Karl Twilleager; PTSD made him want to blow up a bar
Mary sends us the records of one Karl Twilleager who was recently sentenced to five years in prison for plotting to blow up a bar in Washington State because his motorcycle club’s rivals frequented the place. The 66-year-old claims that the year that he spent in Vietnam gave him PTSD and his lawyer wrote in a statement to the judge at sentencing that because of the government’s inability to treat veterans when they return from war, we’re all on the verge of bombing stuff, or something;
James B. Feldman quoted William M. Dulaney who wrote: “What seems clear is that neither the American government nor society is attending to the effects of war on such individuals. Indeed it appears that no process exists by which combat veterans are able to assume their role as citizens, as people. Because of this lack of structured re-assimilation into American society, certain combat veterans have created over time a culture in which they are accepted as the people they have become. The outlaw motorcycle club structure can be seen as a society built along militaristic, hierarchal lines, a highly ordered, controlled and black and white world in which individuals may understand their role, their identity, their place in society.”
The Seattle PI writes;
An Army veteran, Twilleager turned to crime after leaving the military following his service in Vietnam. His attorney contended Twilleager and other veterans found the structure of outlaw biker gangs appealing after life in the military.
Having been convicted of drug crimes in Oregon, Twilleager was sentenced to 12 years in state prison for a 1993 murder in Grant County. Twilleager shot a man three times, loaded his body into the trunk of a car and dumped the remains on a roadside.
As a convicted felon, he wasn’t allowed to have guns. He also lacked the required federal permits to possess a short-barrel shotgun or explosives.
Yes, Twilleager spent a year in Vietnam, here are his records, if you need verification;
My complaint is that there are thousands of Vietnam veterans and thousands of them belong to motorcycle clubs and they’re not plotting to blow up their rivals or a bar or even an outhouse. I understand that the lawyer needed something to mitigate his client’s bad behavior, but using the blood and minds of millions of veterans to do that is irresponsible.
I’m not going to judge Twilleager’s time in Vietnam, I wasn’t there and I don’t know if he did anything that would have brought on PTSD. But, that doesn’t give him or his lawyer the right to propagate the crazy vet myth.
Category: Crime, Veterans Issues
Guy is a terd. That being said the crap that the lawyer and paper spewed out is the same old same old used to justify Poser’s stories or discriminate against Veterans.
Gee, thanks, Twilleager.
Two years in the Army is more than outweighed by 40 years plus of being a shitnbird and an asshole. Using the lawyer’s logic, outlaw bikers would be 100% vets. Not to mention he spent six times as long in prison for murder as he did in the Army… and I bet the recidivism rate from that prison is a LOT higher than the “criminal PTSD” rate from the Army.
The old Vietnam crazy vet story. It’s told over and over. Then embellished by the movie industry. It’s no wonder so much of the general population believes its true.
For the record, Vietnam vets are better educated, and are more successful than their peers.
I get so tired of this crap.
He shouldn’t have pulled out the worn out, tired old “crazy Vietnam vet” trump card. It doesn’t trump anything and never did. I don’t know about his service there but he and his attorney just give another big black eye to those who served well and honorably in Vietnam.
The article says he is going to prison. That means, Walla-Walla State Penitentiary here in my state of liberal, leftist Washington. I know a former CO there and he says they like old guys too. They call them, “big soft pillows”, if you get my meaning. I wonder how the trump card will work on his new cell block buddies?
Some clarification. The quoted material is introduced with “James B. Feldman quoted William M. Dulaney who wrote….” The lawyer is Feldman and the stuff he served up is from William M. Dulaney, a former member of the Outlaws (American Outlaws Association) who got a degree or two and was teaching at Western Carolina University. He is not listed among the faculty of that school today but I know he did teach there a couple of years ago. This statement is also credited to him: “The Pagans Motorcycle Club (PMC) is not a criminal organization or a national criminal organization.” Right. Okay. I’ll buy that—and that bridge in Brooklyn, too. So, the lawyer served up Dulaney’s pap but what I don’t get is how the judge only gave this guy five years. It certainly wasn’t his fine record. Hell, he’s a convicted murderer. What’s more, although the prosecutor didn’t charge him with planning to blow-up anything, a boatload of shit was reportedly taken from his home and a storage locker.
“The outlaw motorcycle club structure can be seen as a society built along militaristic, hierarchal lines, a highly ordered, controlled and black and white world in which individuals may understand their role, their identity, their place in society.”
Does this mean that they make the junior gang members walk around the clubhouse picking up cigarette butts?
I spent just under two years in, and around, Vietnam. I now can blame that time for my urge to wear lace and hug Jonn.
This crap has been echoing around for far too long, with no end in sight.
I blame the movie “Rambo” and the media for the crazy vet meme.
I’m not the most familiar with Vietnam-era terms of enlistment, but this guy’s timeline doesn’t seem to add up. According to the documents, he did nineteen months on active duty, which doesn’t sound like a standard term of enlistment, and was discharged–as a private–almost immediately after returning from Vietnam. I suspect that his military career didn’t end on the happiest of notes, and it sounds like he has continued with his shitbird ways in civilian life.
@10…. There was a early out program in place. I was drafted, did basic and AIT. Served 11 months and 12 days in the Nam, for a grand total of 17 months 12 days. Had to give up a year of GI bill schooling but since I only hada year left to graduate college it was fine with me.
Man, I need to get my eyes checked. I read the title of this post and was wondering why PTSD would make this guy want to blow a bar. I had to read it several times before I saw the missing “up.”
@#7 — Hack.Stone
Actually, yes, they do. Junior members, or probationary members (probies) have to do all the shit work, and without complaining.
GRavel@13, what is the motorcycle gang equivalent of sending the newbies out for frequency grease and a box of grid squares? And if they are “built along militaristic, hierarchal lines”, do they have to attend mandatory classes on preventing sexual assault, celebrating diversity and not to drink and drive on holiday weekends?
@14: It’s quite contradictory for “outlaw” motorcycle clubs to have such strict rules, since the definition of being an “outlaw” biker means you don’t need no stinking rules!!! I guess what they really mean is they don’t want to live by society’s rules, but rather the rules they make up for themselves?
Also, I don’t know if they have gotten around to powerpoint presentations, yet.
He’s trying to protect his Club is all. It doesn’t make it right but I guarantee that is what he is doing
#15 quite the contrary…they do have rules. The 1%er MC’s (commonly known as outlaw MC’s) are the ones that make up the rules for the MC world. All ofther MC’s, 1%er or not, follow those rules.
@17: I know that. What I was getting at is the fact that they don’t want rules applied to them, that they can do whatever they want and that’s why they are “outlaws”. When, in fact, they have very strict rules for their criminal organization, which is why they are 1%ers to begin with. Anyone that attempts to argue that outlaw motorcycle clubs are not criminal organizations is deluding themselves. They are the mafia on motorcycles, plain and simple.
I’m not deriding them, just stating the truth. It is what it is.
IOW; this guy didn’t kill, plan to blow shit up, or anything else criminal because of PTSD, but rather for his club.
I never argued they weren’t criminal organizations