Email Text Released

On Wednesday PutnamLIES. com broke the story of the unauthorized use of a copyrighted image in the "Hot Shots" section.
PutnamLIES.com correspondent Leonard Bernstein uncovered the blatant copyright violation and contacted the photographer whose rights were violated by Hallburn.
PutnamLIES.com excerpted that email in that story. Upon request of the reporter we are now releasing the entire email exchange.

From: Leonard Bernstein
Subject: photo use on website
To: Bernard Zee
Date: Wednesday, September 23, 2009, 1:22 PM
Hello,
I noticed one of your photos on a blog located here: http://putnamlive.com/HotShots2009BlueAngelsBernardZee.jpg
(from the main nav page you would go to the "hotshot" section.
(editor's note: Readers will have to cut and paste to see the above link as we will not link to the site.)Which appears to be http://home.comcast.net/~bzee1a/DSC_8128.jpg with your copyright cropped out. Just wondering if you were aware of this?
The owner of this blog tends to snag photos without credit, and seeing how your photos are for sale, I figured the least he would do is give credit for that great photo.
Thanks!
--
-Lenny-
From: Bernard Zee
Date: Wed, Sep 23, 2009 at 4:55 PM
Subject: Re: photo use on website
To: Leonard Bernstein
Hi Lenny,
Thanks for letting me know about the picture. You're right in that I did not give them permission to use it (I would have, if they asked).
At least they credited me indirectly in the filename of the image.
I'm very honored that you recognized that picture! You've got a great eye for details!
Regards,
BZ


This picture didn't come from an image service.
If it was submitted by a reader, there was no due diligence to check if the reader owned the photo.
Halburn says he won't print a letter to the editor without a scan of the writer's driver's license.
But apparently he'll post any picture anyone sends him regardless of who owns it.

By the way, did you get a copy of Rick Ray's license for his letter or did you just copy the letter verbatim from the Herald Dispatch, Crisco?

Piracy like this is journalism at its absolute worst, practiced
by an immoral charlatan masquerading as a businessman.
He will stoop to the lowest, most vulgar, vile and disgusting
ploys to deceive the honest, hard-working citizen.
He is the lowest form of scum on the face of the earth.

Pussy Publisher Produces Piles of Purloined Pictures

I have zero credibility!
Over the course of the last few days, the investigative team at PutnamLIES.com has accused me of using other people's images. So I changed the one I stole.

But check this one out on my Hot Shots section.

Another Halburn Copyright Violation
This image belongs to Bernard Zee

This picture belongs to a photographer named Bernard Zee. It was taken in 2007 and I published it without his permission. Like some of the cartoons I published, his name was cropped out of the picture.
Mr. Zee writes: "I did not give them permission to use it (I would have, if they asked). At least they credited me indirectly in the filename of the image."

Hot Shots is a reader submitted section. Read the disclaimer.
It just says the submitter allows me to publish the picture without compensation. It doesn't say they had to actually have taken the picture.
I don't need permission anyway. I'M MARK HALBURN, GODDAMMIT!!!

So then I decided I'd go back and poke around the archives.

Guess what I found:
A bunch of images that appear on other peoples' sites.

Here are a few:

The Indian that designed this one probably wears Chinese shoes.

Nobody around here even watches WFRV. Who's going to know?

I hope this guy doesn't come after me. He's got a gun.

USA TODAY? Are they still in business?

These are only a few of the swiped images. There are a bunch more. I guess I'll have to go and change them and claim they never existed. Or maybe I'll claim that they stole them from me.
Anyway, I stick by my defense that this is a dead but sensational issue in a continued campaign to smear me.
Maybe I used to have a subscription to something or other. I can't really remember. The voices in my head are too loud.

It Takes A Thief

IN COLOR

I'm so desperate for original material for my shitty little "news" site I thought I'd start a feature to get people to send pictures in. I called it "See it, Shoot it, Send it" .

Then I stole an image from WRDW.com in Augusta, GA for use on my site.

The original

Or did I steal the image first and use the name after that? I can't remember.
It doesn't really matter though.

I'm sure WRDW paid good money for that image, but you know how much it cost me?
Zero. Zilch. Nada.
I really don't care.
Never have. Never will.
Fuck them. I'M MARK HALBURN, BITCHES!!!

The stolen image

I didn't do anything to the image but resize it a little. Their lawyers will never figure that one out.
If anyone says anything I'll just blame it on my imaginary consultant (like I'd ever take anyone's advice) or my hosting company. I'll just say they did it without my knowledge or permission. I may be forced to fire both of them.

This is just another one of the top flight ethical practices that readers and advertisers have come to expect from me and more proof that PutnamLíve.com is Putnam county's news loser.

Honestly, I don't know how an advertiser can look his customers in the face after advertising on my site.

UPDATE: Once again PutnamLIES.com forces an unethical publisher to do the right thing and discontinue using an image he knew he had no right to use. Halburn has removed the graphic and replaced it with another. Where did the new one come from?
We will continue to hold this slimy fuckstick's feet to the fire.UPDATE 2: The graphic continues to appear on the "Hot Shots" page". If he knew anything about writing web pages that would not happen.
1994 called, Mark. It wants its web pages back, you dumb fuck.

Mark Halburn IS Steve Bosell!

The other night I listened to the Phil Hendrie Show on the radio.
There's a character on his show named Steve Bosell. Steve is an overly sensitive guy that sues everybody at the drop of a hat.

Well, Hendrie's met his match. Halburn's going to sue Hendrie for basing the character on HIM.
Here's what I mean:
Bosell is from Southern California, Halburn's from Southern California. Bosell likes to sue people, Halburn likes to sue people. Halburn was on the radio, Phil Hendrie's on the radio.
Although he's now in the hotel business, even though all he really does is scrape the jizz off the sheets and look at internet porn and PutnamLIES.com while he's there.

Listen to how Steve bitches and moans. Listen to his sense of self-entitlement. Look at some of the lawsuits Bosell has filed. It's exactly what Halburn would do!
THAT'S HIM!!
How RUDE to base a character on HALBURN and not compensate him!! He's a continuing character! He's not getting a dime from this and it is clearly based on him! Somebody's going to PAY!

Listen to this example where Steve calls in:


Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Here's a couple more:
Lost Wallet - HALBURN  LOST MY WALLET TOO - TWICE!
"666" check
Now you tell me that Bosell's not based on him!

Halburn Admits Defeat - PutnumLive endorses PutnamLIES.com, Girlofwords and Cryptic Bullshit!

Desperate Publisher Uses Competitors' Names
In Keywords

In a stunning piece of Putnam County news, I admit that I
have had my ass kicked.

Last week PutnamLIES.com once again called attention to my unethical
practice of keyword stuffing.

Well, I'm at it again.
Only this time I'm using their own words against them.
HA! I'm a FUCKING GENIUS.An unnamed commenter has tipped PutnamLIES.com to my
latest display of assholery.

Look at these now:

"keywords" content="Putnam County News, women, eleanor,
buffalo, scott depot,culloden, midway, bancroft, poca,
winfield, cryptic, hurricane, santa claus, girls, Putnam,
news, girl of words, County, West Virginia, sports,
information,children, animals, Freedom, America, Liberty,
sun, travel, magic mart, pepsi, coke, masters, uno,
teays valley, hurricane, nitro, applebees, dodge, dakota,
layoff, workers, mary kay, nascar, SPORTS, CLOTHES,
KROGER, Cars, sheriff,crime, seniors, flu, shots,
pneumonia, hospital, ford, ginos, tudors, chevy, food,
pizza, rain, dog, cat, weather, snow, hot, cold, sheetz,
walmart, walgreens, dollar tree, stampers, camc, game stop,
rent a center, radio shack, putnam lies, lee, mark, mays,
blogspot"
Maybe if I included "I"", "and", "the", "Halburn" and "Hallburn",
I'd get more hits as well.
Leonard Bernstein claims that using words like these won't
help.
What does he know anyway? I don't tell him how to conduct
his orchestra, he shouldn't tell me how to run my site.
By using the above keywords, I acknowledge that the
people turning on the light in my cockroach-like existence
are right,that I AM an unethical scumbag and a sniveling piece of shit
and by piggybacking my site on their successes, maybe I can
get some traffic to my pathetic reprint site.
Maybe if I spent a fifth of the time I waste whining like
an old grandmother in actually writing my own articles, I
wouldn't have to be a leech and spam keywords to try and
get search hits.

I hope that people don't start contacting my advertisers
and letting them know what a fuckstick I am.It's a good thing that nobody's put together a list.
I'd hate for a Glenn Beck type boycott to be started against
me and my sponsors.

I guess this proves that Girl of Words, PutnamEYES.com,
and Cryptic Bullshit were right all along.

PutnumLIVE.com is Putnam county's news loser.

UPDATE: Halburn is such a scumbag that after his 9:56 AM
visit to PutnamLIES.com, he changed his keywords and
added "Leonard Bernstein".
I guess he forgot about that one.
And he just keeps on adding to them. He really is
batshit crazy.

Who Is Sal Marino?

Recently, over at Cryptic Bullshit, Lee posted a picture of his beautiful daughter, Ava.
Later someone, with an email address containing the name Sal Marino, left the following vile message there:
"That’s the fuckin ugliest baby I have even seen. did you get it from neverland ranch when they auctioned zoo babies?"

On September 8, that same person visited PutnamLIES.com by using the following search terms: "debra girimont putnam county wv."
Debra Girimont, is running as a Republican for some office in Putnam County.

Sal went directly to the story featuring Ms. Girimont, entitled My Bias Is Showing...Again.

Now I don't know who Sal Marino is, but someone either very interested in or associated with Debra Girimont is a disturbed racist.

The last thing Ms Girimont needs in this campaign are allegations that her supporters are bigots and racists.
Her association with Halburn already calls her judgment into question.

If you've been contacted by Sal Marino, or have any information as to his identity, please contact PutnamLIES.com immediately with the details.
Your safety may be at stake!

Fun With Google

Many thanks Lenny!

Down the Memory Hole

A few weeks ago, PutnamLIES.com called Halburn's hand on his unethical and disgusting practice of keyword stuffing to get traffic for his pathetic "news" site.
For those of you that may have missed them, let me reprint those keywords from articles on his site again:

keyword="sex, nude, porn, naked women, santa claus, girls, Putnam, news, County, West Virginia, sports, information, children, animals, Freedom, America, Liberty, sun, travel, pussy, cock, ass, tits, pepsi, coke, masters, uno, teays valley, hurricane, nitro, applebees, dodge, dakota, layoff, workers, mary kay, cigarettes, smokers, marlboro, winston, nascar, SPORTS, CLOTHES, KROGER, Cars, sheriff, crime, seniors, flu, shots, pneumonia, hospital, ford, ginos, tudors, chevy, food, pizza, rain, dog, cat, weather, snow, hot, cold"

(emphasis mine)

I kind of like the way that it goes from Santa Claus to girls to that string of
smut. Don't you?
Disturbing? You bet!
But Halburn doesn't care. Never has. Never will.

By the way, he'll be out and around Putnam County at school
events and festivals taking pictures of your underage
children.
Just sayin'.

He wasn't man enough to respond here even though he read the article numerous times. So now over at Cryptic Bullshit, Lee has called him out on it again. He posted some links to pages he said had those disgusting keywords.

Only this time Halburn thought he showed him.
Being the unethical scumbag that he is, he went to those pages and changed them at 8:13 AM on September 10.
And then he pointed out to him that there was nothing inappropriate there...NOW.

Josef Stalin would be proud.

EXCLUSIVE - PUTNAM POOL BOY ARRESTED AGAIN!

Here we go again!PutnamLIES.com has obtained exclusive access to not-so-shocking news. The Putnam Pool Boy, Mark Halburn (aka Hallburn) has struck again.
This is a story that you'll never see on PutnamLive.com.
In the latest chapter of "harass him so he shuts up," Putnam County Parks and Recreation has conspired with Kanawha County and had me arrested for trespassing at the Shawnee Park Pool in Institute WV.
On Sunday, August 30, 2009 I entered the premises while it was closed DURING POSTED BUSINESS HOURS and demanded to swim, just like I did at the County Park Pool in Eleanor last summer.
They told me that the pool was closed but then I showed the IDIOT a sign that said the pool was scheduled to be open until 6 p.m. They said it had closed early that day and told me numerous times to leave. How RUDE!!
But I got in their face, and told them I was not leaving. I then told them to get the parks director on the phone and tell him to send in his RESIGNATION.

HAH! I'll show them to screw with me. I'm a JOURNALIST!

Usually they have a teenager that I can bully easily , but who was there using the pool?
A SWAT team from Kanawha County!!!!
Holy fuck! I'm not ashamed to say I SHIT MY PANTS right then and there. What a mess!
Since they were men AND cops, I didn't try to intimidate them, but groveled and cried like a little bitch instead. That bastard J. M. Vernon arrested me for trespassing anyway and I was arraigned in front of Kim Aaron and had to post bail.
Even though I'm not on Facebook anymore, I'm glad Kim Aaron is still my friend. She was the one that let me off on my other pool trespassing charge.
Mess with me will you? I've got friends in the Judicial system.

It's obvious to me now that the tentacles of the corrupt Putnam County government are so powerful and pervasive that they cross county lines in order to get Kanawha County to harass me.

NOT my mugshot... this time.

What's next? After another embarrassing trial where I'll plead insanity, I plan to draft another groundless multi-million dollar claim against the Kanawha County Sheriff's Department, Parks and Recreation Department and that pompous bastard Kent Carper. Like dogshit on the sole of a shoe, they smeared my good name. I look forward to seeing them in civil court - if I can get a lawyer that I haven't alienated to take my case on a contingency basis.The Kanawha County Sheriff's office was unavailable for comment, but we invite them to contact PutnamLIES.com.

Keep reading PutnamLIES.com for further coverage of this case.

PutnamLIES.com would not be able to bring you this story if it happened in Putnam County because Sheriff Mark L. Smith and his administration refuse to return my harassing telephone calls after this publisher was acquitted after an allegedly false arrest last year and filed yet another baseless claim for damages against the department.

For more than 6 months, Sheriff Smith has been uncooperative about providing crime reports and has refused to return my annoying phone calls. They're all INCOMPETENT jackasses. Why won't they treat me like the media professional that I am?

Due to my douchbaggery, PutnamLIES.com was forced to file a Freedom of Information Act request with the department in order to view crime reports. As soon I stop behaving like a whiny little bitch PutnamLIES.com will be able to bring you crime news more promptly.

Maybe not always acting like an asshole, treating people with respect and without name calling would work better than calling people corrupt idiots.

Naaaah.

Whatever Happened to Old No Nuts?

You know, Facebook is a wonderful thing. It helps us keep in touch with virtually everyone.
For instance, here's Halburn's wife's status message from today:

"(The boy) is starting to put words together and is trying hard to say them. Well, today he was saying "Mark" and then he got a box of doughnuts. Well, (and I hope I don't offend anyone, but this is funny) when he says doughnuts, it sounds like "nonuts". lol I laugh every time he says it. What did I ever do for entertainment before him???????"


The funny thing is, that's the same thing she calls Mark.

Update: PutnamLIES.com has discovered that shortly after publication of this article, the wife was bullied into removing her Facebook profile.
Later, Hallburn was such a pussy, he removed his own profile as well. Now nobody is his friend. (Like they ever were in the first place.)

Attempted Newspaper Theft Foiled

PutnamLIES.com has uncovered an attempted newspaper theft from a local drug store.

The suspect picked a Hurricane Breeze newspaper (approximate value: 35 cents) out of the rack, opened it and proceeded to read it, then folded it back, placed it under his arm and attempted to walk out the door without paying.

He is described as an extremely obese white male with dark slicked back hair and a mustache, approximately 45-50 years of age, wearing a t-shirt with what appeared to be jelly stains on the front.

Sheriff Mark L. Smith says his office has received several good tips and they believe that they've identified the subject.

Anyone with further information is urged to contact PutnamLIES.com immediately.

Douchebag Reporter Thrown Out Of Polling Place

The School Bond vote was held Saturday and this publisher went out to bring our readers coverage of the event.

Think there's not really anything that could go wrong with a bond election? Are you looking to see me create even more controversy in Putnam County? Then follow me to the polls.

When I tried to enter the polling place with my CAMERA to take pictures, they refused me access. ME. A respected member of the press. (I even had my press hat on). They need to show me more RESPECT as a taxpayer.
And me being me, I had to throw my weight around (and that's considerable) , throw a fit and act like the bitch I am.
I immediately called the County Clerk, Brian Wood's office and DEMANDED that I talk with him, not his assistant and certainly not his voice mail.
All I got was his voice mail.
This made me EXTREMELY ANGRY!!! This office is run by an IDIOT. The County Clerk's office should never be unattended whenever there's an election. I AM TIRED OF GETTING THE RUNAROUND!!! I'M A PROFESSIONAL JOURNALIST, GODDAMMIT!!! Your laws don't apply to me!!! I'm doing the people's work.
You ignorant hillbillies don't know who you're messing with! Haven't you read my mental evaluation? I'm certifiable.

I'm from California! This would never happen there! You can't even hold a simple election without me causing yet another scene and calling attention to myself. Can't you get it through your thick heads? What is wrong with you people?

Since I have shit for brains, I'm too fucking STUPID to know that West Virginia election law forbids anyone except for election officers or voters from coming within 300 feet of the polling place. Plus it's against the law to use cameras OR cellphones in a polling place.

If I wasn't such an arrogant bastard, I should have thought twice about making a stink. I could have ended up in jail AGAIN.
I'll bet that PutnamLIES.com would have loved to have gotten hold of another mug shot of me.

What could have happened to me? The WV State code §3-1-38 says: The commissioners of election shall preserve order at the polls, ... and may direct disorderly persons to be removed, and, if necessary, to be taken and held in custody until sunrise of the next day, or for any shorter time, which may be done by any sheriff or constable or other person or persons designated by the commissioners of election. For such purpose no warrant or authority in writing shall be necessary.

Perhaps the next time I behave this way in a polling place, the INCOMPETENT poll workers will do their job and have me arrested. I DARE THEM.
Voting is one of our most hallowed rights as Americans and must be protected at all costs. Unfortunately, it's assholes like me that it has to be protected from. Leave it to me to fuck things up on a simple school bond election.

By the way, the bond passed 5141 in favor to 4029 against, 56 to 44%.