Is Miami attorney and video game critic Jack Thompson going to jail today for contempt? I'll be there to see it with my own eyes.
Update 1: Nope, he's not. The judge filed a complaint to the Florida Bar Association and recused himself.
Here's a quick update. I have videos of my trip there, the entire trial, and a statement that followed -- will update me media clips in a little bit.
Today, at 4 p.m. at the Dade County Courthouse (aka where I used to skateboard) Jack is being asked to defend his actions to Judge Friedman. We all read dozens of Web sites calling for his blood daily, and truth be told, t is very hard for a gamer to be impartial when affairs of the Jack kind are concerned. We may disagree on a lot of things (surprise, I'm a liberal, shoot me), but
having spent some time with him I've only found him guilty of being an overprotective dad with a law degree. Nevertheless all is fair in love and war -- he's tried to take down Take-Two various times, so here's their shot to give it back. Ironic that the phrase printed on the
Bully box should fit. "Canenis camem edit" -- Dog eat dog.
So, once again, big news in video game history is being made in my back yard. I was actually hoping to get some graphic design work today but, alas, I might have to take one for the team. We just exchanged some emails.
Niero: "I can't believe it's come to this. If they let me in, I'll be there."
Jack: "Come on down!"
Hit the jump for the press release he sent out this morning. We'll be back with the scoop a little after 4 p.m., I'll call it in as soon as Thompson and Friedman are done
Bullying each other.
Take-Two, the makers of Grand Theft Auto games and the Columbine simulation game
Bully, are the great defenders of their "First Amendment right" to market and sell mature video games to children.
Bully, for example, according to the world's leading authority on the harm caused by violent games to kids—Dr. David Walsh of the Institute on Media and the Family—has weighed in on
Bully and stated, categorically, that this game has been incorrectly rated by the ESRB and should have been rated "Mature." As a result of this fraud,
Bully is being sold to children as young as ten around the country. Walsh says this game clearly teaches kids to be violent in response to bullying. Columbine's Klebold and Harris would be proud.
Two weeks ago, Miami attorney Jack Thompson, the nation's leading critic of the sale of violent video games to children, sought an injunction in Florida courts preventing the sale of
Bully under existing nuisance laws. It turns out, now that experts have played the game, that it is even more violent than Thompson knew. The game routinely rewards the use of explosives, slingshots point blank to the face, and the crushing of craniums with baseball bats and metal fire extinguishers. All of this rewarded violence is by the game's hero "Jimmy Hopkins." Take-Two has lied about what is in the game, and now the lies have been proven. Thompson will be back in court to secure the injunction he sought earlier, and he will now get it.
However, there is first something going on in a court room today. The Miami Judge who unleashed
Bully on America's children is Ronald M. Friedman, who had promised and ordered a full review of the game to its conclusion. He violated that order. He allowed paid employees of Take-Two to take him on a guided tour of the game, with no cross-examination by Thompson, in which they falsely told the Judge how nonviolent the game was and that violence is uniformly punished in the game. All lies. Finally, the judge violated his own order by publicly and falsely describing the content of the game before its public release. The judge violated another order by refusing to conduct a hearing on all this, as he had promised on October 12.
As a result of the Judge's multiple errors and violations of his own orders, Thompson took an appeal of his flawed decision and explained to the appellate court and to the media what really happened. As a result, Take-Two has asked this same Judge Friedman to fine Thompson or throw him in jail for being "disrespectful" of this Judge.
This Judge is apparently delighted by the prospect of throwing into jail the party who blew the whistle on his judicial misconduct. Today, at 4 p.m., on the 13th floor of the Dade County Courthouse, Jack Thompson is being asked to explain to Judge Friedman why he should not be held in contempt and thrown into jail.
The Take-Two lawyers asking for this are the delightful folks at Blank Rome who are a) the registered lobbyists in the US Senate and House for Take-Two, and b) the largest bundlers of campaign cash contributions to President Bush. This is the same President Bush who invited Jack Thompson to his Presidential School Violence Summit two weeks ago because of Thompson's expertise on the link between violent games like
Bully and school massacres.
What this Judge is doing violates 18 USC 241, which prohibits any state official from using his authority to infringe upon the Constitutional rights of a citizen.
Jack Thompson may be going to jail today upon the request of people who claim the First Amendment protects the sale of pornography to children but does not protect public debate about that distribution.
By the way,
Bully contains homosexual activities between Jimmy Hopkins and other male students. Is this a great country or what?
Contest:
3:26 PM on 10.25.2006 | 
