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<\/a><\/center><\/p>\nTwo and a half years ago, Eric Frein, a Cold War reenactor, murdered a Pennsylvania State trooper, Cpl. Bryon Dickson II. Trooper Alex Douglass was seriously injured in the attack. Frein was found guilty in a recent trial and during the sentencing part of the trial, Frein’s father takes the blame for his son’s actions, according to PennLive<\/a>;<\/p>\n Eric Frein grew up listening to his dad’s war stories.<\/p>\n His father, Eugene Michael Frein, told him he was a tank commander in Vietnam.<\/p>\n And a sniper.<\/p>\n And that he was in many firefights with the Viet Cong.<\/p>\n And for all of his life, Eric Frein listened to the man he emulated.<\/p>\n But the defense is arguing there was a big problem with his father’s tales.<\/p>\n None of them were true.<\/p>\n “He was raised in a household filled with false stories about a hero who was not a hero,” Eric Frein’s attorney, Michael Weinstein, told the court today. Frein’s father exposed him to these exaggerations of his military service in what Weinstein said amounts to “self-aggrandized, narcissistic behavior.” <\/p>\n But it wasn’t only these made up war stories – which likely inspired his becoming a re-enactor – that had an influence on Eric Frein. It was also his father’s theories about the police having too much power and the government taking away too many rights, the defense argued, that all added up to Frein shooting two state troopers – one of them fatally.<\/p>\n “I failed Eric as a father,” the elder Frein said from the witness stand.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n So, apparently, that’s all it takes – stolen valor causes murder.<\/p>\n Thanks to Thom for the link.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"