jack thompson

National news



Sept. 25, 2006, 6:58PM
Suit blames video game for N.M. slayings


© 2006 The Associated Press

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Family members of three people slain by a 14-year-old on newsman Sam Donaldson's New Mexico ranch sued the makers of the video game "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City" on Monday, claiming the crimes would not have occurred had the teenager never played the violent game.

The $600 million lawsuit names several companies and Cody Posey, who it alleges played the game "obsessively" for several months before he shot his father, stepmother and stepsister in July 2004. Posey, now 16, was sentenced earlier this year to state custody until he is 21.


The games and others in the "Grand Theft Auto" series depict police killings and other acts of violence. The lawsuit calls various editions of the game "virtual reality murder simulators."

"But for Posey's use of these products ... he would not have killed," the lawsuit claims.

The game trained him "how to point and shoot a gun in a fashion making him an extraordinarily effective killer without teaching him any of the constraints or responsibilities needed to inhibit such a killing capacity," according to the suit.

According to the suit, plaintiffs' lawyer Jack Thompson was told by a sheriff's deputy that the game and a Sony PlayStation 2 were found at the ranch.

Posey had told police he shot his family after his father, the ranch foreman, slapped him for not cleaning horse stalls fast enough. Prosecutors described Posey as a ruthless killer, but his lawyers claimed his father had abused him for years.

The plaintiffs accuse the corporate defendants _ Sony Corporation of America, Take-Two Interactive Software Inc. and its subsidiary, Rockstar Games _ of a "civil conspiracy," saying they should have foreseen their entertainment "would spawn such copycat violence."

"We believe the suit is without merit and we will strongly defend the company," Take-Two spokesman Jim Ankner said.

The Associated Press left a message Monday at Sony's New York headquarters seeking comment.

The lawsuit was filed by Verlin Posey of Texline, Texas, representing the estate of the teen's father, Delbert Posey; and Pat and Leona Basham of Elephant Butte, parents of Tryone Posey and grandparents of Marilea Schmid.

Thompson also is the attorney in a $600 million Alabama lawsuit against Rockstar, Take-Two and Sony that blames "Grand Theft Auto" for the 2003 murders of two police officers and a dispatcher at a rural police department. Devin Moore, now 20, was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in that case.

As to what is being done to me by the video game industry, Insider-style: Sweetie, you have no idea. How idiotic that you would claim to know. Stay tuned. You might learn something. In the interim, I'd had my life threatened repeatedly and other stuff done that I'm not going to publish here. How dare you assert that you know something about something you know absolutely nothing about!

As to the rest of you gamers, please note: The goofball who made the above comment is typical of the video gamer's argument, and it goes like this: I don't want something to be true, so I'll assume it it not, and then work forward from there.

As to the Colbert information: He has another brother. I've spoken with him. His name is Jim. He's confirmed he's Steven's brother. Wow, how stupid can gamers be? Very it seems.

Immediate News Release – 9/23/06

Landmark Lawsuit to Be Filed Monday against Video Game Industry

Last March and July, Miami attorney and anti-violent video game activist appeared on CBS’ 60 Minutes to discuss a wrongful death lawsuit he filed, along with co-counsel, against Sony, Take-Two, Wal-Mart, and GameStop for making and selling to an Alabama teen the Grand Theft Auto: Vice City game. The cop-killing murder simulator trained this teen to kill three cops in Alabama. Four experts who have testified before Congress have told the Alabama court that if he had not played the game, he would not have killed. Strong stuff, but it happens to be true.

Now the Alabama Supreme Court has rejected the industry’s bogus First Amendment arguments, and the case is proceeding to trial this next year. Damages sought are $600 million, and that may be low, as Alabama’s statutes require punitive damages based upon the net worth of the corporate targets. Is this a great state or what!

On Monday, September 25, Thompson will journey to another state and announce, with his co-counsel, the filing of what will likely prove to be hugely significant wrongful death action against Sony and Take-Two. The angel is in the details, as this battle in the “culture war” may indeed eclipse even what is going on in Alabama.

On thing Thompson will talk about at the news conference are the ways in which the industry has targeted him and his family for harm in retaliation for his appearance on 60 Minutes. Anyone who has seen The Insider, whose title role was played by Russell Crowe as Jeffrey Weigand, the Big Tobacco whistleblower, knows what Thompson is going through. Leading the extortion charge is the giant Philadelphia law firm of Blank Rome, which gives more money to George Bush than anyone. Blank Rome is Take-Two’s registered lobbyist on Capitol Hill, specializing in “opposition research and destruction.”

One thing that is useful in what is going to occur Monday is that the prosecutor of the kid who killed in this instance actually called Thompson and asked him to bring this lawsuit. That’s the equivalent of “man bites dog.” Law enforcement typically circles the wagons when a perp who has killed trains to do so on virtual reality simulators, because of the short-sided, knee-jerk, public safety-endangering response of law enforcement that “We don’t want to explain this behavior, because it looks like an excuse.”

That’s an understandable response, but a deadly dangerous one, as our society must come to grips, and quickly, with the fact that entertainment copycat killings are occurring all over the place. Just take a look at what happened this month at Dawson College in Montreal.

Contact Jack Thompson for more details at 305-666-4366.

Oh, here's a little interesting tidbit for you Jon Stewart lapdogs: Steven Colbert (very funny guy)has a brother Jim Colbert, although he pronounces the T.

Jim is the assistant DA in Los Angeles (City of Angels for you gamers who don't read much). Colbert is the lead attorney in the LA lawsuit against Take-Two for the fraudulent marketing and sale of GTA: SA.

He's a very nice guy, and he really likes the information I gave him. Go figure.

Oh, and for imparting this information: You're welcome again.

Now: Put down the controller, step back from the platform, and get a life. Jack Thompson

Actually, the better question is this: Who will save idiot gamers from themselves?

The answer is this: I shall.

I'm holding a nationally significant news conference Monday to announce what will be a major blow to the let's-molest-minors-for-money video game industry. The media are lined up, and will be there. Trust me.

Oh, and for all you gamers whose frontal lobes--or what is left of them--I seek to save: You're welcome!

In Christ, Jack Thompson, Your Humble But Persevering Servant HOOAH!

Speaking of video game addiction:

I am hold a major news conference on Monday. The media in the locale quite distant from my home are all atwitter, and I am sure you all will be as well when you find out what this is about.

Hope you gamers can all be there. We'll have addiction treatment doctors standing by.

Jack Thompson

Your serial spinner here, Dennis McCauley of GamePolitics, is presently reporting at 5pm on Tuesday, September 19, at his own vanity site, that the important American Psychological Association Report of August 2005 states that there is only correlation between violent video game play and increased aggression in teens, not causation.

Dr. Brad Bushman, who is one of the members of the APA Committee which issued that study states to me that that is utterly false, and that the APA study found causation.

If you go to the study itself you'll find that it speaks repeatedly of causation, not correlation.

There goes your Dennis the Menace again. Why you have him do a "column" here is beyond me, what with the above nonsense at which he has been caught.

First of all beemoh, get a real name. I use mine, because I'm not a coward.

Secondly, gamers apparently think they're the only ones who have a right to be edgy, sarcastic, and sometimes just downright in-your-face. Gamers do have a near corner on the hypocrisy market, however. Not total, but near.

Thirdly, if you were paying attention (but you haven't been, because you're a gamer) you would know that video games really do fry your brain. See Harvard, Indiana, and Michigan State brain studies. So, if the fried brains reference bothers you, go cry to Harvard, if you are still able to read a map.

Fourthly, "video game culture" is an oxymoron so funny that Dennis McCauley doesn't get it. Any person who understands culture and history and, oh, reality gets it. Again, that is why you don't get it.

If you want to complain about my news releases, then please tell me how many national shows you've been on because of your brilliantly conceived and executed news releases. I've been on 60 Minutes twice, Today eight times, BBC and other UK telecasts probably ten times, Good Morning America twice, Paula Zahn's programs five times (she's incredibly beautiful in person, by the way. want her autograph?), and about 60 other shows, including Oprah (she's a pain).

So,my press releases work just fine. How yours coming?

Hooah!

Dennis McCauley should crawl back under the rock he oozed from:

Immediate News Release - September 14, 2006


Video Game Site’s SLAPP Bar Complaint against Anti-Video Game Activist Found to Be Baseless; Thrown Out by The Florida Bar



WARNING TO VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY “REPORTERS”:

HARASSING JACK THOMPSON IS DANGEROUS TO YOUR VOCATIONAL HEALTH



Dennis McCauley is a Philadelphia-based “journalist” who writes freelance articles for the Philadelphia Inquirer promoting video games as “culture.” Petri dish culture, maybe.



Mr. McCauley decided he didn’t like Jack Thompson’s activism and Thompson’s pushing back against McCauley’s readers’ harassment of Thompson, so Mr. McCauley filed what is called a SLAPP bar complaint against Thompson with The Florida Bar claiming that Thompson is “unethical.” SLAPP is an acronym for “strategic litigation against public participation,” and it is a device increasingly used by corporations to deter citizens from participating in the public square against their predatory, reckless practices.



Mr. McCauley learned this SLAPP methodology studying the huge Blank Rome law firm, curiously also based in Philadelphia, which filed its own SLAPP Bar complaints against Thompson to punish him for his successes against Blank Rome’s client, Take-Two, which makes, markets, and sells its violent video games to children, including the Grand Theft Auto games.



Bad news hit today for Mr. McCauley who also runs a video game obsession site at www.gamepolitics.com. The Florida Bar, which is no fan of Jack Thompson, took a hard look at McCauley’s ridiculous Bar complaint and wrote Mr. McCauley the following in a letter dated September 11:



“This is to advise you that on the basis of a diligent and impartial analysis of all the information available as of this date, The Florida Bar has found no present basis for further inquiry. Therefore, this case is now closed.”



McCauley, by the way, refused to disclose to his web readers that he had filed a Bar complaint against Thompson, yet continued to attack Thompson at his web site, even going so far as to cite Thompson’s problems with The Florida Bar caused by the entertainment industry SLAPP filers. Any real journalist knows of the duty to disclose such a conflict of interest. McCauley pretended to be impartial to his readers while personally pursuing a Bar complaint against a public figure he was scathingly writing about! The dishonesty of that is taught in Journalism 101.



Closed hopefully is the door to other Taliban-tactics of video game enthusiasts who have tried, with death threats, bar complaints, and operatives dispatched to Thompson’s neighborhood in Miami to intimidate him into silence about the public safety hazards posed by violent video games which are serving as murder simulators. The guy in Montreal this week who went on a shooting rampage in his college was an obsessive video gamer. Two of his favorite games were Take-Two games, by the way, including Grand Theft Auto. All of this news is spilling out now up north, as Canada is in an uproar about the linkage of the games to the massacre. Thompson has been contacted all day long by media to explain the nexus. Dennis McCauley has not called, however.



Possible legal action against McCauley is being considered, as Thompson is preparing a federal lawsuit to punish porn and video game industry lawyers for repeatedly using The Florida Bar to harass Thompson. McCauley foolishly inserted himself into that mix. Relatedly, another video game web site has today put itself in harm's way. So many knuckleheads with brains fried by games; so little time.



CONTACT Jack Thompson for more information. Contact the Philadelphia Inquirer to see if McCauley is still a freelance “journalist” for that newspaper.

and this just in:

Immediate News Release – 9/14/06



Montreal School Shooter Trained for Massacre on Two Violent Video Games



Dawson College student Kimveer Gill apparently literally trained on his two favorite murder simulation video games to go on his college shooting spree, just as did Klebold and Harris at Columbine High.



The two games, according to Gill’s own web site, are Postal and Super Columbine Massacre.



Miami attorney and anti-violent video game activist over a year ago challenged the maker of Postal, Vince Desi at Running with Scissors in Tucson, Arizona, to publicly debate whether or not his company should continue marketing Postal. Thompson predicted that it might lead to a mass killing, as a mass knife assault in Russia had been linked to Postal. Desi refused. Desi is now likely to have his company named in a wrongful death action in Canada: http://www.totalvideogames.com/news/Jack_Thompson_Double_Dare_You_9141_2629_0.htm



Even more remarkably, Thompson last year appeared on CBS’s 60 Minutes regarding a wrongful death case that he and his co-counsel filed in Alabama on behalf of the families of three cops slain by a teen who trained on Grand Theft Auto: Vice City to kill. The video game training of the Alabama killer became known when he was quoted as saying: “Life is like a video game. You have to die sometime.” Kimveer Gill, the Montreal massacrist, is quoted saying precisely the same thing, while enthusing about his play on violent video games:

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060914/gill_profile_060914/20060914?hub=Canada and

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/06/17/60minutes/main702599.shtml



The massacre in Montreal is simply the latest tragedy of mass killing linked to violent virtual reality murder simulators. The worst is yet to come. Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc., is set to release on October 17 the game Bully, which in every sense is a Columbine simulator.



CONTACT Jack Thompson at 305-666-4366.

Dear Knuckleheads at Joystiq (sadly, you don't know who you are), note the causal nexus, not the correlation, between violent game play and violence. Duh:

Violent video games alter brain's response to violence
17:17 12 December 2005
NewScientist.com news service
Helen Phillips
A brain mechanism that may link violent computer games with aggression has been discovered by researchers in the US. The work goes some way towards demonstrating a causal link between the two - rather than a simple association.

Many studies have concluded that people who play violent video games are more aggressive, more likely to commit violent crimes, and less likely to help others. But critics argue these correlations merely prove that violent people gravitate towards violent games, not that games can change behaviour.

Now psychologist Bruce Bartholow from the University of Missouri-Columbia and colleagues have found that people who play violent video games show diminished brain responses to images of real-life violence, such as gun attacks, but not to other emotionally disturbing pictures, such as those of dead animals, or sick children. And the reduction in response is correlated with aggressive behaviour.

The brain activity they measured, called the P300 response, is a characteristic signal seen in an EEG (electroencephalogram) recording of brain waves as we register an image. The P300 reflects an evaluation of the emotional content of an image says Bartholow, being larger if people are surprised or disturbed by an image, or if something is novel.

Violent scenes
The team recruited 39 experienced gamers, and used questionnaires to assess the amount of violent games they played. They then showed them real-life images, mostly of neutral scenes, but interspersed with violent or negative (but non-violent) scenes, while recording EEGs.

In subjects with the most experience of violent games, the P300 response to the violent images was smaller and delayed. “People who play a lot of violent video games didn’t see them as much different from neutral,” says Bartholow. They become desensitised. However, their responses are still normal for the non-violent negative scenes.

This may not be surprising - video games have been used to desensitise soldiers to scenes of war. But when the players were subsequently given the opportunity to “punish” a fake opponent in another game, those with the greatest reduction in P300 brain responses meted out the most severe punishments.

Even when the team controlled for the subjects’ natural hostility, assessed by standard questionnaires, the violent games experience and P300 response were still strongly correlated with aggressiveness. “As far as I’m aware, this is the first study to show that exposure to violent games has effects on the brain that predict aggressive behaviour,” says Bartholow.