September 23, 1989 - January 6, 2012 (22 years old)
Shaun Jacobs was a man living in Portsmouth, Virginia whose death from an apparent suicide and the subsequent media blackout that followed caused international discussions regarding the United States' involvement in the business of states following the broadening of the Patriot Act after the annexation of Afghanistan and parts of former Iraq in late 2010.
Personal Life
Born Shaun Tyrone Jacobs in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Shaun and his mother, Lucinda Mykell Grant, moved to Portsmouth in 1996 after the breakup of Lucinda and Shaun's father, Austin Jacobs, a former United States Marine. There, Lucinda took up work as an anesthesiologist at a local dentistry practice, while young Shaun attended the public school system.
Shaun graduated from Portsmouth Regional High School with honors, and originally planned to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), majoring in internet security, but dropped his application from the waiting list unexpectedly following his mother's diagnosis of advanced stage breast cancer.
Despite unfavorable odds, Shaun's mother survived her bout with cancer, and later that year, Shaun began attending Portsmouth Community College as a freshman, majoring in computer science.
"Chrysanth" and possible international connections
[This section has been removed by user:eagle1prime as of January 8, 2012 @ 12:42 hrs]
Death and Controversy
Death
On the night of Friday, January 6, 2012, Shaun Jacobs was found dead at his computer, with an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, by his friend and classmate Christan Miller. Shaun's mother, Lucinda, returned home that evening to find the police already there. Lucinda, Miller, and their immediate family are now under witness protection protocols, despite the death having been ruled a suicide by Portsmouth head coroner Michael Davies.
Within a few days of Jacobs' death, word spread through the US World of Warcraft forums and through internet sites such as YouTube and 4chan, with some sites adopting a mocking tone, and others offering what appeared to be genuine sentiment. Jacobs' guild in World of Warcraft, the Grey Fox Organization, named after a mysterious thief in the video game The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, performed a memorial service in game for Jacobs and for his character, Chrysanth (which was raided by the enemy guild Golden Sunrise twice during the service, despite pleas from both sides for peace on the World of Warcraft forums).
Controversy
Several events preceding and following Jacobs' death have been noted by both the press and the population in general.
First, two weeks before Jacobs' death, he received, by email, a
[This section has been removed by user:eagle1prime as of January 8, 2012 @ 12:42 hrs]
Second, almost immediately following Jacobs' memorial service in World of Warcraft, when GFO players, some friends of Jacobs, were meeting, all World of Warcraft servers went down for exactly twelve minutes, at which time certain data was analyzed, modified, and/or removed from the server, according to unnamed World of Warcraft GUI hackers. Blue posts (posts made by Blizzard developers and forum moderators) have described the incident as arising "due to the massive server load in one area from the fighting between GFO and GS players".
Third, statements made by Jacobs' friends and family show him as a person unlikely to commit suicide. According to one close friend, "Jacobs was always a really happy, really fun guy. He was always playing tricks and showing off. He was really good with computers - I mean, really, really good - and he knew he had a bright future. I can't imagine why he would have killed himself."
References
--------------------------
[This is an archived image of how the page appeared on January 8, 2012 according to Google. The page has since been removed in accordance with US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Code 5127-402c.]
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment