@Color Anon
Not trying to defend the human trainwreck, and I think it’s not implausible that he did what he’s been accused of, but I think it’s been pretty clear for years that he’s really, really messed up in the head. He could admit to sinking the Lusitania and killing Millard Fillmore next. What comes out of his mouth doesn’t necessarily correspond to anything in reality… and when you’re talking about putting people in prison, that’s important. I know we like to see the world in clear, black-and-white tones. I know we prefer everything to be simple.
I think the best possible outcome here is commitment, permanent if the local law allows. He should have been committed long ago. Even the briefest examination of his life, even if you discount all the craziest, worst things from places like Something Awful and /b/ and Encyclopedia Dramatica as exaggerations or falsehoods created “for the lulz,” leads to the inescapable conclusion that he should never have been allowed to live on his own. It is manifestly obvious that he’s not competent to take care of himself and never has been. He should have been put in an assisted living facility, some kind of halfway house, when he turned eighteen, some place where he could have continuous supervision and no unsupervised Internet access. He was never going to be normal and he was never going to be able to live on his own, but none of the rest had to happen. None of it. A hundred years ago he’d have been the village idiot and after the fourth or fifth time he got caught molesting the livestock he’d have gotten jailed and sterilized as a mental defective and lived out the rest of his days at a Hull House, with the proctors keeping him on a short leash, perhaps literaly.