Imagine that, Curtis Hart, self-professed "open records hound", drops out of council race because he doesn't want anyone seeing his personal records

How ironic. Or moronic. Or both. Yeah, both. 

https://tdn.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/curtis-hart-pulling-out-of-kelso-city-council-race/article_eddec0a0-c259-5aa5-b857-53026a97a2e5.html

Curtis Hart pulling out of Kelso City Council race

Brennen Kauffman Jul 14, 2021 2

Curtis Hart will appear on the ballot for the Kelso City Council primary, but he is working to suspend his campaign.

Hart said Wednesday that he was no longer planning to move forward due to concerns with years of financial disclosures, for himself and his wife, that are required by the Public Disclosure Commission for political candidates and office holders.

“I’m a public records hound, so I know what can happen once you have those records open to the public, especially if there are people that don’t like you,” Hart said.

His decision to suspend the campaign came after the drop-out deadline for the Aug. 3 primary election. Cowlitz County’s ballots were in the process of being shipped out Wednesday and will list Hart as a candidate for position 1 on the Kelso City Council.

Hart gained notoriety over the last four years for his aggressive vigilante work against sexual offenders in Kelso, often through public records. A record request he made to the Cowlitz County Sheriff’s Office for details of every low-level sex offender turned into a three-year lawsuit after a group of “John Doe” offenders sued to stop their release.

The “John Does” argued they would suffer severe harassment and harm if Hart went through with plans to publicly release their information. In March, the Washington State Court of Appeals issued a decision in favor of Hart obtaining the full list of records.

Hart said he had initially entered the City Council race because of discussions around limiting the number of sexual offenders who can live in one residence in Kelso. The city staff began drafting an ordinance to establish limits for registered sex offenders in May and Hart said that progress was another reason he was happy to exit the race.

Cowlitz County Auditor Carolyn Fundingsland said if candidates miss the initial withdrawal deadline, there was no process for them to be removed from the ballot any other time before the November general election.

“There is no leeway in state law,” Fundingsland said. “Those candidates, if voted for they will advance to the general election and can be elected to office.”

Hart said Wednesday that he would refuse the position if he did end up winning the race in November.

The other two candidates on the ballot for position 1 in Kelso are incumbent Jeffrey McAllister and Brian Wood. The two candidates with the most votes in the August primary will go on to the general election in November.

Washington vigilante scumbag Curtis J Hart publishes Level 1 registrant info and begins harassment campaign

 A few years back, when Clitoris... er, "Curtis" J Hart of the "Punisher Squad" decided to harass me, he left a nasty little threat on the OnceFallen.com FB page:

Apparently, he won the appeal and is free to destroy the lives of Registrants in his county. What were the judges smoking?

Washington state law strictly limits public disclosure of all level 1 registered sex offender information. Information concerning this level of registration shall be shared with other law enforcement agencies, and upon request, relevant, necessary and accurate information may be disclosed to any victim or witness to the offense and to any community member who lives near the residence where the offender resides, expects to reside, or is regularly found. Level 1 sex offenders may not be subject to general public notification. Level 1 sex offenders meet most, if not all, the following criteria and are considered a low risk to the community: Offense is non-violent, Offense committed in a family setting, Offender has completed a treatment program, Overall the offender is a low risk to the general public. 

And yet, the judges of Washington State is allowing Clitoris J Hart to bypass this protection. He's posted the data of all level 1 registrants of his county at:

hXXps://curtishart70.wixsite.com/level1s*xoffenders (I obviously slightly altered the link so as not to hotlink my blog to his harassment. 

What a shock, Clitoris J Hart and the Punisher Squad are already starting harassment campaigns. 

I look forward to seeing Clitoris J Hart get sued into oblivion. This is simple harassment, pure and simple. 

Kelso WA vigilante thug Curtis J Hart is abusing the court to harass level 1 registrants in his community

If the judge needed any proof of Curtis Hart's ill intent, all he had to do was look at the harassment the OnceFallen.com received at the hands of Hart and his cohorts. In the past few hours, a number of folks flooded the OnceFallen FB page with harassing comments. This goes to show that the state of  Washington does not enforce the ban on the misuse of registry info to harass registered persons. 

It should be noted that The Daily News has seemingly supported vile vigilante activity. They are strongly connected to another Washington vigilante, Donna Zink, and helped promote a similar fight Zink had done. They are censoring certain posts made by those critical of Curtis Hart. 

https://tdn.com/news/local/judge-grants-hart-sex-offender-records-pending-appeal/article_45073298-6deb-560b-8499-ef6481470d18.html

Judge grants Hart sex offender records, pending appeal

Alex Bruell alex.bruell@tdn.com  Oct 4, 2018

Cowlitz County Superior Court Judge Stephen Warning said he has “no doubt in (his) mind” that Curtis Hart will make “childish, irresponsible, vindictive and immature use” of records of all level 1 sex offenders in Cowlitz County.

But, “reluctantly,” Warning concluded Wednesday that the law requires that Hart should get them.

“Sometimes the law is an ass,” Warning said, “and Mr. Hart is entitled to his records.”

Hart won’t get the records yet, though. Warning will decide Oct. 10 what should or should not be withheld from the request. In the meantime, attorneys representing some of the offenders will be able to appeal the decision — which attorneys indicated is a near certainty.

At the very least, about 200 of the county’s 570 level 1 offenders committed their crimes while they were juvenile, and their names will not be released, according to the county sheriff’s office.

Hart, a Kelso resident who said he wants post the sex offenders’ names on the Internet, called Warning’s decision “pretty good.”

“I very much think of this as a First Amendment battle,” Hart said after Warning’s ruling.

He has said that sex predators deserve scorn and that he doubts many of the offenders are capable of reform, even though level 1 offenders are considered the least likely to reoffend. Hart has acted as a self-appointed sex offender vigilante who has organized a “punisher squad” that has baited several would-be offenders, leading to at least three being arrested and charged.

Previously, only a handful of offenders had sought injunctions to block release of their names. However, on Wednesday, four attorneys argued on behalf of about 50 “John Doe” offenders also seeking injunctions. They said that releasing their names would make them vulnerable to harassment, attack, loss of employment and public embarrassment.

On an individual basis, records about specific sex offenders are publicly available. But police databases listing all level 1 offenders are generally not published, though the state Supreme Court ruled in a 2016 Franklin County case that they must be disclosed if someone requests them under the state Open Records Act.

Attorney and privately contracted public defender Joshua Baldwin argued Hart’s request should be blocked based on concern for vigilante action against the offenders.

“(Hart) considers it sport to harass or otherwise harm people he believes are sexual predators,” Baldwin told Warning. “He has exhibited a willingness to support ... violence against them.”

Hart told The Daily News in September that he doesn’t advocate violence and, on Wednesday, he told the court that he doesn’t “intend to harass anybody.”

Rather, he said he’s only trying to make information available so people can make “an informed decision” about who they live near or let near their children. And he disputed claims that posts on “The Punisher Squad” Facebook page, which he operates with several other moderators, indicate that he wishes violence against sex offenders.

One such post referenced by lawyers shows an image of a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire accompanied by a caption that reads, “Liberals: you can’t just wave(sic) a magic wand and make pedophilia disappear.”

“I share thousands of memes on the internet all the time,” Hart told Warning. “I am a pacifist. ... It’s legal to be mean. It’s legal to offend people.”

He also said he’s changed his mind about being selective about which offenders names to publish online. Now, he said, he intends to post the entire list when he receives it.

Warning cited the Franklin County Supreme Court case in deciding to grant Hart’s request. If there is a concern that it could endanger the offenders, that’s a job for the Legislature to contend with. His job is to uphold the law, Warning said.

Baldwin argued that the Franklin County case ruling is not a precedent in Hart’s case. In that case, Donna Zink requested and received the names of 21,000 registered sex offenders across the state, but she didn’t ask for as much identifying information as Hart has, according to Baldwin.

Eli Marchbanks, a Vancouver attorney representing several of the plaintiffs, said research on the topic has shown disclosing sex offenders’ information can lead to harassment, assault, and even death. Disrupting their stability potentially increases the risk that an offender offends again, he said, and would decrease public safety.

Hart argued that even if releasing the records made sex offenders more likely to reoffend, it would be “all the more reason for people to find out who (those sex offenders) are.”

Marchbanks asked Warning to set the matter for a trial to give all sides more time to present a case.

“If that information is released now, then the cat’s out of the bag,” he said.

(Hart) considers it sport to harass or otherwise harm people he believes are sexual predators. He has exhibited a willingness to support ... violence against them. — Joshua Baldwin,

attorney for sex offenders

Curtis J. Hart of Kelso WA and his laughable one-man "Punisher Squad" is the latest wannabe vigilante scumbag

Don't Tread On Me hats are for douchebags. 

This man is Curtis J. Hart, a "libertarian politician" from Kelso, WA. In addition to running a small-time online radio show and generally making an ass of himself, and losing elections by landslides in podunk towns, Hart runs his own joke of an online vigilante team called "The Punisher Squad." What a joke. I guess he must be desperate if he couldn't beat a 70 year old man for a podunk commission seat. 

How Hart feels about helping the homeless

http://www.kgw.com/news/local/vancouver/vigilante-group-hunting-potential-child-predators-in-kelso/68619123

Vigilante group hunting potential child predators in Kelso

Maggie Vespa , KGW 11:19 PM. PST March 04, 2016

KELSO, Wash. -- Ask Curtis Hart if he considers himself a vigilante and you’ll get a blunt answer.

“I’ve been called worse,” he said.

Regardless of the title, Hart says he and roughly five of his friends, who call themselves the Punisher Squad, are serving a vital purpose. They’re catching potential child predators before they have the chance to strike, posting videos of their encounters on YouTube, and only calling police once it’s time for an arrest to be made.

Their first experiment, which happened Thursday, was a success in Hart’s mind.

The proof, being that of 36-year-old Adam Olson, of Castle Rock, who is behind bars, being held on $50,000 bond.

“He believed he was there to meet a 13-year-old girl to have sex with,” said Hart. “The whole thing was exactly like an episode of ‘To Catch a Predator.’”

According to the Kelso police report, Hart and a friend posted a message Thursday in the online app ‘Whisper’.' They posed as a 14-year-old girl, looking to “have fun with an older man”.

“Immediately, I got 30 to 40 responses,” he said.

Hart says he zeroed in on Olson. The two traded selfies, and Hart, still posing as the teen, said he was actually 13.

Quickly, reports show, the conversation became sexual.

“It was absolutely disgusting,” said Hart.

Hart said Olson pressed to meet the fake teen, so he rounded up some buddies, at least one of them armed, and headed to Kelso’s Tom O’Shanter Park.

He said Kelso police had no idea, until Hart and his friends decided it was time for officers to make an arrest, which they did moments later.

“We didn't want to leave it up to the police because you can't just sit around on your hands waiting for government to come and fix everything,” said Hart. “To wait for government is to want your city to end up like Flint, Michigan.”

It’s the same rationale used by similar civilian groups around the world.

The trend, in one city, was dubbed “The Hunter Phenomenon”.

Police elsewhere have pleaded for it to stop, saying it’s ruined lives, put civilians at risk and left would-be slam dunk cases riddled with holes.

KGW reached out to Kelso Police for comment on Olson’s arrest. We were told no one was available.

People living in Kelso and Longview, though, did want to talk about the idea, including David Willis. He has two daughters, and he’s all for it.

“The police are overwhelmed,” he said. “As far as a community, you want people to come together.”

Others were not so sold.

“They're not police,” said Bob Johnson. “They don't have experience. They don't know what they're doing, and we have laws that protect people that haven't done anything yet.”

Prosecutors in Cowlitz County have yet to file formal charges against Olson.

He’s being held on probable cause for one count of second-degree attempted rape of a child and one count of communication with a minor for immoral purposes by electronic means.