Author: TAH Legal Team

Lest you forget who Royston Potter is, here he is talking about his awesome military records:

This came to the fore because he believes that the Boston Bombing was perpetrated by unknown special operators:

In a previous article, we at This Ain’t Hell have questioned the military background and credentials of Royston Edward Potter.  Due to his admitted background as a self-acknowledged polygamist who went public, was fired from his job as a police officer as a result, and even took the State of Utah to Federal court in a challenge to Utah’s bigamy laws (where he lost), we were reluctant to believe that he actually was a military retiree.

We were wrong.  We have received a reply to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) from the National Personnel Records Center (NPRC), in Saint Louis, Missouri.  They are the official repository for all records of Federal military service.  If the records aren’t there, well, there’s no record of it happening – so it probably didn’t happen in Federal military service.

We wish to state, for the record, that per information releasable under the FOIA from your official records on file at NPRC, Royston Edward Potter is indeed a retired LTC, US Army Reserve.  And his career is simply amazing.

In 28 years combined Active and Reserve Component service, according to his official military records on file at NPRC, he even received medals.  He has the Army Reserve Component Achievement Medal; the National Defense Service Medal, for serving on Active Duty after 11 September 2001; the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal, for a tour in Bosnia (the same tour for which he received the National Defense Service Medal); and the Armed Forces Reserve Medal with Bronze Hourglass and “M-device”, also received for his tour in Bosnia (we presume the first listing for the AFRM on his FOIA reply indicates receipt of the medal for performing 10 years of qualifying Reserve Component service in a 12 year period).  He also rates the Army Reserve Components Overseas Ribbon – indicating he performed Reserve training in an overseas location, probably Japan, and the Army Service Ribbon.

That’s it.  Per his official records, Potter received absolutely no personal decorations for merit or valor whatsoever, not even an Army or Joint Achievement Medal.  All items on his massive and hugely impressive rack of six (6) total ribbons are for service vice meritorious performance or valor – what one might call “been there” badges, were one inclined to do use that term.

Yea, verily, that is correct:  Royston Edward Potter’s highest decoration is the Army Reserve Components Achievement Medal.  That is the Army Reserve and Army National Guard rough equivalent of the Good Conduct Medal for the Selected Reserve, except that officers are also eligible to receive it.  Receiving it requires nothing more than serving in a Troop Program Unit (TPU) or Individual Mobilization Augmentee (IMA) position for either 3 or 4 consecutive years (depending on the date), provided said years qualify for Reserve Retirement and the soldier’s disciplinary record is clean.  See paragraphs 4-14 and 4-18 of AR 600-8-22 for the specific eligibility criteria.

In our experience, this may be a rare if not singular and unique achievement.  I have personally never before heard of anyone retiring after a 28-year career with no personal decorations whatsoever – not even an Achievement Medal.  And certainly not one who retired at the exalted rank of Lieutenant Colonel!

We therefore humbly beg your forgiveness, Royston Edward Potter – oh most exalted and talented retired LTC with no decorations for merit or valor and no deployments to combat or a bona fide designated combat zone.  (Bosnia was designated by Congress as a Qualified Hazardous Duty Area, to be treated as if it were a combat zone, by PL 104-117; it was never designated a Combat Zone by DoD.)

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One UPDATE:  As Susan notes below:

All, as others have mentioned, Mr. Buxton was likely assigned this crap case.  He made a specious argument and deserved to be mocked – and lo we have mocked and it was good.

However, he does not deserve to be contacted or threatened. As your mother told you, it is all fun until somebody does the stupid and gets hurt or arrested.

That means please do not contact him folks.  We are trying to stay out of court on civil charges, not add criminal ones to the charging sheets. 

 

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We, the crack legal team here at This Ain’t Hell come before you humbled.  As some of you may remember,  TAH previously featured a series of posts on one Justin Weiss as part of our efforts at outing Stolen Valor posers.  Mr. Weiss, who was not amused, told us that:  (a) he was in uniform in his role as an actor; (b) he never claimed to have served; and (c) things we found offensive were on the internet because he had been hacked.  Because we did not immediately remove the post, Mr. Weiss informed us he would contact an attorney.  We hear this every day and completely ignored Mr. Weiss’ threats until we received a letter from one Mr. E. Dale Buxton II (Esq.) an attorney at a very high-priced, high-profile law firm we will not name (because they have some really good lawyers and we don’t want to be buried in paper for the rest of our lives).  Mr. Buxton informed us that not only were we guilty of defamation, but also copyright infringement. 

We, the crack legal team at TAH were unconvinced.  We believed that we had good defenses and that perhaps it would be amusing to match wits with Mr. Buxton.  However, after Mr. Buxton’s latest missive, we have decided to admit defeat.  One does not do battle with the immortal, or attempt to secure a spot at their side on Olympus or Valhalla or Fiddlers Green when one is not equal to such a task.  We come before you as humble as a supplicant lying supine at the altar of Eleos, the Greek daimona of mercy, pity and compassion.  We were wrong.  We have wronged.  We couldn’t have gotten any wronger. 

Like Icarus, son of Daedulus, who attempted to escape from Crete by means of wings that his father constructed from feathers and wax, so did your authors and their legal team seek to escape through legal maneuvering the precarious position brought on by their posts.  But as the wings of Icarus did melt from the sun, so did our efforts come to failure when we approached too closely the jurisprudential brilliance of E. Dale Buxton, II (Esq.) and we were sent plummeting into our Aegean sea of despair. 

Thus, we hereby abjure and renounce without reservation all previous comments regarding Justin Weiss, and have taken down all posts previously present on our website.   Much as a child’s teacup is unable to contain all the waters of the world, so unequal to the task at hand are words such as “sorrow” and “guilt” that we must perpetually strive to our dying day to make this right.  As renunciation, sorrow and guilt are insufficient to this task, we further pledge ourselves here onward to seek without rest the deification of Justin Weiss and E. Dale Buxton II (Esq.)   Like Sísyphos, king of Ephyra (now known as Corinth) punished by being compelled to roll an immense boulder up a hill, only to watch it roll back down, and to repeat this action forever, so shall we endeavor to make right what we once made wrong.

Here, we explain to you, our readers, why.

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