this post was submitted on 29 Feb 2024
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The envelope never made it to Judge Arthur Engoron, but caused an emergency response at the courthouse.

Judge Arthur Engoron, who handed down a $355 million ruling against former President Donald Trump in his civil fraud trial, was sent an envelope containing white powder on Wednesday, causing an emergency response at his New York City courthouse, a source with direct knowledge of the incident confirmed to NBC News.

The judge and his staff were not exposed to the substance — his mail is pre-screened on a daily basis and was intercepted before it reached him, the source said. A court officer opened the letter and powder fell out, according to the New York Police Department, exposing the officer and another court employee to the substance, the source said. The New York City Fire Department said the two refused any medical treatment. The threatening letter was first reported by ABC News.

The threat is far from the first against the judge. Police on Long Island responded to a bomb threat at his home last month, hours before closing arguments in the Trump trial were scheduled to begin.

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[–] [email protected] 126 points 8 months ago (7 children)

Someone is about to meet the Postal Inspection Service and have a very bad time. You do not fuck with the mail. They will find your ass.

[–] [email protected] 92 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Unless you're Louis DeJoy, then you can fuck with the mail all you want with impunity.

[–] [email protected] 44 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Oh yeah I forgot about that story arc.

I didn't realize he's still post master general. There's a Time article claiming he's been doing a lot of beneficial stuff now. But I honestly have no idea how biased it is toward any agenda.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 8 months ago (1 children)

He saw which way the wind was blowing, and decided to use his powers for good. I don't think he's stupid, just unscrupulous.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago

Yeah, I got the impression that he's just opportunistic.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

Wow interesting article, really paints him in a different light

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago

Just an FYI, Biden could remove him anytime he wants. He won't. He has appointed enough postal governors to get a new Postmaster General.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 8 months ago (4 children)

I feel like it would be pretty easy to untraceably send a single letter. False return address, address written slowly with your alternate hand (or printed), dropped in an unmonitored street mailbox a few hours away from your home…how would USPIS find such a person?

[–] [email protected] 20 points 8 months ago

In that situation, they wouldn’t find them.

But in many other situations, criminals do dumb things like writing their return address.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Municipal or private CCTV by the mailbox? In the UK at least it's quite common.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 8 months ago (11 children)

Letter boxes don’t stamp the specific location in most places. And even if they did, you could just use an outgoing box at a large community, or someone’s house mailbox.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 8 months ago (3 children)

Printed? Your printer leaves a unique pattern on all its documents. Oooh

Dropped in a mailbox, oooh the neighbour across the road has a ring doorbell

Didn't turn off your phone? Ooooh

[–] [email protected] 11 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Let's be honest though these people probably took a photo of them posting it, and now it's on up on twitter.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

My money would be on Truth Social or a QAnon/Maga facebook group.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago

I just like the idea that somebody might be stupid enough to put their real return address on the envelope, and your suggestion is the first time that it's occurred to them that they might not need to do that.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Agent Jack Danger is on the case.

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[–] [email protected] 75 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Terrorists, plain and simple

[–] [email protected] 36 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

Or you can use the alternative spelling: r-e-p-u-b-l-i-c-a-n

[–] [email protected] 23 points 8 months ago

They are all domestic terrorists I hear. From them. I heard it from them.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago

Cuckservatives

[–] [email protected] 38 points 8 months ago (2 children)

I feel like this kind of behavior can be attributed to the unintended consequences of social media engagement algorithms, black boxes taking over peoples minds and turning them into angry thralls, it's like a natural disaster. Trump was basically an internet meme and he evolved into this

[–] [email protected] 25 points 8 months ago (1 children)

American education has also been nerfed to the masses, so critical thinking skills were destroyed. They created a system of useful idiots for control, rather than educating a nation for prosperity. This has been decades in the making.

Trace the money.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago (3 children)

I don't believe in conspiratorial thinking though. I don't think this happened on purpose. Social media algorithms were built to maximize engagement by collecting user data, the algorithms learned that people engage more if posts amplifying negative emotions are amplified, and that explains how stuff like this happened. It's actually scarier to realize the state of society is because of an accident caused by negligent capitalism rather than tyranny.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 8 months ago (1 children)

People were sending white powders in the mail before social media.

Social media exacerbates it, but extremism is a social/ cultural acceptance issue.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

It's the level that behavior has been amplified that's scary and unusual, before the internet it was only the most extreme fringe groups. It isn't normal to go online and feel like a 50/50 chance everybody you meet is an extremist. That's a recent thing just sometime within the last 10 years and it's never been like that before ever

[–] [email protected] 23 points 8 months ago (3 children)

Anyone remember anthrax and ricin scares of days past?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

Yea there was one at my university for ricin which ended up being a false positive

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

I hope it was cocaine to make him work hard in the case.. wall street vibing..

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I send good bribes, the best bribes, and the crooked NYPD dump them out on the ground

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

Naw. They arrest the messenger, take one of those “million dollars in coke” pictures, then snort it anyways.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 8 months ago (5 children)

A court officer opened the letter and powder fell out, according to the New York Police Department, exposing the officer and another court employee to the substance, the source said. The New York City Fire Department said the two refused any medical treatment.

Uhhh - so two employees were exposed to a yet unknown substance that has to be at least considered to be harmful and were even allowed to refuse medical treatment? Am I missing something here?

[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago

shit they'll probably be charged for the medical treatment. Every Americans knee-jerk reaction these days is avoid the hospital and ambulances for fear of medical debt wiping us out.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Until we know what the substance was we could be missing a lot. The letter could have been more of a threat than an attempt. Maybe it's just baby powder or maybe they just didn't breathe any of it in. The powder is probably just presued harmful until proven otherwise. Does that help clarify? In my opinion this article shouldn't have been released in this form. It's to wordy with to little information.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Yeah, the article isn't all that great. Still, the fact that the two exposed employees refused medical treatment suggests to me, that the nature of the substance at least wasn't yet known at that time, since it shouldn't be necessary to even offer that, if the substance was known to be something harmless like baby powder.

Cheers, though!

[–] [email protected] 11 points 8 months ago (3 children)

A: You think we should call the ambulance? B: Nah, I didn't even touch it, and it's probably nothing anyway.

"Refused medical treatment"

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

B: Nah, I cannot afford medical care. I'm only covered if my life is clearly in danger.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

You have the right to refuse treatment at any time you want.

Now, there may be other things going on, like observation and isolation. There’s not a lot that can be done anyhow; until symptoms of something start showing up, most likely the fastest way to verify what treatment is appropriate is to run tests on the powder.

That’s the kind of thing that gets put at the front of the line.

Probably just cornstarch or baby powder. But also, both those could conceivably be a carrier for something.

If I was their boss I’d go with the “and let you spread it to your family?” Guilt trip instead.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 8 months ago (3 children)
[–] [email protected] 33 points 8 months ago

That's just Don Jr.'s Silk Road order coming in.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Maybe it's Russian interference. Send white power derived envelopes to prominent players on both sides to get the people riled up against each other.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Don Jr is sending white powder to the judge. Let's hope he got his baggies mixed up and Don is snorting anthrax right now.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago

I wonder if the sender will do their federal and state sentences concurrently or consecutively.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago

What is it? 2001 again?

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