Question comes as a kind of addition to one I asked awhile back. It was about having met a truly evil person. I can tell the story again if anyone is interested but as a young teen I interacted with a guy in the Aryan brotherhood from California several times.

  • 2piradians@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    I went to high school with a psychopath. He was a friend of an idiot friend. He beat up a quiet kid on the bus once and later tried to steal my car. He disappeared for awhile, and I later learned he’d been locked up. I searched him on the internet a few months ago because I had a feeling he’d be in prison.

    Yep. He raped a girl, beat up her boyfriend, and was being hunted down for burglary when the cops cornered him (I think on the rooftop of a 2-story house). Then he said some stupid line and backflipped off the roof.

    After awhile in prison he managed to get hold of the tool the prison guards use to slide the food trays while the new guard was in the cell with him. He beat the guard to death with it, then acted casual about it. There’s a video of the aftermath.

    So he’s on death row now, trying to play the Jesus card.

    There’s a shitty Amazon doc about him, name is Billy Tracy.

    EDIT: When you mentioned knowing a truly evil person, that’s what Billy is. I could see it in his eyes from the moment I met him, just a void. When I searched him up his parents weren’t mentioned much, but what was there seemed to indicate they were as baffled as anyone about how he turned out. Maybe, who knows.

    • muxika@piefed.muxika.org
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      3 days ago

      Do you know that they were involved in violent acts? Did they serve overseas?

      Also, if they did commit acts of violence, were they justifiable (for saving a person’s life from an assailant, for example)?

        • muxika@piefed.muxika.org
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          Good on ya for respecting the gravity of it and his silence about it. It’s fucking horrible what war does to people. You could sign a contract with the best of intentions, naive as they may be. Regardless of why you joined, they have your ass, and whatever you’re forced into will weigh on you.

          • YappyMonotheist@lemmy.world
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            2 days ago

            “Best of intentions”

            My man, you joined the military, not a bakery. And if you joined the American one, even if you’ve only had a diet of strict pro-Western imperialism propaganda, you KNOW you’re signing up to kill. And they don’t “have your ass” as much as God does, and whatever punishment they would’ve gotten is certainly not as bad as Hell, but these people don’t believe in anything in earnest.

  • Agent641@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    I worked with a guy who cut the head off a child molester in prison. He was ok but a bit short tempered.

  • callouscomic@lemmy.zip
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    2 days ago

    Yeah, my oldest brother … also a lot of cops. They all did the same shit to their wives. The cops don’t go to jail for it though.

    • Chippys_mittens@lemmy.worldOP
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      2 days ago

      There’s a motorcycle club centered around protecting kids and at risk teens near me. I always toss some cash into their bucket at local events. They sell merch and give out stickers.

        • SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca
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          If you are really interested, look up the psychology term “projection”.

          These bikers show up to motorcycle meets and they are creepy as fuck, and not infrequently, one gets arrested for child porn and pedophilia.

          • Chippys_mittens@lemmy.worldOP
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            1 day ago

            Idk, I did a little research and it looks like thats happened 5 times in total since 1995. With a total population of 3,000 plus bikers currently and thousands in and out in the last 30 years. I’m not a biker so I cant speak to what you’re saying about having met them at meets. I just think generalizing that they are all projecting is inaccurate based on numbers and the positive impact they seem to have. Again though, if your lived experience is different I can’t dispute that.

  • InvalidName2@lemmy.zip
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    I only met the guy after he was released from prison. His violent act was murder, but he plead guilty to manslaughter so he got a shorter sentence and possibility of parole.

    Anyway, before the incident, he was part of the friends group that I had more recently joined. So when he got out, he started hanging with us. From the very first time I met him, his behavior concerned me. I wrote it off thinking I was judging him unfairly or irrationally since I knew he’d murdered someone. It was like he was only pretending to be friendly, just enough to fool the people who knew him, but it was a thin veneer covering over unhinged emotions.

    Problem was, initially the off putting behavior was all inconspicuous and easy enough to rationalize, so I held back saying anything to my other friends. They didn’t seem to notice, or if they did, they weren’t saying anything. So, it felt isolating.

    In the end, that isolation was the opportunity this guy used to target me. Turns out his shtick (and psychopathic gift) was to manufacture drama between people and pit them against each other. He started with me, or at least it seems like he started with me – probably because I seemed like an easy target.

    The first incident I remember is when someone’s favorite lighter went missing, we tore the house apart looking for it, and the murderer miraculously found it in my bedroom. I’d never even left the room until we started searching, so fortunately I was given the benefit of the doubt. But stupid shit like that kept happening, but only when he was around.

    Where he really messed up is that he started pulling this same shit on others, and eventually enough of us did the math.

  • gigastasio@sh.itjust.works
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    3 days ago

    I remember that thread and the guy I’m about to mention is the same guy I talked about there…

    I once played in a band with a guy who was, by all objective standards, a musical prodigy. Could play anything, wrote prolifically, was an amazing singer and overall performer. He was hilarious and fun to hang out and talk with too. Except once he got to know you and trust you, he’d let it be known that he was an unapologetic pedophile.

    He had done ten years previously not just for possessing CP but for using his underage niece to make and distribute his own (that’s where the violence comes in). He was on lifetime supervision and he was convinced that making it big as a musician would be his ticket out of that and doing whatever the fuck he wanted to again. He seemed to genuinely not understand the evil of what he was doing and insisted it was a perfectly natural thing and blamed the system for all his problems.

    Few years after we parted ways I found out he got caught hoarding more CP and they put him away for life.

  • persona_non_gravitas@piefed.social
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    I’m still acquaintances with someone I now know killed one of their parents. Was told by someone else and confirmed on my own, he hasn’t mentioned it.

    I hope I haven’t let it impact our relationship. I don’t wholly know the context and he served his time, should be allowed a fresh start without it being dug up again and again.

    • YappyMonotheist@lemmy.world
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      You could serve a million years but if you don’t regret it (if what you did was morally wrong and you got locked up for good reasons, many people are not, sadly) then what “fresh start” is possible?

      Maybe they just got abused by their parents so heavily they were pushed into this, and that’s understandable, but in other cases I don’t think that spending time locked up necessarily means you’re a different person who “deserves” a chance to have a normal life, it all depends on how you processed things.

  • Apytele@sh.itjust.works
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    Yeah I worked with criminally insane men for two years before moving on to normal acute psychiatry. For the most part they’re just sad and petty. There was only one that ever truly gave me the heebie jeebies and one after in regular acute. In both cases though I did not know what they had done until later; in the moment there was just this instant visceral NOPE feeling.

    • Chippys_mittens@lemmy.worldOP
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      2 days ago

      That’s so unsettling. I would want a very detailed understanding of the person and their past before I was in the room with them. Thanks for sharing.

      • Apytele@sh.itjust.works
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        a) most of the time you actually don’t want to know. You take precautions with everybody, half the time knowing just makes it harder to pass dinner trays.

        b) they also just. hire brand new adults with highschool diplomas. give them a two week crash course in psychiatry. then just. “Here’s the criminally insane men!”

  • IWW4@lemmy.zip
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    3 days ago

    Yes, I grew up as poor white trash. I have known murders, rapist and criminals, they were the dudes my brothers hung out with.

    In college a guy who in my social circle, meaning I used to party with and hang out with pretty often, got arrested for attempted murder. He was beating the shit out of his girlfriend outside of her apartment building. Two dudes intervened and he stabbed one in the heart.

  • muxika@piefed.muxika.org
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    2 days ago

    This happened decades ago, but I still think about it sometimes. It’s foggy, but some details I haven’t forgotten.

    One of my friends invited me to the movies. His wife was doing laundry and wasn’t interested in the movie, so she stayed home while we took off. When we got to the theater, we realized we were over an hour early. So, we decided to go back to his place to grab a bite.

    When we got back, I stayed in the living room while my friend went upstairs, looking for his wife.

    Then I heard everyone shouting and screaming, the sound of metal banging on the floor. Heavy thuds and crying.

    The door opened to the master bedroom upstairs and another man, covered in sweat and blood, scrambled out of the house.

    I went upstairs and saw the aftermath: my friend’s weight set tossed to the floor, scuff marks and drops of blood everywhere. My friend and his wife were in the master bathroom, arguing and crying.

    I don’t remember clearly what happened after that, but I know that my former friend beat a man nearly to death for sleeping with his wife.

  • HubertManne@piefed.social
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    I lived in what was considered one of the most dangerous areas of my city at one point. There was a teen age kid who became part of the local gang. The local gang was sorta funny. It was actually really small and sandwiched between two larger gangs and unless you lived in a few block area you might not even be aware of them. Another thing was gangs at the time around me (not sure how much has changed) really did not recruit from high school. Usually if someone made it to high school without being in a gang they likely were not going to be. The gang sourced mostly from about junior high or high schoolers who just did not go to school. Basically drop outs. This is really disturbing from what you read about initiation rituals. recruiting sorta started in gradeschool but became serious in junior high. Now the gang leaders were adults btw. Creepy losers really although possibly with some mob connections (once in awhile a fancy luxury car would stop by and there was some talk with the leaders so im guessing here). Anyway I kid moved in and man was he just jonesing for violence. I mean most gang stuff was sorta a lot of show. Yelling and shit with larger groups and then some shooting in the air and everyone scatters. At that time handguns were illegal so gang members tossed them quick as being caught with one meant definite arrest. Pretty much they were treated like drugs. If the gang ever wanted to kill someone im sure he would be the choice for their under 18 trigger puller. Its not like I knew him or talked to him but I 100% knew he would pull the trigger with no qualms. Other kids might at least have qualms. I would not be surprised if the gang leader adults were not a bit afraid of him. Killed animals and shit for fun. Funny thing is he almost never did tagging as that was like activity to get the grade schoolers involved.

  • tangible@piefed.social
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    2 days ago

    Yes. I have (once) spoken to a guy who killed multiple people. He died by getting shot himself and was just a violent person in general.

    And just recently I learned that a former co-worker is a suspect in the death of his partner.

    • LeapSecond@lemmy.zip
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      3 days ago

      The fact that he’d be eligible for parole after 15 years after holding people captive for 24 years is insane.

    • Chippys_mittens@lemmy.worldOP
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      I disagree with your initial statement but I wont have the same unproductive argument again. Pretty fucking horrific stuff you were around. Thank you for the contribution

    • Beacon@fedia.io
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      2 days ago

      There is such a thing as evil. No one is ever 100% evil or 100% good, but that doesn’t mean evil doesn’t exist.

      • durinn@programming.dev
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        I want to agree. I really do. But labeling people as evil is detrimental to the evolution of humanity, because it fosters hatred. My point of view is that there are malicious actions, not evil people.

        • YappyMonotheist@lemmy.world
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          This is just the classic “let’s leave it up in the air so nobody gets judged because I wouldn’t like it either!” Western laissez-faire mentality that stops any thorough moral analysis. I’ll only accept it if it’s coming from a Cartesian “I think therefore I am and I can’t say anything else about anything with certainty”, if not it’s just moral permissiveness/intellectual laziness. Not everyone can just be “talked into sanity” and prosociality, many people have chosen their paths and as such can only go one way, in this world or the next. Can we make that final judgment, unbiasedly and accurately? No, but that’s reality, we can still acknowledge they’ve crossed enough thresholds and seem unrepentant enough that, for all intents and purposes, we can reasonably consider this person “evil” and, more importantly, just antisocial and dangerous enough to either lock up and ostracise.

          In the real world with real means, do you think you could talk Trump out of touching kids and gambling the lives of many for the sake of personal profit? Satanyahu to stop colonizing West Asia? Do you think you could stop a rapist while he’s at it with the words of Jesus or Muhammad? Come on, now.

          • durinn@programming.dev
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            I don’t remember saying that my distinction between evil people versus harmful deeds has anything to do with my stance on punitive consequences. We have to work together to protect each other from people that would harm us, whether that is through correctional programs with no incarceration or locking them up for the rest of their lives. Justice and punishment is not black and white. I wish for both of those evildoers to drop dead immediately. But that doesn’t change my opinion on how detrimental to society I believe labeling people as “evil” is. Our actions define whether we are “good” or “evil”. There is no inherent morality. We should punish people for their harmful actions, not for whatever made-up imaginary persona we label them as.

            • YappyMonotheist@lemmy.world
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              We are who we choose to be, and if you have been nothing but sociopathically antisocial all this time, I’m not gonna expect you to randomly change your mind… and I can safely call you an “evil person”. Evil because they decided to be so, and I’m just labelling this person’s most salient characteristic, not saying they were born that way or whatever, ofc not. People are malleable on paper but for pragmatic reasons at some point (specially if you’re old) I assume you’re stuck in your ways and no words will make you turn it around, and as such you can warrant the static “evil” label.

              • durinn@programming.dev
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                I guess I could go as far as to say, that it’s a pragmatic oversimplification for the masses and for our criminal justice system.

    • Substance_P@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      … "after Fritzl convinced her and the authorities that they were foundlings each time. "

      Case closed Sergeant, it’s just another foundling, they seem to be plentiful in these parts. WTF!?

      • durinn@programming.dev
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        That case is a bottomless pit of vileness. Don’t try to understand it. Unless you want to, in which case I digress.

  • Aeao@lemmy.world
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    I was a big time coke head. The kind that when I call dude answers. And I knew the same dude for like 15 years as he climbed up. I wouldn’t say I was the bullk of his business but I will say I was on of those clients you don’t want going to the compition.

    I say to explain these next situation.

    Dude would occasionally be like “I’m out but I’ll tell MY guy you’re coming over he’ll help you out.”

    Domingo over in this is a major trap house. Very well trained pit bulls all around. Guns left haphazardly around. Big guns. And a girl on a stripper pole every time who wasn’t chained but clearly didn’t want to be there. Ever seen the last part of requiem for a dream? The girl had those dead eyes.

    I didn’t like going over there. I’m sure my dude has done some shit to rise. That’s fine.

    I guess there’s a level to “this guy does bad things” that I’m okay with. Past that line… honestly if it wasn’t for the girl on a poll I think I would’ve been cool with him.

      • Aeao@lemmy.world
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        When you do coke things are like Harry Potter. “I’ve never been down this street before… has this always been here”

        And the big dude just smiles and taps on like three bricks and a run down trailer with way too many cars at it appears. Loaded with drugs.

        The next week you back and the whole street is just gone.

        Another thing like Harry Potter is the wand shop. Sometime your coke guy hands you a baseball cap and said “don’t take this off while you wait in the car bro. No what you doing! Wear it like this, damn!” so you are assigned a hat specifically for you and trained how to use it.

        Instead of “magical beasts” it’s random pit bulls everywhere wandering loose. Who owns these dogs?.

        And you know when Harry first visit gringots vault

        I’ve also seen people pick up packages and “ it’s best you don’t tell nobody what you just saw”

        I’m going to keep adding to this and make it a copy pasta