Police have identified the man who set himself on fire in a park outside the Manhattan courthouse where former President Donald Trump’s business record falsification trial was taking place, with officials reviewing whether to restrict access to Collect Pond Park following the incident.
Max Azzarello of St. Augustine, Florida, was identified by officials with the New York Police Department (NYPD) at an April 19 press conference as the man who entered the park, tossed what police said were some “conspiracy theory-type” pamphlets in the air, doused himself in a flammable liquid, and set himself ablaze.
Mr. Azzarello survived the inferno, which raged for about a minute before police arrived on the scene and put it out, NYPD said. Emergency responders rushed him to the hospital, where he remains in critical condition.
Police said a preliminary review of the pamphlets indicated that they were related to “Ponzi schemes, and the fact that some of our local educational institutions are fronts for the mob,” with NYPD officials adding that they don’t believe he was targeting any particular person or group with his shocking act.
“We just right now label his as sort of a conspiracy theorist, and we’re going from there, but the investigation will continue,” one of NYPD officials said.
“We’re looking through his social media and what he did online prior and it appears that he did post something in regards to this event prior to the incident,” an NYPD official said at the presser.
As more information comes to light about Mr. Azzarello and what motivated his actions, a picture emerges of an apparently psychologically distressed individual espousing far-left anarchistic ideas.
‘Ponzi Papers’
Mr. Azzarello’s shocking self-immolation was captured on video, which showed him kneeling on the ground and holding his head with his hands as the flames engulfed him.“My name is Max Azzarello, and I am an investigative researcher who has set himself on fire outside of the Trump trial in Manhattan,” he wrote in his manifesto.
He called his self-immolation an “extreme act of protest” meant to draw attention to an “urgent and important discovery.”
“We are victims of a totalitarian con, and our own government (along with many of their allies) is about to hit us with an apocalyptic fascist world coup,” he wrote.
“These claims sound like fantastical conspiracy theory, but they are not. They are proof of conspiracy. If you investigate this mountain of research, you will prove them too,” he claimed.
In the pamphlet—which apparently was the same one he tossed into the air before setting himself on fire—Mr. Azzarello elucidates his overarching aim, which is to abolish the government and replace it with a nebulous-sounding one that “serves all.”
Police confirmed at the press conference that, before he set himself on fire, Mr. Azzarello pulled out some pamphlets that an NYPD official described as propaganda-based, “almost like a conspiracy theory type pamphlet.”
“Some information in regards to Ponzi schemes, and the fact that some of our local educational institutions are fronts for the mob,” one of the investigators said at the presser.
“So a little bit of a conspiracy theory going on here,” the official added.
Mr. Azzarello’s family has been notified, police said, adding that the incident remains under investigation.
