professionals, a problem exacerbated by substance abuse. Some of the probation conditions included treatment for those conditions (Man who made threats over social networks ordered to follow treatment with psychiatrist (June-2015)).
He was, and seemingly still is, an ill person.
“We have made the decision…….”
Interesting that he exercises the “Royal we”. Must be channeling Queen Victoria.
Re: richardelguru @ #5…
There are two other possibilities… He may be an editor or have a tapeworm.
On the underlying problem… If he’s caught up to his old tricks again, what will be the likely legal response?
@whheydt:
whatever the response may be, I hope it’s not jail.
As far as we know, the 3-year supervision did result in a vast diminishment in harassment and abuse. There are good reasons to think those measures were effective, though we can’t be absolutely certain, of course, that he wasn’t somehow privately harassing someone who hasn’t come forward about it in a way we’ve noticed.
We also know that his behavior is not acceptable when he’s sober, but much, much worse when he’s not sober. So one would expect that he’s going to go along being a nasty internet troll, but not necessarily one who requires the intervention of law enforcement, for a bit of time before going on another bender, losing it completely and re-becoming someone who destroys lives.
If he receives health-focussed interventions that keep him sober, that might be enough to prevent the worst of his old behaviors. But if its not, I’d rather we not incarcerate people and so my current leaning, based on the knowledge I have now, is to again use criminal prosecution and a suspended sentence to require a tight monitoring & intervention regime.
Though none of his crimes allow for particular long sentences, he so obviously commits the over and over that, if necessary to create a sufficiently long-lasting and stable supervisory regime, a court could probably order a longer period during which the sentence is suspended.
I don’t know the law in Ontario on civil commitment, but there are times in BC when civil commitment can be followed by a mandatory supervisory regime after release. IIRC, how they manage to do this is interesting: the patient is “on leave” from residence in a particular facility, rather than “discharged” from that facility. This “leave” can go on for quite some time; the Mental Health Act doesn’t specify any maximum amount. If the person really doesn’t require treatment “in or through” a particular facility to be imposed on them, they can apply to end the forced treatment whether they are currently in residence or not. Extended life outside the facility can be an indicator that would lead a court to end forced treatment, but that indicator can be swamped by other evidence (for instance, evidence that they’ve been treated before and relapsed before, leading them to harm others – combined with a professional opinion that relapse is again likely).
This is all BC, but I’m pretty sure it’s accurate (as scanty as it may be). And, more importantly, I’m fairly certain that Ontario has similar provisions – including leave provisions – in its Mental Health Act.
So the way to stop Markuze is to prosecute him or involuntarily commit him if/when he starts harming others again. Prosecution would probably be accompanied by another suspended sentence, but theoretically he could also be judged guilty but “not criminally responsible” by reason of his mental illness, then for the duration of his sentence he could be assigned to a medical setting instead of a prison.
Any way you handle it, actual prison probably wouldn’t benefit Markuze, and since society (appears at this time) to benefit just as much from supervised treatment of Markuze, it would seem forced treatment is probably the best option.
Poor guy. Imagine being him.
I’ve never been a target of his so this is probably a lot easier for me, but of all the old trolls(?) I’ve long felt bad for him because he is genuinely ill.
On the other hand, someone demanding a Leica camera as payment for imagined slights or someone else insisting he would never inflict the horror of oral sex on a woman…
@Tabby:
Yeah, obviously my perspective is also affected by the fact that I’ve never been a recipient of abuse by Markuze. But I nonetheless think it’s reasonable to be much more sympathetic towards someone with a mental illness and a horrible personality that their mental illness makes difficult for the individual to change than towards someone who simply has a horrible personality but could change if they wanted.
To Crip Dyke and others
My initial reaction here is: If this guy really is a physical danger to others, exactly how much longer must his (harassment) victims and potential physical violence victims wait before the police and medical establishment act? Inability to follow harassment law to this extreme extent suggests to me that he will always be a danger to others. This seems like one of those exceptionally rare times that maybe I think involuntary commitment is the right answer – assuming that I could be convinced that he poses a reasonable threat of physical violence to others.
In other words, if someone demonstrates this extreme amount of refusal or inability to follow a law like harassment law, then I think it’s time to lock them up under the confinement theory of justice, until such time that gain the ability or conviction to follow the law.
I mean, really. He harasses a bunch of people, with sometimes threatening remarks. Police and medical health intervention. He does it again. Police and medical health intervention. He does it again. Etc. How many times must this happen before we take the seemingly necessary actions for the protection of his (harassment) victims and the protection of his future potential victims of physical violence? In other words, if there ever was a case for involuntary commitment based on criminal history of harassment but before specific acts of violence, this has got to be it. If this doesn’t meet the threshold, then surely no one could ever meet that threshold. Right?
Forget the three strikes rule. How many strikes has this person had? How many more do we need before we can conclude that he will never be fit to be a free member of society? This is like primae facie evidence that he’s not competent to be a member of society. I haven’t followed this closely, and so the only question that I still have is the likelihood that he will become violent. I find it hard to muster the conviction to argue for involuntary commitment on the mere basis of extended harassment – even though I might be wrong and I might not be going far enough and maybe he should locked up just for the harm he causes to others via harassment and because of his seeming unmalleable commitment to harassment.
Am I missing anything?
He’s relatively … um, restrained so far.
Here’s a random post from the bad old days I sent a friend who hadn’t encountered Markuze
back when, just to give the flavor of his former full-tilt crazy. (sadly, this one lacks his famous
GOATS ON FIRE!)
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.atheism/AXmqXe6zXIQ/RQiuwu7YmLgJ
They’ve already waited too long IMO
The problem is that they have acted, but they did so in a way (through the criminal law, using a suspended sentence as a threat) where their power had an inevitable end-date. At this point, there has to be a *new* action to force treatment on Markuze (if we’re going to do that).
Whatever his past, if it’s true that his harassing behaviors stopped during treatment then neither civil commitment for behavior of several years ago nor a prosecution for crimes that were probably (I haven’t checked) handled via plea agreement (to plead guilty to only 1 or a few and by agreement have that stand in for all the violations, with a sentencing recommendation that would be stronger than for an ordinary single violation) is going to go anywhere.
Although I’d have preferred an original disposition that had more flexibility, it seems we’re going to have to await new crimes or new evidence that Markuze requires involuntary treatment before further action is taken. This isn’t necessarily what is right or just, but it is the situation we’re in because of how his behavior was originally handled by the authorities.
I’m with you. Although, as I understand it, he hasn’t been physically hurting other, he’s clearly been harming others.
Yep.
I sense some tone that you think we’re disagreeing. Am I wrong? If I’m right, could it be that you were taking me to be describing how things “ought” to be handled with Markuze when instead I was just trying to communicate what the state of the law is (and thus what our current options are)?
As I understand the situation (which is poorly), he’s been complying with treatment requirements under the coercion of a suspended sentence. He previously didn’t stick with treatment. However, during the last 3 years under treatment, he wasn’t actually locked up. During this period of treatment, he also wasn’t harming anyone through his habit of harassment.
So if all that is true, it sounds like the right thing to do is involuntary treatment (however attained) but not incarceration and not normally in-patient treatment confined within the physical location of a hospital wing (though his treatment might includes short periods of that, the majority of time would be in whatever setting worked during the last 3 years).
To Crip Dyke
You’re right about reading into my tone. I don’t know the particulars. I tried to make it clear I don’t know the particulars. I think there’s no disagreement, and I think I misunderstood no. Again, thanks for being so nice and informative.
No problem.
have a good one.
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For the rest of us, in that group exchange, did you notice that another loony by the name of Mark was posting the same cray-cray as Dennis? I think he has a sock puppet! :D
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