A person, identified as Maxwell Azzarello, on Friday (local time) set himself ablaze outside the courtroom where former US President Donald Trump is facing charges in a hush money case, people speaking to US news media outlets said.
Horrified witnesses and broadcasters saw and recorded Azarello taking out pamphlets, strew them around, take out and pour a liquid accelerant all over his body and set himself on fire.
Video cameras stationed outside the Manhattan courthouse where former President Donald Trump is on trial caught the gruesome scene and the aftermath as authorities tried to rescue him.
CNN, Fox News Channel and MSNBC were all on the air with reporters talking about the seating of a jury when the incident happened and other news agencies, like The Associated Press, were live-streaming from outside the courthouse.
The man, who police said had travelled from Florida to New York in the last few days, hadn’t breached any security checkpoints to get into the park. Cops believe that the liquid accelerant he was using was a type of alcohol-based substance used for cleaning, according to a separate report by NBC New York.
Was Maxwell Azzarello A Conspiracy Theorist?
Maxwell described himself as an investigative researcher in his blog and social media accounts. He said he was an investigative researcher in a blog post on Substack just hours before he self-immolated.
They were unsuccessful at first but were later able to douse the flames, allowing authorities to send him to the hospital.
Azzarello, a Florida resident, was able to take a few steps while he was burning and walked till a police barrier as flames engulfed him. He fell down and cops from the New York Police Department (NYPD), who were present there due to the high-profile nature of the trial rushed with what appeared to be a fire extinguisher to douse the flames. Others also rushed with their jackets and other items to cover the fire.
They were unsuccessful at first but were later able to douse the flames, allowing authorities to send him to the hospital.
Bystanders as well as a CNN reporter said that smell of burning flesh covered the air and the man’s flesh was seemingly sizzling due to the burns.
The fliers that he dropped contained a link to his Substack account where he posted a blog explaining his action before he set himself ablaze. The blog was titled: ‘I have set myself on fire outside the Trump Trial’.
He said his ‘extreme act of protest’ was an act of drawing attention to what he claimed was an ongoing ‘totalitarian con’.
“(They were) almost like a conspiracy theory type of pamphlet, some information in regards to Ponzi schemes, and the fact that some of our local educational institutes are a front for the mob. His condition is not good, but as of now he is still alive,” NYPD chief of detectives Joseph Kenny was quoted as saying by news agency AFP.
“We just right now labelled (him) a sort of conspiracy theorist, and we’re going from there,” deputy police commissioner Tarik Sheppard was quoted as saying by the news agency.
“(The government is) about to hit us with an apocalyptic fascist world coup. To my friends and family, witnesses and first responders, I deeply apologise for inflicting this pain upon you. But I assure you it is a drop in the bucket compared to what our government intends to inflict,” Maxwell wrote in the blog post before he set himself ablaze.
In his LinkedIn profile he appears with a photo of former US President Bill Clinton and claims he has been self-employed since March of 2023.
“(The government is) about to hit us with an apocalyptic fascist world coup. To my friends and family, witnesses and first responders, I deeply apologise for inflicting this pain upon you. But I assure you it is a drop in the bucket compared to what our government intends to inflict,” Maxwell wrote in the blog post before he set himself ablaze.
In his LinkedIn profile he appears with a photo of former US President Bill Clinton and claims he has been self-employed since March of 2023.
Azarello also filed lawsuits last year against Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation, Binance, Peter Thiel, Mark Cuban, Richard Branson and Mark Zuckerberg, claiming that they made money for decades through fraudulent schemes.
“Each of the defendants has knowingly conspired, participated in, benefited financially from a decades-long fraudulent scheme,” he claimed in his lawsuit. He was arrested twice last year for disturbing the peace in Florida.
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