Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Herschelkrustofsky/Archive

Report date August 19 2009, 19:31 (UTC)

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * Evidence submitted by Georgewilliamherbert

is long banned ( Long term abuse/Herschelkrustofsky ) for years of abuse over Lyndon LaRouche issues. He has continued sockpuppeting actively, with 29 confirmed and 28 suspected sockpuppets blocked already.

IDed and blocked two socks on Talk:Views of Lyndon LaRouche recently (Prehistoric fish and Epistemologically yours) based on obvious duck test and account name comparisons with older confirmed Hersh socks. A new IP has shown up with very similiar behavior.

The primary goal of this request is to check if the IP and most recent accounts share geo-local correlation. If so we have a new location they're operating out of. The previous edits were in southern california (various IPs including AOL IPs in that area); this new one is in Reno.

Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:31, 19 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Comments by accused parties    See Defending yourself against claims.


 * Comments by other users

Requested by Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:31, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
 * CheckUser requests


 * Clerk, patrolling admin and checkuser comments
 * . Adding two socks from the category so that nonstale results can be gotten. NW ( Talk ) 19:35, 19 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Conclusions
 * ✅ and  as Herschelkrustofsky. IP rangeblock expanded. The IP listed above is . Nishkid64 (Make articles, not wikidrama) 19:54, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Tagged appropriately. NW ( Talk ) 19:58, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

18 February 2011

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

''Please list evidence below this line. Remember to sign at the end of your section with 4 tilde characters " ~ "''

There is a thread at Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive818 with allegations, and reportedly evidence, of sockpuppetry, but there doesn't seem to have been an SPI to confirm it. David Biddulph (talk) 05:07, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.''

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * - This is being hashed out on ANI with the CU done privately. No need for a separate SPI. T. Canens (talk) 10:23, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

16 May 2012

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

These are a series of single-purpose accounts that show up to bias the Lyndon LaRouche related articles in the direction of LaRouche. They have great facility with Wikipedia on first entrance, and often times they make 10 edits to get over autoconfirmed. They are all well supplied with positive sources - even dated and foreign language sources. These article were under constant attack from a serial sock puppeteer with this same PoV. Hipocrite (talk) 17:34, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.''

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
After reviewing this and digging back through the archives, it looks like is a  match, but the other named accounts appear. No comment on any IPs.

I would welcome another checkuser's review of my findings -this is my first time investigating this particular case, so there may be details I've missed. TN X Man 18:25, 16 May 2012 (UTC)


 * blocked on the basis of likely technical overlap and clear circumstantial evidence from contribution history. Awaiting additional checkuser input on other accounts. MastCell Talk 23:10, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
 * - Per MastCell's request -- DQ  (ʞlɐʇ)  04:28, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Tnxman has already remarked on the likelihood of the other named accounts being related. I re-checked myself, and would broadly concur with the first conclusion. More specifically, I would say that Waalkes is ❌, Jacob2342 is, and FronkTheFrank is technically (different but nearby region to where Herschelkrustofsky was last known to be). AGK [•] 15:00, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the review. It sounds like there is no compelling technical evidence of additional sockpuppetry here. I'll keep an eye out as to whether coordination among these accounts rises to the level of a meatpuppetry concern. MastCell Talk 20:02, 18 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Per MastCell -- DQ  (ʞlɐʇ)  01:39, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

20 June 2012

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

More SBCGlobal Los Angeles IPs editing to whitewash Lyndon LaRouche. If not Herschelkrustofsky, a different LaRouche related serial sockpuppeter. Hipocrite (talk) 23:53, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.''

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
. Sorry, but CUs don't publicly make connections to IPs. Elockid  ( Talk ) 02:48, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Closing as no action taken. Please feel free to refile if there is new evidence. ⋙–Berean–Hunter—►  18:37, 23 June 2012 (UTC)

12 October 2012

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

There's a long history of socking on Helga Zepp-LaRouche, and I think this is one of them. It's an SPA with only four edits, three of which on La Rouche topics. Drmies (talk) 04:17, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Comments by other users
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Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * It seems that you are referring to, not Zephia99 who doesn't exist. De728631 (talk) 21:04, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes. Some nights I can't type worth a shit, it seems. Corrected another typo, above. Drmies (talk) 03:11, 13 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Blocked indef as sock. Closing Dennis Brown - 2&cent;    &copy;   Join WER 11:44, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

17 July 2014

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

Joe Bodacious has been very active in articles relating to Lyndon LaRouche, showing a pro-LaRouche stance, and a complementary stance against critics of LaRouche.

The very first edit of Joe Bodacious was this one on 5 April 2011, bringing the name Pier Francesco Biagi into the article on earthquake prediction. This is one day after Biagi was profiled on the LaRouchePAC Youtube channel: "Japan Quake Forecasted ", uploaded 4 April 2011, recorded 1 April by LaRouche associate Matthew Ogden. Also on 1 April, LaRouche's Executive Intelligence Review issued a press release about Biagi. On 8 April, Biagi was interviewed in Vienna for the LaRouche PAC, a date that can be seen ten seconds into this video. So we can see that the LaRouche movement is very interested in Biagi.

Herschelkrustofsky was interested in topics related to Guyana. (A co-founder of LaRouche's Schiller Institute was Guyanese Foreign Minister Frederick Wills, the article created by Herschelkrustofsky.) Joe Bodacious moved from earthquake prediction to Guyanese articles, for instance the history of Guyana, the Guyanese journalist Freddie Kissoon, a Guyanese political party, and another Guyanese political group Alliance for Change. In September 2011, Joe Bodacious found his way to the little-seen Guyanese biography Brindley Benn which had been created by Herschelkrustofsky in 2004. Joe Bodacious added a reference.

Joe Bodacious has edited many articles related to the LaRouche movement and its critics:
 * The first strongly pro-LaRouche disruption from Joe Bodacious was this reversion, restoring some arguably undue text to the lead section of Lyndon LaRouche's bio, showing that LaRouche successfully predicted the 2008–9 economic downturn.
 * Citizens Electoral Council
 * Views of Lyndon LaRouche and the LaRouche movement
 * J.L. Chestnut biography; a man who "was active in protesting the jailing of political activist Lyndon LaRouche."
 * One month after this late July 2012 article published by the Schiller Institute blaming HSBC, Wachovia, Citibank, and Riggs Bank for laundering drug money, Joe Bodacious added Riggs Bank to an article about arms dealing.
 * LaRouche movement
 * LaRouche critic Chip Berlet

At the mediation page about the Schiller Institute disputes, without any prompting Joe Bodacious referred back to the mention of swastikas in a Lyndon LaRouche bio, even though nothing about the Schiller dispute touched upon the connection Dennis King drew in 1989 between the Nazi swastika and LaRouche's photo of spiral galaxies. The bit about swastikas was added to the LaRouche biography back in December 2006 by Herschelkrustofsky sockpuppet. The swastika was first mentioned on the talk page by another Herschelkrustofsky sock:. The Herschelkrustofsky sock referred to the swastika at BLPN. In January 2007, this same sock said that too many links in the article were cited to Dennis King, giving King "a soapbox for some of King's more exotic notions". In August 2007, another sock of Herschelkrustofsky——defended having the swastika bit in the article, and he defended it again in November 2007. This same sockpuppet brought Chip Berlet to the edit warring noticeboard in November 2007, with the swastika as the reverted text. Yet another Herschelkrustofsky sock——proposed new text for the article, supposedly a compromise to solve an ongoing dispute, and his draft text included the swastika. In August 2011 at Wikipedia Review, Herschelkrustofsky highlighted the swastika bit as an example showing King to be a poor source. I found it very suspicious that Joe Bodacious brought up this completely irrelevant issue from years ago, since the swastika was a favorite tactic of Herschelkrustofsky's socks. Herschelkrustofsky is currently keeping close tabs on the swastika issue, so it is very likely that he is interacting with Wikipedia through the account Joe Bodacious.

I am asking for checkuser to look for sleepers because Herschelkrustofsky has been known to create lots and lots of them. Binksternet (talk) 22:07, 17 July 2014 (UTC)


 * Also, I've been looking at WikiChecker results which show a sort of daily rhythm for the Herschelkrustofsky socks.
 * Herschelkrustofsky's peak hour was 15:00 UTC. There were four peaks through the day.
 * Marvin Diode's peak hour was 14:00 UTC. There were four peaks through the day.
 * Niels Gade's peak hour was 15:00 UTC. There were four peaks through the day.
 * MaplePorter's peak hour was 22:00 UTC, with four peaks, the second highest being 14:00.
 * Tsunami Butler's peak hour was 15:00 UTC. There were four peaks through the day.
 * ManEatingDonut's peak hour was 14:00 UTC. There were four peaks through the day.
 * Leatherstocking's peak hour was 15:00 UTC. There were four peaks through the day.
 * Gelsomina's peak hour was 14:00 UTC. There were four peaks through the day.
 * HonourableSchoolboy's peak hour was 15:00 UTC. There were four peaks through the day.
 * Joe Bodacious shows four hours that are closely tied for peak. They are 00:00, 01:00, 04:00 and 14:00 UTC.
 * All the sleep periods seen above are centered on 07:00–09:00 UTC. I see that a similar analysis was made by Will Beback at Long-term abuse/Herschelkrustofsky, but it only goes to 2011. Binksternet (talk) 02:34, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.''

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * - Sleeper check. King of &hearts;   &diams;   &clubs;  &spades; 06:02, 23 July 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't see any accounts used recently enough to be compared with the Checkuser tool. It may be possible to check the list of known IP addresses in the LTA report, but that's probably not determinative either unless there's a hit (low probability).  Based on the behavioral evidence, I think there's good grounds to block the account if it's made any dodgy edits. I will look and act accordingly. Jehochman Talk 21:29, 23 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Blocked The account has been causing sufficient trouble to warrant a block. Would a checkuser please look around for any other sleeper accounts that might match this one, and we should block them too. Jehochman Talk 21:33, 23 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Nothing else to report. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 12:53, 24 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Tagged, nothing else to do here. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 13:19, 24 July 2014 (UTC)