Dr. Walter Palmer's Decorator

I ran across this real estate listing  and thought Ol' Dr. Palmer, who killed Cecil the lion, would love this place.

Not only is it chalk-full of dead animals, but there's what appears to be ivory as far as the eye can see.

Snuggle up with the dead fox.  

You'll never feel alone here...

The perfect place to hole up between hunting safaris.

"GET ME RYAN MURPHY!" What we know about the assault on Dustin Mitchell.

"Dorothy! Who's Dorothy?" the alarmed citizens of Emerald City cried when seeing the witch's ominous message in the sky. I was reminded of that scene this week after watching the disturbing video of the notorious Dustin Mitchell lying in a Downtown St. Louis intersection, battered and bloodied, demanding bystanders contact Ryan or possibly Brian Murphy. 

The following morning Mitchell posted he was mugged, but, perhaps because the video showing him antagonizing the driver who assaulted him went viral, replaced the post with an unusually introspective update: "Whoever decided to serve alcohol in pitchers is responsible for most of my life's problems."

Many St. Louisans who've long followed Mitchell's antics suspect this whole thing was staged. As someone who's studied and written the book on our city's colorful characters, I feel certain that's not the case. 

A staged scene would involve a sober, innocent, and well-dressed Mitchell rescuing someone from an attack, and he'd be attempting to sell the story the way he did when claiming he defended a Trans woman from a knife-wielding cab driver. He certainly wouldn't go to all this trouble to create the unflattering scene in that cringeworthy video. 

According to my source, who first brought the video to my attention, Mitchell was at a Washington Avenue bar doing shots of Jameson when he "got sassy and argumentative" with a group of patrons including a regular named Miguel, and was asked to leave. He then went to nearby Rosalitas, where I had my fateful dinner with him back in April. When the bars closed he was seen in the street surrounded by bystanders. 

I've asked Mitchell about Ryan or Brian Murphy, and will update this blog if he responds. 

Meanwhile, some have been inspired to create memes based on Mitchell's standoff with the truck, including this one from Anthony Leon Reed Jr: 

And this one from the "Maestro of Memes" Josh Jordan: 

**UPDATE: RESPONSE FROM MITCHELL**

"I was very drunk. No idea where I even was. I most likely deserved it. Everyone needs to find a new topic to discuss."

On the million dollar question about who Ryan or Brian Murphy is, Mitchell replied, "It's nobody's business."  

Gassy Unfriends Relatives over Delusions of Grandeur

Backstory:

The hothead known as Gassy is best known for his well-publicized arrest after being caught performing oral sex on a small town sheriff, and for his volatile temper. He's banned from most St. Louis LGBT bars for assaulting patrons. (He even verbally assaults the sheriff, who by all accounts is a very nice guy, when he sees him at JJ's - which is one bar he's not banned from).

People asked me to write about him for some time, but I didn't until he declared war on me early this year, allowing himself to be used as Blooper's pawn. On behalf of Blooper he vowed to take me down, along with anyone who comments on my posts, "one. by. one." and began a campaign of harassment and intimidation against a writer after Blooper revealed the pseudonym used in his popular magazine column.

The peculiar thing about Gassy is that he wants to be both feared and pitied, bizarrely oscillating between gleefully vowing to destroy his enemies and then attempting to gain sympathy with talk of being bullied by said enemies.

Family Feud:

While perusing social media Gassy learned that his own relatives had read my book, Delusions of Grandeur,  which he considered a betrayal, and unfriended them as a result.

Before the release he claimed he was in 44 pages of the book. He's not mentioned or even alluded to in the critically acclaimed work.

Nobody likes Gassy.

Snake Pit Update: Rescuing Chinstrap

For those just joining us…

Little more than a year ago a character I’ll call “Blooper” was a local magazine photographer and chef. He appeared to have a lot going for him. He’d travel to other cities for photo shoots, announce plans to buy the restaurant where he worked, and often boasted about his large suburban home, which he owned with his partner who I call “Chinstrap” due to his trademark beard.

The home was also the scene of the tragic suicide of his late partner Desmond, who hung himself in the garage.

In the past year he lost everything, beginning with the magazine gig. He then went after a former associate by revealing his pseudonym, only known by a handful of people in town, and recruited an unstable hothead known as “Gassy” to terrorize the writer and his family, which he did by sending letters to his employer and messaging him irate threats while the man was on vacation with his child.

Blooper was fired from his restaurant job for showing up drunk and causing a scene, and as he left he vowed to ensure the business failed. He took to Facebook to disparage the business and the owner, and went on to quit a few other jobs in similar fashion. His motto seemed to be "leave no bridge unburned." 

The sprawling home he boasted about owning turned out to be his disabled mother’s residence, and he had to vacate when a judge granted her an emergency protective order after he physically attacked and smothered her in a fit of rage. She came forward with tales of him abusing her, Chinstrap, and the couple’s two dogs. Chinstrap confirmed her story, telling me Blooper once doused him with liquor and tried to set him on fire. 

Once they were gone she discovered they’d stolen her identity and ran up a substantial debt with rims, concert tickets, trips to Chicago, a large television, and bar tabs. Chinstrap has a rap sheet for identity theft. "I'm sixty years old and I'll never be able to buy anything in my name again" his mother said. 

Last year the community was shocked to hear that Blooper's ex, Desmond, was in fact alive, contrary to what Blooper had claimed. While he did hang himself, and police did arrive to find a dead body, paramedics miraculously revived him. Upon waking from his coma, his family whisked him away to Northern California to start a new life. For years Blooper claimed he was dead, and he forbid anyone who knew otherwise from mentioning him. 

Back to his mother and the living situation. Blooper managed to convince many that his mother’s multiple sclerosis had caused her to lose her faculties, and he garnered a good deal of sympathy for being put out on the street as a result.

A family agreed to take in Blooper and Chinstrap, but kicked Blooper out almost immediately, after he slapped their pre-teen child. Blooper then flailed from couch to couch, and turned over his emaciated dogs to a local rescue agency where he proceeded to make a scene in the lobby over unpaid fees. 

The couple took on a third partner, a young guy I’ll call Rivers, which often left Chinstrap feeling like the odd man out. He’d leave the triad once or twice a week and take to Facebook with his heartbreak, then get back with them and delete the statuses. Rivers eventually got out, but not without paying a heavy price. 

While Gassy was the most aggressive defender of the group I refer to as “The Snake Pit,” many others expressed outrage at my coverage of their antics, despite the public way they live their lives – where every fight was online or in front of witnesses at bars or parties.

Latest Developments

Recently several defenders, former foes of mine, have come forward and requested that I get the truth out about what’s really going on. These people feel Chinstrap is being blackmailed into staying in a horrific, physically and emotionally abusive situation.

I’ve felt a sea change for a while, the sense that their friends were abandoning Blooper in droves while coalescing around Chinstrap. I first heard about tension when the group was at a Belleville pool party. A day or two earlier, during one of their weekly breakups, Blooper sent friends a video of him crying in pain while supposedly cutting himself. He threatened suicide unless Chinstrap talked to him. Friends were in crisis mode, begging Chinstrap to take action and even attempting to call Blooper’s estranged mother. At the party a friend approached Blooper, grabbed his uncut arms, and went off on him. Blooper walked away and avoided her for the rest of the event, disappearing to do drugs upstairs much of the time.

At another party at the same house Blooper physically assaulted Chinstrap in front of everybody, and then called the police on Chinstrap when he left – a move which alarmed the hosts, who didn’t want to invite police attention.

“The actual adults in our group that know everything...yes. They side with [Chinstrap]. [Blooper] has a lot of people convinced that [Chinstrap] is the problem maker though. These are all the young boys he hangs with and of course, his paralegal roommate that keeps threatening [Chinstrap] with legal shit.”

The friends spoke of Blooper threatening to get Chinstrap sent back to jail if he doesn’t jump when he says jump, saying he “has plans in motion in the event [Chinstrap] steps out of line” and all he has to do is contact his probation officer. “Blooper's thing now is to say ‘There is no fifty-fifty! It’s completely my way or nothing. He either agrees to be my bitch, give me a ride whenever I say, do whatever I tell him, or I’m going to kick his teeth in and he’s going to kick rocks!’ the friend recalled. “[Blooper] is a monster.”

When Chinstrap couldn’t get away from work to take Blooper to lunch, Blooper went on a public tirade over social media, and then called Chinstrap’s employer repeatedly with details of his criminal past.

According to the Pro-Chinstrappers, it was Blooper who stole his mother’s identity, and they say he’s admitted to framing Chinstrap for it. I, however, think they were in on it all together, and certainly enjoyed the spoils together.

Blooper’s stature has fallen like a rock in the Grove, but he still has a following in the east side strip clubs, where apparently he drinks for free. “Everybody is afraid to stand up to [Blooper] in that group. The stripper boys and such, it’s really quite sad” a former friend says. “He hangs with people that enable him to do drugs on their dime and get him drunk, again, on their dime…He hits on them, makes them feel special and they do whatever he wants. Then he acts a fool and they all think it’s funny. [Blooper’s] sheep is what I call them.”

A source close to Gassy said he now realizes how he was manipulated and used by Blooper, and the two no longer speak – although they were never close to begin with. Blooper has long made fun of him.

Gassy’s partner moved to Memphis and Gassy tagged along, where he sits around and drinks all day, bitterly plotting his revenge on me. I told his friend I’d be willing to drop the dispute if he’d apologize to the writer he terrorized for no reason, but that offer only enraged him further.

Chinstrap’s friends are using me as the jaws of life to help pull him from the wreckage of his relationship with Blooper. For the past year I’ve argued that they were two heads on the same beast, and such side taking was akin to arguing about which pile of shit smells worse. Now, though, I agree with them – to an extent. While neither smells like roses, there’s no bigger pile of shit than Blooper.

Correction: An earlier draft said Blooper's mother had  muscular dystrophy when she actually has multiple sclerosis. 

Revisiting the Resurrection of Desmond Johnson

Nothing upsets the apple cart like coming back from the dead.

Three years ago St. Louis mourned the death of Desmond Johnson, who hung himself over a volatile relationship. In a dramatic January plot twist he resurfaced, alive and well, living in Northern California.

Police found a dead body hanging in that South County garage and cut him down like a slab of meat, but miraculously paramedics were able to revive him. When he woke from his coma, family whisked him away to the West Coast.

The revelation sent shockwaves that are still reverberating through the city's LGBT community, which divided into camps- some celebrating, but others fuming about the negative light cast on his ex who, along with a handful of others, knew he was alive all along. Defenders of his ex argued Desmond was at least equally to blame for the relationship's domestic violence, while others pointed to subsequent displays of violence by his ex in the past three years, some quite public.

Old friends turned against one another, Gassy, a disgruntled gas station attendant, declared war on friends of Desmond, sending letters to people's employers and boasting about getting people kicked off of Facebook, and attempts at blackmail were made. My book became a target, with Gassy and apparently Margarine Schnapps leading the charge to get my Facebook account pulled in advance of the summer release.

Some are still angry at me for not telling "both sides" of the story regarding the rocky relationship, but my thought was only one side was told for three years (that side being the ex was the victim and Desmond's suicide was the ultimate manipulation tactic), and the point of the story was that Desmond was alive, not hair splitting over the fights.

Few have suffered more from the fallout than Jolene "Gotcha." She had been friends with all involved, and even cleaned up the blood from the garage floor.

Shortly before Desmond resurfaced she was unfriended by the ex, who took to Facebook and called her a thief for not driving across town at four in the morning to return a backpack he'd forgotten in her car. Still, some think she owed loyalty to her former friend, and should have been more vocal about his side of the story. She's been accused of pursing "fortune and fame" at his expense.

So, that's the backstory. Desmond's resurrection set off a chain of events that are still unfolding.

Today is his birthday, and he's happy and healthy two thousand miles away.

Cyber Bullying in LGBT St. Louis

Yesterday Facebook exploded over Brian Meister sending unwanted XXX pics and videos to a member of the Triad Train Wreck, resulting in a great deal of public mocking.

Fair enough, except many of those making fun of him for being "a fat pervert" on the thread are the same people who claim discussing someone's criminal history, ongoing criminal activities, or overall repugnant behavior is bullying.

You can't have it both ways.

The fact is, for many of you, if you enjoy drinking with someone it doesn't matter if they've:

• beat their mother,
• assaulted their partner in front of a dozen witnesses at the bar,
• physically and/or verbally attacked dozens,
• pulled a knife on someone,
• stolen identities,
• been convicted for having sex with minors,
• crashed into a highway trooper while drunk/high, leaving him disabled, and refused to apologize,
• or terrorized a family on vacation and tried to get people fired over a vendetta.

If they're your drinking buddy, anything said about them is bullying.

Because you find Meister unappealing, it's alright to mock, make fun, and threaten him.

For me, adults taking the heat for their actions is just called life, and bullying is something a stronger person does to a weaker person over characteristics, not their own nasty behavior.

Gassy, the biggest bully in town responsible for half of the above list, even claims he's being bullied when people (i.e. ME) discuss his latest actions. This is the guy banned from nearly every bar in town for assault, and always making threats of future assaults, but even he's got defenders.

It's time for intellectual consistency on bullying. Either prove your point by standing up for someone who don't want to drink with or screw, otherwise put on your big girl panties, grow up, and expand your vocabulary.

Heading for a Stormy Summer in STL

I typically date within a decade of my age, but last summer a fun and handsome guy about fifteen years younger asked me out, and I decided to give it a try. He was sexy and kind, and I really liked him, but in the end I couldn't get past the age difference and the feeling I was a father figure.

One of the most jarring examples was when he shut down an east side strip club, and one of his much older friends, Michael Haley, 44, ended up careening into a state trooper on his way home, seriously injuring three people. Fortunately my gentleman caller wasn't with him, but we were on a day trip days later when he received a call with instructions on what story to give to the police. The concocted tale apparently omitted certain substances and shutting down the east side club.

"Do not lie to the police, they will find out!" I said sternly.

The guy was smart and I doubt he would've altered his story, but I know people want to help out their friends and he was feeling pressured.

Jim Weckmann, owner of Rehab and Bombers Hideway, was also pulled in to Haley's web of lies.

"Trust me when I say I'm over Michael Haley. We were one of the bars he said he was at. We had to prove via cameras and credit card slips that he wasn't part of our establishment. That was last year and just last week we got another letter stating we may be called! Called for what? Never cared for the man and I feel for the cop."

I hadn't thought about the DUI incident in some time, but I was notified yesterday that Haley posted a message of encouragement to the group behind the debunked smear that I made fun of people for being HIV positive on this blog. A smear so blatantly false that it could only weather an eight minute storm before it was removed.

My illustrious list of detractors here in St. Louis includes people with rap sheets for domestic violence, assault, identity theft, sex crimes, and repeat DUI convictions. The group seems to grow and mutate by the day, and is now coalescing around a fledgling media organization. I've been threatened with both bodily harm and a cease and desist letter, my Facebook updates are always being reported, I even dealt with a bizarre attempt at blackmail.


But at least my body hasn't been destroyed by them, as of this writing. Unlike former tropper
Jeremy Potocki, a married father of three, who suffered serious brain and back injuries, and will never return to his job.

The trooper and his wife are haunted by the seeming lack of remorse from Haley.

"An apology would go a long way, that I even thought he was sorry. But I just feel he's sorry he got caught" Mrs. Potocki told KMOV. 

Of course Haley is a "no regrets, no apologies" kind of guy.

We've got a couple of months before the release of Delusions of Grandeur, and it appears it's going to be a turbulent summer in this haunted old river city as the worst people crawl out of the sewer to throw whatever they can at me.

People like to say "I don't have time for this" but the fact is I cleared my schedule last year and came to St. Louis to complete and publish my book, so I've got a little time.

Let's play.