Chapter 3 of my Substack research, titled Earth Horse Beats Fire Horse Dead, Dead, Dead, is up at my Substack, so check it out.
Yesterday was my birthday, so thank you to the handful of well-wishers who reached out. I spent the evening alone, watching Donnie Darko, so it was quite a party, but in a retarded town like Missoula, being alone is the safest option.
On Friday I watched someone present information on homeless trash and how he’s picking it up because it’s everywhere. I also listened to one of the participants suggest this guy should get money and support for the amazing work he’s doing, the same person who said something similar about Ryan Tollefson after he got ARRESTED for picking up homeless trash two years ago.
NBC Montana has been following cleanup efforts along West Broadway Street in Missoula. On Wednesday, the man who took it upon himself to move debris from the riverbank to the sidewalk was arrested for disorderly conduct.
Ryan Tollefson said police arrested him after he defended himself when a homeless person attacked him. The man accused Tollefson of taking away his possessions.
I’m not trying to throw shade on the local effort to hold our public officials more accountable, because good work has been accomplished through this group, most recently the volunteer-led cleanups of the Snowbowl parking lot owned by the asshole who refuses to be proactive in dealing with “car camping”. But, despite incremental accomplishments, many of the participants still don’t understand how vicious the lawfare can be when you cross the clique running this town, so I do my best to warn them.
Unfortunately, taking the time to warn people makes me feel just like Cassandra.
The Cassandra metaphor (variously labeled the Cassandra “syndrome”, “complex”, “phenomenon”, “predicament”, “dilemma”, “curse”) relates to a person whose valid warnings or concerns are disbelieved by others.
The term originates in Greek mythology. Cassandra was a daughter of Priam, the King of Troy. Struck by her beauty, Apollo provided her with the gift of prophecy, on the condition that she agree to accept his romantic advances (or without prior agreement from Cassandra, depending on the source), but when she refused Apollo’s romantic advances, he placed a curse on her, ensuring that nobody would believe her warnings. Cassandra was left with the knowledge of future events but could neither alter these events nor convince others of the validity of her predictions.
If your community has corrupt cops, corrupt prosecutors, a corrupt Sheriff’s Office running corrupt jails, and corrupt state oversight, my prediction is the Federal authorities will be just another layer of corruption, too distracted by an FBI director defending literal animal fuckers to pay attention to fusion center complicity in drug trafficking.
Tomorrow, in furtherance of reducing this local ignorance, I’m implicating our Police Chief, Mike Colyer, in helping setup, then cover up, Sean Stevenson’s death. Another name tied to this case is Bob Franke, the police officer who was once partially paid by the Downtown Business Association to manage the downtown transient population before becoming the Detective who was apparently standing in the St. Pats hospital room when Sean Stevenson was being removed from life support by the coroner for the Missoula County Sheriff’s Office.
Like Mike Colyer, Bob got himself a promotion for controlling the narrative around Sean Stevenson’s death and ensuring early attention went to the patsy, Johnny Lee Perry, who got himself shot in the back in the woods 20 months after Sean died.
This is SUCH a small town that I even know Lydia Arnold, the woman who briefly served as the “communications officer” (read paid narrative controller) for the police and, before that, a one-time volunteer for me when I coordinated the Homeless Outreach Teams for the Poverello Center.
Why were you guys so interested in homeless people back then, Bob and Lydia? Another small-town question in my mind is what kind of gossip Lydia Arnold could have gleaned about ME by attending the women’s group for the church my mother still attends.
And people wonder why I hate this town.
It makes sense that people don’t want to sacrifice their paychecks, social status, mental stability, and literal freedom to stand up for what they claim to believe in–like, for me, that would be NOT killing a homeless man in a coma before notifying his family–and that’s why I told the judge who loves bathrooms and nothingburgers about the chilling effect he was enacting by validating the delusions of a very unwell person:
If the County Prosecutors who regularly clear cops of killing people with performative coroner’s inquests want to put me back in jail for writing about what’s happening to me, they should do it. If they want to put me back in jail for being too broke to afford the $395 dollars for my electronic harassment, they should do it.
And if they want to add another charge for continuing to ask where my stolen property is, then THEY SHOULD DO IT!
And if YOU, dear reader, would like to donate digital dollars to my future commissary fund, here’s the place to do it.
Thanks for reading. Tomorrow’s post is already scheduled to drop at 9am.
