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Rikers Island State Penitentiary, NY where Raphael Golb, the son of an academic rival, could be sentenced to 4 years. . . . . .for certain emails that he sent perhaps hoping to "obtain a benefit" or perhaps hoping to "annoy," by parodying a professor; And email accounts he opened -including many he never used; And for a name he invented; And for perhaps hoping the professor might not get $650. [But which the professor got.] |
A new point about those emails, in which Raphael Golb says he "parodied" Dr. Lawrence Schiffman.
First, I repeat two points from a previous post; hang on, though, there's new info to follow.
1) "PANICKED AND CONFESSIONAL E-MAILS"
This quote from the Associated Press article Sep 14 2010 (J. Peltz):
"New York University professor Lawrence Schiffman's students and colleagues started getting panicked and confessional e-mails, in his name, that pointed to blog posts accusing him of plagiarism. Prosecutors say the e-mails and website posts were a hoax created by [Raphael Golb]."
(Of course the "website posts" themselves- accusing Schiffman of plagiarism- were not part of any "hoax"- they were Raphael Golb's deadly serious accusations.)
from: Raphael Golb Dead Sea Scrolls Blog
http://deadseascrollstrial.blogspot.com
Witness for the prosecution Dean Stimoson verified that Schiffman's colleagues found the emails "weird." Dr. Schiffman said that colleagues were asking him what was going on.
So, if Raphael Golb's intention was for people to think he really was Dr. Lawrence Schiffman, he did a terrible job of it.
Raphael Golb said he purposely made the emails "weird" ("purposely outlandish" was the phrase Raphael used often in his testimony), to be sure the emails would be recognized as fake.
On his New York University webpage, Dr. Lawrence Schiffman's professional email address (presumably the email account he uses to contact colleagues, deans and students):
lawrence.schiffman @nyu.edu
We were told the email account from which Raphael Golb's "parodies" in Dr. Schiffman's name (and 'professor' with small "p") were sent:
larry.schiffman @gmail.com
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| Dr. Lawrence Schiffman @nyu.edu |
The District Attorney's office sought up to 4 years for Raphael Golb, upstate in Reikers Island State Penitentiary. And in fact after the sentencing, rather than let Raphael wait for the Appeals office to open in 2 hours, it was ruled that Raphael should be shackled immediately and sent upstate on the very next bus to Rikers Island State Penitentiary. I wonder what horrendous crimes they thought Raphael Golb might have committed in those 2 hours.
I like to compare Raphael Golb's sentence to that of a man I once met who also served 4 years in the same State Penitentiary, for the rape of a woman he noticed jogging along the parkway. The rest was parole.
A witness for the prosecution, the person in charge of all New York University computers system-wide, stated quite emphatically, some two or three times, that it is "extremely easy" for anyone to forge an "nyu.edu" email account.
All are agreed that Raphael is a pretty bright guy. If Raphael Golb really wanted to "steal" Dr. Lawrence Schiffman's "identity"- rather than "parody" him- I'm sure Raphael Golb would have figured out a way to more closely imitate Dr. Schiffman's actual professional nyu.edu email account.
"Gmail" is possibly the most popular mail used for parody email accounts, as far as I can determine from a little googling. Here for example, the Onion newspaper takes a look inside "President Obama"'s "Gmail" Inbox, Trash and Drafts folders:
Giving Obama a "Gmail" account for presidential business, is clearly part of the joke.
Take a look at the Onion article: you will see that these are actual screenshots- actual pictures taken of an actual "gmail" account opened in Obama's name ("barry.obama1961@gmail.com.").
Clearly, the Onion writers opened this actual email account for their parody.
Take a look inside the three folders: Inbox, Trash, and Drafts. See the emails inside those folders? Clearly, the Onion writers wrote those parody emails themselves.
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In "Obama"'s "Inbox": an email from "Hilary Clinton" entitled: "Better Late than Never." The text of "Hilary Clinton"'s email begins: "B Let's take that bitch on together. I mean it. Imagine if..."
Better still, from "Dick Cheney": title of "Dick Cheney"'s email: "F-ck you." Entire text of "Dick Cheney"'s email: "F-ck you." By the way, the Onion did not leave out the "u."
In "Obama"'s trash, an email from "Joe Biden." Title: "Hellloooo??? "Joe Biden"'s text: BARACK Why won't you answer my emails? It's been three days and..."
And in "Obama"'s Drafts folder, "Obama" is in the middle of writing a message to "Eli Pariser": "Dear Eli Whatever, I WANT TO STRANGLE YOU"
... Is that meant to "annoy" or "alarm" anyone?
Take another look at the name on the "Obama" account: "barry.obama1961@gmail.com." 'Barry' like 'Larry,' diminutives and nicknames, clearly appears to be another common mark of parody.
Adding a number, as 1961 (Obama, his birthdate), is also clearly common in parody- Raphael sometimes added a number such as "2," as in "frank.cross2@gmail.com", "sarahpalin2@gmail.com."
We learned that Raphael Golb also opened an email account "sarahpalin2@gmail.com." One wonders who "sarahpalin1" @gmail might be.
Sarcasm aside, since Sarah Palin actually was in the original indictment of Raphael Golb, charging him with "criminal impersonation" of her name, because of his "sarahpalin2@gmail.com" account-- this shows me the extremes to which the indictment was looking for as many things as possible to bring against Raphael Golb.
Raphael Golb consistently used all these common parody characteristics all the time, in his email account names, blogs and emails.
We learned that Raphael Golb also opened an email account "sarahpalin2@gmail.com." One wonders who "sarahpalin1" @gmail might be.
I have seen one of the original affidavits for the search warrant, and there is indeed a charge of "criminal impersonation of Sarah Palin." I wonder what happened to that charge.
Frankly, I wish the prosecution had sent for Sarah Palin to fly in and also testify against Raphael Golb- how about for "identity theft," why not.
Sarcasm aside, since Sarah Palin actually was in the original indictment of Raphael Golb, charging him with "criminal impersonation" of her name, because of his "sarahpalin2@gmail.com" account-- this shows me the extremes to which the indictment was looking for as many things as possible to bring against Raphael Golb.
I am an English teacher. All my information and interpretations come from what I witnessed at the trial and read online. I took notes at the trial as best I could, and have looked for as much online as I can; but I do not always understand the nuances in law, or scholarship. If you see errors, please drop me a line.
