Louisiana Attorney General to Jack Thompson: Put Up or Shut Up

September 2, 2006

The strange, contentious situation surrounding the legal defense of Louisiana's video game law has gotten even stranger and more contentious.

Yesterday, Miami attorney Jack Thompson (left) forwarded to GamePolitics a pair of e-mails. The first was from Deputy Louisiana Attorney General Burton Guidry to Thompson, sent late Wednesday afternoon:

"Ok Mr. Thompson, put up or shut up. I need affidavits and other documentation to defeat a motion for summary judgment. If you really want to help just get me the affidavits and some scientific data that can defeat this motion as soon as possible. Time is of the essence since [the game industry's motion] has been filed today. I need the information by Monday in my hands for filing. Can you and will you?"

Guidry is referring to the video game industry's motion for summary judgment, filed with Federal Judge James Brady's court earlier that day.

Thompson's reply, which the controversial attorney also forwarded to GP, is addressed to Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco and cc'd to Guidry and other officials of the Attorney General's Office:

"I and my experts, all of whom have testified before Congress on the demonstrably harmful effects of video games on teens, are happy to help the State of Louisiana defeat the fraudulent attack upon the above by the video game industry in federal court.""However, that help is dependent upon your office's and Attorney General Foti's commitment, as I have been saying for weeks now, to do everything that is necessary and proper to win."

"As it stands now, your office has ignored all of my warnings and requests in this regard... Your own office's Terry Ryder [Gov. Blanco's Executive Counsel] has been missing in action on all of this.""Governor Blanco, get involved at least to the above extent, or kiss this law good-bye... Burton Guidry has childishly told me (his words) to 'put up or shut up.'"

"The taunt applies to Attorney General Foti, not me."

No word yet from Thompson on GP's request to clarify exactly what he wants the Guv or the Attorney General to do. If the anti-game activist is forthcoming with that info we'll update the story.

Posted in Games & Culture

Comments

Submitted by Thompson: Attorney Generals are pansies » That Game Bl (not verified) on Fri, 01/19/2007 - 21:47.

[...] Hey, good idea! Now if only the ESRB would launch a nation wide campeign to educate parents on the ratings system… Anyway, Jack isn’t too happy about it. Its not like the AG forced Wyatt to yank the bill, or that this move is designed to save it so it can be presented at a later date, but I guess that just isn’t enough. Following in the footsteos of the current bad blood with the Louisiana Attorney General (that link is definanelt worth following, bu the way), Thompson has issued this statement presenting his thoughts on Utah’s Attorney General: As you know AG Shurtleff is a video game enthusiast and apologist for the industry… He won’t take my calls, so he has intentionally isolated himself from the scientific, medical, and law enforcement evidence that violence games played by teens spawns violence… the US Supreme Court disagrees with him on this issue, but I guess we can’t expect an Attorney General of a state to care what the U.S. Supreme Court has to say. [...]

Shout box

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MaskedPixelante: New Kickstarter for Tex Murphy 6. You know the drill. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/251414413/tex-murphy-project-fedora05/15/2012 - 7:29am

RedMage: Waiting on the collectors edition. I want my Soulstone UBS!05/15/2012 - 6:33am

hellfire7885: I'm still downloading it B.05/15/2012 - 12:40am

beemoh: Anyone failing to log into Diablo, then?05/14/2012 - 7:59pm

james_fudge: Andrew Eisen is like the Men's Warehouse guy05/14/2012 - 2:32pm

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ddrfr33k: You know, that bill was a bad idea to begin with. I'm amazed how much the state fought to try and get that bill going05/14/2012 - 11:00am

RedMage: I joke all the time about how Cali paying the ESA isn't helping Cali's deficit, but DAMN. http://lat.ms/Kc31Ub05/13/2012 - 2:58pm

ZippyDSMlee: I can see chargeing 20$ a year for but anythng more than that is assinine...05/12/2012 - 11:29am

lordlundar: Zippy, yup. Last reports said there is no DICE servers on-line any more, only the leased ones.05/12/2012 - 10:01am

ZippyDSMlee: Did what I hear is true that the free BF3 severs got turned off?05/11/2012 - 7:45pm

Dante: NOTE: site linked is nsfw05/11/2012 - 2:59pm

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