Here I wrote of the last 3 years of my life.
This is the facts of how the torture came to pass, and my observations on it at the time.
It was the first piece that I shared with everyone, including the FBI and various police.
I was hired at Printsites after a few interviews with Donald Wasserman, primarily due to his interest in a javascript canvas project I had created previous to my hiring. On the first day of working in person at the Fenton office, Donald commented about MSU firing me for too many personal days via something Tyler Frankenstein said in his referral. Donald said he wanted me to be happy about the work I was doing at Printsites. I stressed I was there to write code and not do fringe systems/devops tasks. When I tried to talk about my 14 years of writing javascript and project managing javascript projects at MSU, Donald cut me off with “I’m not interested in MSU, I want to hear about what you did at Liquidweb.”
Despite my wishes, I was tasked with learning all of docker-compose and then convox. From there, I created a custom local development system to ease the pain of integrating new programmers into working at Printsites. Meanwhile, I continued to work on other projects and training the other Printsites employees. As I was able to familiarize myself with all the pieces of the puzzle in a few short months, and love helping others, I was always able to assist anyone there with any problem they might be having.
Around the time Sarah Daily started working at Printsites, I noticed a large pimple behind my left earlobe. I had never experienced anything like this before, but did not think much of it at the time. I was sick for about a week around then, as many of you will remember.
I continued to request an adjustment towards programming when discussing work with Donald. At the same time, Rick Koster began speaking with folks about changing remote rules to bring people to the Flint office more often. I stressed my concerns that this would not be beneficial for people like Sarah, Ira, David, and Sam who all lived over an hour away from Flint. We were all being charged Flint city taxes, despite not always working in Flint.
Around that time, I made a trip to the UP that seemed somewhat "surreal" and I returned commenting to those of you at Printsites at the time, that I felt as if something had changed. I can remember being notably more agitated and angry than I typically am, as a well know calm person. Despite this, I tried to encourage good moral by bringing in jerky and beer from the U.P., as this was enjoyed by all in the past. I also brought in desk toys and a disc golf basket to make the new office a fun place to be.
A month after my talk with Rick Koster about the remote concerns, Steve Knox called me in for a chat. Steve thanked me for the beer I had brought in. I was then introduced to his wife, who then fired me for the beer. This was a workplace where drinking was both allowed and common; there was a giant wine rack in the kitchen, and the beer fridge was always full. His wife who no one ever had seen, was then never seen again.
After my firing, a number of people called to express their concerns. Donald was very vocal about the incoming “downfall” of Printsites. He promised he would have jobs available for everyone effected. He offered that if I were to help him with Capitalzen, he would have a job for me. At this time I found out that Sarah, while still working at Printsites, was also working on a project for Donald. Matt Wisner was also involved in all these projects as well. Following Donald’s lead, I continued to encourage Sarah and others to prepare for things at Printsites to go downhill.
A few weeks after my job had ended, about a month after Donald had left Printsites, I noticed I was still part of the HR system and my insurance was still active. I noticed that this was also the case for Donald and other employees that no longer worked with the company. It should also be noted, that despite the spouses of the executives being on the HR system, Printsites was not employing the required numbers in correlation with a MEDC multi-million dollar taxpayer-based grant to build the office in flint.
Dave Nyberg (at the time, U.P. representative to Gov. Synder) put me in touch with MEDC’s Erik Wilford, after my attempts to contact the agency seemed to fall on deaf ears. I had a conference call with Erik and 2 other folks there. I reported that Printsites was keeping various corporate spouses on the payroll and not removing fired/quit employees. I also showed them that my insurance was still active months after no longer working there. I had even gotten new glasses.
For nearly a month Donald continued to promise that his lawyer was working on my contract; by the last week he was claiming it was in the mail. Then he suddenly broke ties. He removed me from the Capitalzen project despite being an official contributor to the project on Github. Donald refused to give me the job I was promised, despite being more qualified to do it than even himself. I have a large amount of email, chat, and other correspondence outlining this, and would be happy to provide the specifics if requested.
I continued to try to stay in close touch with the rest of my former coworkers. I started a chat group in which many of you participated. Sarah remained a contributor to the open source robot project. I also organized lunches out with many of the remaining employees. Sarah invited me to lunch one day and told me she had received the job from Donald. She said that things in her personal life were going well, and I should come to visit Lansing and meet her girlfriend, Colette Motta. I did so, and got along well with Colette; so I made frequent visits to hang out with them and other friends in the Lansing area.
On one of these visits they offered to let me stay in their guest room as we had been out at the bar, and I still lived in Fenton. I woke up early the next morning to find Sarah awake and drinking coffee. She uncomfortably asked if she had woken me, saying “Kovu (their dog) had gone in the room, and she had gone in to retrieve him.” When I walked into the bathroom I noticed that I was bleeding, but I did not think much of it at the time.
After continued visits, my lease was nearing an end in Fenton. Colette and Sarah encouraged moving to Lansing and I began looking for rental houses. They were both very helpful; Colette even came with me to view houses. I eventually rented the house I live in now. There were still regular events with the girls and other former and current Printsites employees; including Ira and David. We often played the card game Magic the Gathering at my house or Sarah and Colette’s. There were parties, and nights out at bars and restaurants. I eventually heard through the grapevine that Rick Rockman III and Rick Koster had been removed from Printsites by the shareholders.
For some reason, at some point, Sarah then somehow disconnected from professional connections; un-following me on Github. I was still the main owner of the Printsites convox and still received receipts monthly. Devon Bleibtrey asked for ownership of the account; but as he was tied to the same association as Donald, Sarah, and Matt that I was promised a job at, I refused to respond to him. Despite how absurd it was for Sarah to remain working with our former coworkers after they did not adhere to the agreement, we were able to remain friends. The three of us had agreed to remain best friends and never break ties.
At one point, Sarah and Colette spent some time apart. Colette had no place to stay in town and was registered for classes at LCC. She asked if she could stay here some nights as to not drive back and forth from Detroit for classes. I told her she would live here full time for free as long as she needed to. Despite their troubles, I attempted to cheer her up while staying here. She expressed an interest in learning to code and I purchased colettemotta.com for her. Around this time I noticed another large pimple behind my ear lobe, this time on the right side of my head. Colette gradually started spending the night at Sarah’s more and more, and I assumed things repaired.
It was at this time that I began to hear faint murmurs around the house. As it became more and more audible, I was scared and confused, but the words and phrases I was hearing seemed far more “dumb” than anything that would ever come from my own personal monologue. This continued to become increasing clearly audible. I then consulted a long time friend who is a practicing psychologist. She recited the Hippocratic oath, then explained to me that brain chemistry would almost always shift towards paranoid schizophrenia in a person’s mid 20’s and not in their late 30’s. She stressed that my explanation of what I was hearing did not sound as if it were a psychological condition, and offered to refer me to a hearing aid specialist.
While these symptoms worsened, I attempted to continue maintaining life as best as possible. During a visit to Chicago with my brother and sister-in-law, I called the Chicago FBI office and reported Sarah Daily, Colette Motta, Matt Wisner, and Donald Wasserman. I also attempted to report my vague understanding of what happening at the time to the Lansing Police Department; but they basically would not even come here to hear me out. The cases of my reports were closed without notifying me, and changed case numbers in a way that seemed not worth the effort. I immediately realized that people would write this off as paranoid schizophrenia, despite what the actual psychologist had told me.
In an attempt to both cope with what was happening, and to make public what I was learning about how to battle the assault, I created a new website. It included some humorous stories along with an article about how to cope with torture. This is essentially how I have continued to survive with this for over another year now.
I had been teaching Colette how to grow weed for her and Sarah in my basement. In order to help her learn and allow for group notes to be organized I began creating a horticulture JavaScript application. Shortly after my call to the FBI, Colette returned to help with the grow. At that time Sarah finally re-followed me on Github. Both girls were huge supporters of this project. From there, despite the ongoing mental torture, things were pretty good for a while. We would often trim weed and have meal nights at their house or mine. We were back to disc golfing, card nights, and other fun things. Colette was over frequently to work in the grow downstairs.
A hearing aid specialist recommended getting an MRI. With symptoms becoming increasingly painful, I went to the Sparrow hospital ER one night. They said they were giving me an MRI; then suddenly I was then taken in for only a CT scan then rushed out the door 15 mins later. I was told to come back for an MRI if it got worse. I then attempted to visit an ear, nose, and throat doctor; but fearing the push-back from describing the actual symptoms, I did not go into much detail. He simply stated that I had tinnitus and should consider getting my dental work updated to even out the issue of chewing on one side of my mouth.
When I later attempted to return to the hospital for an MRI the doctor took my family aside and recommended committal. I was in Detroit for 10 days because of this, and was never able to get the recommended MRI. Despite taking the light amount of prescribed medications, this obviously had no effect on the electronically generated symptoms. So I began getting all my dental work up to date and making an effort to increase hydration and decrease allergy-like symptoms.
I continued to speak open and honestly to everyone about the ongoing issues. I used the various methods described in the above mentioned article to negate the symptoms to the best of by ability. Things remained well with the girls, and I continued to work towards an Android and iPhone release of the horticulture app. After a fun summer BBQ at a friend's house, Sarah asked about doing some theming work on the horticulture app.
Upon getting Sarah started with the horticulture app theming, I again inquired how I had still not received the promised job from Donald and Matt. She was very vague and cold in her non-answers; and we again began to argue over the topic. I attempted to reach out to Donald and Matt to inquire about the status of the job I was promised, but they did not even respond. It did, however, cause Sarah to again cut professional ties. Eventually because of this, Colette stopped participated in the grow. She broke ties as well, going as far as to no longer participate in the Bat House Building non-profit group we had been working on with our friend Jeremy Wilson.
I have at this point fully updated all my dentistry work and am again able to chew on both sides of my mouth, as was recommended by the ear, nose, and throat doctor. I also have been frequently seeing my primary care physician about the ongoing observable physical symptoms of the inner ear being constantly filled with fluid. I have had a full physical and blood panel, and am otherwise very healthy and disease free. The inner ear and ear drainage canal issues will inevitably lead to finally getting the MRI that I was turned away from over a year ago.