Ungagged

It's been a long time since I've written about William Cassidy, the man stalking Jetsunma and harassing our sangha since 2007. It was a forced and difficult silence; we were all prevented from discussing the case or responding to his continued online attacks while the legal proceedings were underway. It was brutal seeing Jetsunma tormented every day for years without being able to rise to her defense and watching helplessly as her health deteriorated to the point where she is now living with severe pain and multiple stress-induced conditions.

Unfortunately justice did not prevail. Several months ago we learned that the judge dismissed the case, concluding that William Cassidy was merely expressing his First Amendment rights to free speech when he bombarded Jetsunma with those 8,000+ tweets and blog posts-- a sickening collection of vulgar, hateful and threatening messages. Additionally, the judge asserted that since Jetsunma is a public figure she's basically fair game and Cassidy's comments weren't a "true threat." Really. Here are a few of Cassidy's "not-a-true-threat" tweets using various accounts:

("Tora, Tora, Tora" is the phrase Japanese kamikaze pilots shouted before striking their targets)

As disturbing as those tweets would be coming from anyone, remember that William Cassidy is a violent, convicted felon, not some teenage boy firing off scary-sounding tweets to mess with people. We take his threats quite seriously even if the judge didn't.

Since Cassidy's release from federal prison, he's resumed his online attacks on Jetsunma, our sangha and KPC. Of course.

So that's the update on Cassidy. The final piece to add is that--as if Cassidy weren't enough-- in February, 2011, we learned we had a second stalker named Andrew Wilson. This article gives the background on how that happened and the ways he's joined forces with Cassidy in cyberstalking Jetsunma. Due to various investigations we were also forced to remain silent in the face of Wilson's harassment and threats, so as William Cassidy awaited trial in federal prison Andrew Wilson was running amok online.

The charge of cyberstalking would have made legal precedent and saved countless lives. Someday it will, no doubt. It's just a matter of time before someone (statistically likely to be a woman) is killed by someone (statistically likely to be a man) after a period of intensifying cyberstalking. Having lived through this nightmare, I can tell you that cyberstalking is no different from "real life" stalking, in which the violent threats escalate as the victim tries in vain to protect herself. The law fails victims of "real life" stalking every day, and it has now failed victims of cyberstalking as well.

What Jetsunma has had to endure deserves to be told. Stay tuned.