Spanky Pete Meets Defeat, And This Blogger Has That "Headline Deja Vu" Feeling...

Contributed photo, taken when "Spanky Pete" was actually in the jail pictured, blog post by John Hoff

When an anonymous commenter left a link to Peter "Spanky Pete" Rickmyer's latest court defeat, my first reaction was, "Wait a minute, didn't I recently write about two of his court defeats?"

I went back to check the old article,  Spanky Pete Meets Defeat (Level Three Sex Offender Peter Rickmyer Manages To Lose Two Court Cases In One Day, Guess Who Is His Loony Toons Lawyer?)

And I compared it with the case at the other end of the posted link, Peter Stephenson a/k/a Peter Rickmyer v. Tom Roy, in his official capacity as Minnesota Commissioner of Corrections. In this case, Rickmyer challenges the lower court's denial of his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. This is basically a "let me out of jail or prison" petition.

(Why was Rickmyer in jail? For throwing bad paper in the general direction of this blogger)

As it turns out, this is a "Spanky Pete" case I have not yet reported upon, even though the ruling was on May 9.

My bad...

...Let me make up for lost time.

So Rickmyer was in jail, then back to prison, then he was let out again. He tried to get out of jail with a "habeas my perverted old corpus" motion, but didn't succeed. Unhappy with the district court refusing his "leggo my Eggo, and also me" petition, Rickmyer appealed.

Rickmyer lost. A ruling was by a single judge on the Court of Appeals, The Honorable Gary L. Crippen, who wrote that Rickmyer's post-prison release conditions (including "do what your zookeeper tells you") were reasonable. Rickmyer violated this condition by "not following certain directions given him by his agent regarding legal preparations and filings and contacts with certain individuals."

Rickmyer tried to assert these conditions violated attorney-client privilege, wrongfully denied access to civil proceedings, or otherwise hurt his butt.

I mean "were unlawful."

The Court of Appeals didn't buy any of this and, actually, there were a some other tedious arguments by Spanky they didn't buy, either.

All in all, a typical day in court for Peter Rickmyer, as spanker becomes spankee.

There is, however, a disconnect between Pete's three court defeats in a row, the last one talking about Department of Corrections being allowed to keep a tight lid on this human can of worms, versus day-to-day "spanky reality" experienced by people who work in the Hennepin County Government Building and in the skyway area.

If Pete has a leash, it is several miles long. He seems to come and go pretty much as he pleases, engaged in nothing that can be perceived as productive and much that comes off as creepy and dubious. (Click here for "Spanky missive" he fired off recently to the Sheriff's Department)  I have back channel reports of working women creeped out by encountering Spanky scuttling around in his usual Government Center haunts. Shouldn't Spanky Pete be working some menial job instead of hanging around the halls of power?

Of course, few people want to make a phone call to Spanky's zookeeper and get caught up in some kind of revocation hearing, or attract undue attention from Peter Rickmyer, poster boy for genital exposure and unwanted touching.  There is a strong sense that even though DOC has cracked down on Spanky in the past, that getting DOC to listen is like pulling teeth. Furthermore, DOC engages in a "we will not reply to your emailed complaints" policy with this blogger, and I suspect I'm not the only one to experience this.

So the question becomes...

Does Rob Roy of the Minnesota Department of Corrections have a tight reign on this sex offender? Or is it actually the other way around?