Lentz, Karl

[wserra]

Ah, I forgot about poor old Paul Gratton. Well, back in December he was sentenced to 45 months. Before that, however, he filed two civil cases, both using the Lentz tried-and-bombed method of filing a "claim" instead of a "complaint". Guess how he did.

Gratton filed the first of the civil cases against the ATF before his arrest. 15-cv-1251 (TNMD). The ATF, you see, "trespassed" on his property when he was raided and they took some stuff, including two particularly valuable items - a Gateway DX4300 (circa 2009) and an E-Machines 9600 (circa 2004). They and some peripherals attached to them - a clay tablet inscriber, perhaps? - are worth $1.1M, according to Gratton. Hey, they're antiques. Dismissed.

Next, Gratton tries a claim ("Not a complaint! Not a complaint!") against the Marshalls for also "trespassing" to take his stuff, including some of the stuff he already claimed against the ATF. This time he only claims that his valuable time is worth $5/min, instead of the $1/sec he claimed against the ATF. I guess he realizes that he's not as valuable when he's in jail. This time Lentz has a brilliant idea - Gratton should file in TN state court, away from those nasty feds. Well, the feds had an even better idea - remove it. 16-cv-97 (TNMD). Dismissed, rapidly, following removal.

But I keep the best for last. In March of last year, Gratton (pro se, of course) had a pretrial conference in Nashville before Judge Sharp. He appeared to have a new source for his juristic wisdom, one that told him that he should not speak, but rather write everything down. This groyse chochem was in court as well. Shockingly, Judge Sharp had little patience with this maneuver:

THE COURT: Well, yeah. Tell me, Mr. Gratton, who is with you there? Who is this?
Mr. Gratton, I'm talking to you. Are you going to write? Is that how we're going to play this today?
...
Let me ask you this. Why -- why can't you answer me? Why -- why -- are you going to write this down, Mr. Gratton?
All right. Let's just -- let's just move.
...
Mr. Gratton, what's your response? And I need you to come up to the podium to respond. Mr. Gratton, come up to the podium if you have a response. I'm not taking your pieces of paper; I'm talking to you.
All right. It appears that Mr. Gratton does not have a response to either one of those. Both of those motions are granted.

Effective approach. This goes on for a while until the following occurs:

THE COURT: I just -- I just told you.
Tell me your name again, sir.
All right. I don't know who this is, but Mr. Smith I think is his name.
If -- if I have asked you a question, you need to respond to me or you will be asked to leave the courtroom.
Let's -- let's get this guy out of here. Sir, you -- you need to leave the courtroom.
You just heard me. Get up and get out.
MR. GRATTON: This man is my hearing, sir. I wish for him to be with me.
THE COURT: If we need to -- if we need to call the marshals and have him physically removed, we will do that.
You need to get up, sir.
All right. Let's -- let's have him physically removed.
MR. ANTHONY SMITH: Can we --
THE COURT: Have him physically removed. Get out. I'm about two seconds from coming down there and removing
you myself. Get out.
(Mr. Smith left the courtroom.)

Gratton should have stayed with Lentz. True, he'd still be right where he is, but he'd only have pissed away one fee to an idiot.

Anybody know who "Anthony Smith" is? Earlier in the hearing, the AUSA said that he thought Smith was British.

[Jeffrey]

I'll see what I can find. In other news I've been avoiding mentioning it to not give it attention but Lentz has started a new website.

http://freeufromlaw.com/

Meanwhile of the Corpus Christi couple with FDA troubles, one was sentenced and the other was found not competent to stand trial and sent for psychiatric treatment for 4 months.

http://www.kristv.com/story/35433123/lo ... und-guilty

[Jeffrey]

Fogbow reporting he did 3 days in jail for larceny.

[wserra]

Fogbow reporting he did 3 days in jail for larceny.

He did indeed. I had meant to follow this up, and then a number of things (chief among them COVID-19, not personally but the chaos in the NY legal world) intervened. The followup turned out to be worth it.

Karl Lentz (or Carl Lentz, as he sometimes calls himself), you see, likes coffee. His problem - well, amongst his many problems - is that he doesn't like paying for it. So last October, three times over a span of five days, he goes into a local store, helps himself, and walks out without paying. After the third time, the store takes exception to Lentz quenching his thirst on its dime, and reports him to the police. They arrest him, and charge him with three counts of petit larceny. In VA, where Lentz now lives, this charge is a misdemeanor (as it is in most states).

Karl Lentz is not one to go quietly - moronically, but not quietly. So he files what he calls an "Immediate Emergency Motion: Jurisdiction". The burning question to which he seeks the immediate answer: "what is the nature of the party in whom this Court seeks?" When the court tells him to go fly a kite, he answers his own question, basically in multiple choice. One of his answers is worth repeating: the state "cannot state a claim of and or for corpus delicti". Well no, Karl, you drank the corpus delicti. Are you claiming that the state has an obligation to test and preserve your piss? Finally Lentz considerately proffers to the court a proposed order dismissing the case. In true Lentz fashion, he can't even say "case dismissed" in a way that makes any sense. The court, of course, declines to sign it.

Since he gets no relief from the court, Lentz decides that he'll show them - he demands a jury trial. In most places with which I'm familiar, the prosecutor would simply have reduced the charge to something that doesn't require a jury, thus avoiding an incredible waste of time. But VA, God bless 'em, gives Lentz his jury - which of course convicts him. Sentence - one day for each cup of coffee, to run consecutively - three days in jail. The dockets show this. Lentz appeals. The appellate docket shows that, in the eight months since Lentz filed notice of appeal, he has filed nothing else. I have no idea of the applicable VA deadline to perfect an appeal, but I'd bet that it will run.

If that were all, it would be bad enough: "Sov gets himself jail for stealing coffee". But it's Lentz, so of course it's not all. He has filed no fewer than three federal lawsuits over this stupid molehill. All three were dismissed sua sponte (for those unfamiliar with the phrase, it means that the court acted on its own motion). I have the papers, and will be happy to link to them if anyone wishes, but enough Lentz gibberish for one post. I link to the order dismissing the last of the three cases (20-cv-56, VAWD), only because of one line: "I am unable to decipher from Lentz’s petition what claims he is attempting to present to this court". Judge Jones, meet Karl Lentz.

So, for anyone considering paying Lentz to do anything more sophisticated than chopping firewood, remember this: he turned mooching coffee into jail time. Why, following his advice in handling a speeding ticket might get you the death penalty.

[NYGman]

https://religionnews.com/2020/11/04/car ... l-failure/

IS it the name??

[wserra]

The VA Court of Appeals dismissed Lentz' appeal on November 17, 2020. The docket shows that Lentz never filed a brief.

[Pottapaug1938]

Reading Lentz's unintentionally humorous "pleadings", I was struck by the use of the word "germaine".

Unless he is talking about a women of French or French-Canadian heritage (like a delightful woman who I once knew... but I digress), he is proving that a ten-cent brain should not use ten-dollar words.

[Jeffrey]

Scott found Lentz being mentioned in a recent OPCA horse smuggling case:
https://www.canlii.org/en/ab/abqb/doc/2 ... qb382.html

The relevant section:

Lentz v Sheetz (2020), 5:20-cv-00005-MFU (US District Court, W.D. Virginia, Harrisonburg Division) - Lentz stole coffee from a coffee shop. Lentz was then arrested, convicted, and incarcerated. Lentz appears to have argued he did not have to pay for coffee since it was his birthday. Lentz subsequently sued the owner of the coffee shop and claimed: “$440,000,000.00 , four hundred and forty million Dollars, one-million dollars per day for everyday i have been falsely accused of stealing brown liquid, also known as coffee, from a SHEETZ BROS COFFEE gas station, in Stuarts Draft VA.” (sic).

[wserra]

Actually, it's more than just that. Paragraphs 19-25 are all about Lentz.

ACJ Rooke!

[notorial dissent]

My how the mighty(snort snicker kaff ) have fallen, reduced to stealing coffee and then filing frivolous/outright ridiculous about it.

[eric]

The same applies to Ms. Anderson, the plaintiff mentioned in the horse smuggling case mentioned above. A 100 K$ horse is something more than a few cups of coffee. For those of you not a part of the "horsey" set, the Anderson family are a big name in equestrian sports in Canada. I'm not sure how she got hooked up with the Lentz/Christopher James Pritchard duo, I haven't been able to find any mention of her on Christopher's web site or facebook but her documents seem most like Pritchard's.

[Jeffrey]

I'm not sure how she got hooked up with the Lentz/Christopher James Pritchard duo, I haven't been able to find any mention of her on Christopher's web site or facebook but her documents seem most like Pritchard's.

It's a little hazy but I think Burnaby mentioned a horse lady that was into OPCA in Canada.

[Burnaby49]

I'm not sure how she got hooked up with the Lentz/Christopher James Pritchard duo, I haven't been able to find any mention of her on Christopher's web site or facebook but her documents seem most like Pritchard's.

It's a little hazy but I think Burnaby mentioned a horse lady that was into OPCA in Canada.

Maybe, but nowadays my memory is also "It's a little hazy" and I have no recollection of a horse lady.

[Burnaby49]

Maybe you were thinking of this;

R. v. Hurley
2017 ONCJ 263
https://canlii.ca/t/h3cq9

[1] On the 5th day of March, 2015, the Ontario Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (“OSPCA”) removed 25 horses and one goat from 534 Case Road, in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario (“the Farm”), for the stated purpose of relieving the animals’ distress.

. . . . . . . . . . .

[4] When Rebecca Hurley did attend at the trial she objected to the proceedings and regularly challenged the jurisdiction of the court. She made a number of unsuccessful requests, including: a trial by jury; a common law court of record; the discharge of the matters; and the return of her property (i.e. animals). Many of the positions she advanced can be characterized as “organized pseudo legal commercial argument” as explained in Meads v. Meads, [2012] ABQB 571 (CanLII). She also challenged the qualifications of two of the prosecution’s expert witnesses on two voir dires. However, she did not appear to complete the trial with the result that the she did not cross-examine any prosecution witnesses at the trial proper and she did not present any evidence in her defence. Therefore, the evidence of the prosecution witnesses was unchallenged.

[5] On March 13, 2017, I found Albert Hurley not guilty of all seven counts charged. I found Rebecca Hurley not guilty of the first count on the Information, but guilty of the six remaining counts. On that day, I committed to providing these written reasons.

[Jeffrey]

Ok I figured it out, I was thinking of this veterinarian:

https://www.quatloos.com/Q-Forum/viewto ... 60#p176860

I must have confused dogs with horses.

[Burnaby49]

Ok I figured it out, I was thinking of this veterinarian:

https://www.quatloos.com/Q-Forum/viewto ... 60#p176860

I must have confused dogs with horses.

You remembered a minor posting from 2014? I write the topic up and I don't remember it.

[JamesVincent]

You remembered a minor posting from 2014? I write the topic up and I don't remember it.

You don't remember what you had for breakfast yesterday.

[Burnaby49]

Same as today, two poached eggs on hashbrowns.

[JamesVincent]

Same as today, two poached eggs on hashbrowns.

Mix some scrapple in there and that sounds awesome.

[Burnaby49]

Same as today, two poached eggs on hashbrowns.

Mix some scrapple in there and that sounds awesome.

Scrapple is typically made of hog offal, such as the head, heart, liver, and other trimmings, which are boiled with any bones attached (often the entire head), to make a broth.

Top that with some homemade South Carolina mustard BBQ sauce and I'm in. I'm a big fan of offal. I've got two whole lamb livers in the freezer and two beef tongues curing in the fridge.