Last week we asked if Lane Myers expected “I am Spartacus” movement was real. What we were asking was if his followers would all rise and repost his videos while he was in jail and force the government to charge them all with harassing his victim then be confronted with so many people breaking the law that they’d have to set him free.
His call for lawlessness aside, we looked at his demands of his viewers and questioned if he could pull off such a move, and we were left with doubts that what he was demanding would play out.
Lane Myers is currently sitting in the Pima County Adult Correction facility with his access to his fans coming through livestreams he holds from jail on Josh Gray’s “This is a Public Service” YouTube channel.
Gray’s channel has been the only channel to meet Myers’ demand of his “I am Spartacus” moment, as Grey reposted all of Myers’ videos related to the victim in his two sets of charges.
While YouTuber and activist John Filax put up the victim’s contact information and played portions of Myers’ videos, his actions were about as far as the “I am Spartacus” moment played out as no other significant channels took part to honor Myers’ demands.
Myers would later order all of his followers to attend Friday’s motion hearing to modify his release conditions. He expected them to both attend his hearing but also defy the Judge’s orders banning recording of the hearing. He clearly said that if they supported him, they must be willing to go to jail for him.
According to our court reporter who attended Friday’s hearing, no one defied the Judge’s orders. There was a single man scrolling on his phone who was asked to put his phone away during the hearing. The man left the courtroom, apparently did whatever he needed to do on his phone, then returned to the courtroom with his phone no longer visible.
Three men who talked about livestreaming after the hearing, did not livestream during the hearing, which was aired in audio-only format on Pima County’s YouTube channels. There were no outbursts by anyone in the courtroom other than Myers himself.
Myers had previously boasted that he would be talking circles around the judge and was set to humiliate prosecutor Rachel Stiles. Probably based on his great success in Tucson City Court, where the judges let him get away with outrageous antics.
Going into the trial, as stated on Gray’s livestream, he was confident that he would dominate Judge D. Douglas Metcalf and get away with the often-abusive behavior he has been famous for.
Viewers prepared to see the fire and brimstone antics were disappointed as while Myers did his best to disrupt the hearing, speaking out of turn, speaking over people and generally ignoring the Judge, he was brought back in line each time with the reminder that his pro se status and his ability to even be in the courtroom could be taken away.
Myers was not prepared for a Judge who was willing to work with him but would not be dominated by Myers’ distracting antics. His pledge to “humiliate” prosecutor Rachel Stiles fell by the wayside.
Stiles actively worked to get him access to the jail’s law library and media evidence. When she needed to act, she did not display the monstrous behavior Myers has been accusing her of and actually cleared hurdles for Myers’ ability to defend himself.
Myers had pledged that he would spend the entire time talking over the Judge and stating, “information on a government website is not personal information.” He was unable to fulfill this pledge, as the Judge, prosecutor and his own advisory attorney worked to bring him back to focusing on the proceedings.
While Myers was successful in turning a 15-minute hearing into a 90-minute ordeal, and he inadvertently gained a significant victory by having the decision on his livestreaming privileges delayed until Tuesday, he was not satisfied by the results of his work.
His fans did not show up for him. His advisory attorney refused to take part in his antics. Neither the prosecutor nor the Judge were intimidated or swayed by his boasts and the media, members of the January 6 rioters, the QA’non Shamon or President Donald J. Trump did not show up in force to support Myers.
But were they ever?
Myers runs a YouTube channel with about 15,000 subscribers. In comparison, our tiny news outlet has 1/3rd of his subscriber base. While he kills us in live viewership numbers, his is often barely able to come close to Jose “Chille” DeCastro’s meager live event numbers when he does streams. Post-event views have the videos average between 2,000 and up to 6,000 views over the past month.
Produced videos average between 2,000 and 4,000 views. Again, slaughtering our numbers, but we’re not trying for a national movement that is meant to draw in the attention of Donald Trump or other national dignitaries.
Myers has recently excelled at fundraising, with a lot of money coming from a small set of doners. He was able to raise over $3,000.00 for the month during his time in jail. Again, his numbers can’t compete with DeCastro’s fundraising ability and have seen a troubling drop off on Friday.
Lane Myers’ GiveSendGo campaign pulled in $50.00 in donations for Friday, down from the over $300.00 take the day before, with our own GoFundMe On-Going Expenses campaign raising $10.00. No other campaigns received donations for Friday.
Myers himself reacted to his court appearance by issuing a statement through Josh Gray, appearing on Gray’s YouTube channel, that he no longer wishes to receive audio messages from his fanbase.
The pair, who had been live streaming multiple times a day leading up to Friday’s hearing, also declined to livestream following Myers’ appearance in court on Friday.
As Friday’s hearing made it clear that Myers’ statements in jail can and will be used against him, this may be the end of live statements from Myers as he awaits trial. As we’ve seen with Craig Hendry, an end to regular statements literally ends crowd sourcing support as neither Hendry nor Myers had teams in place to handle fundraising efforts when both men entered incarceration.
We’ll continue to monitor Myers’ situation, however, at this time, we can say support from a mass movement is not currently happening. He may have an outpouring of support in the future, but, if Myers loses his ability to communicate, the likelihood of a mass movement decreases by the day.
JOURNALISM IN CRISIS
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Correction: In the original version of the article and in the audio version of the article, Josh Gray was misidentified as “Jeff Gray.” We apologize for the confusion.
