Tags:
Journalism of Courage
Dramatic scenes played out outside the New York courthouse where Donald Trump’s historic hush-money trial was taking place as a 37-year-old man set himself on fire. Hours later, he passed away.
The man burned for several minutes in the presence of several cameras outside the courthouse with witnesses saying that he had pulled pamphlets out of his backpack and threw them in the air before he doused himself with a liquid and set himself on fire.
Max Azzarello, a 37-year-old man from St. Augustine, Florida, was outside the courthouse holding a placard and protesting as Trump’s trial went on at the Manhattan courthouse.
He had a career in marketing, sales, and technology, and even worked on a political campaign in 2013. He was known for leaving supportive Post-it notes for classmates and performing karaoke at Rutgers.
According to reports, he was holding a sign displaying the address of a website where the same pamphlets were uploaded. The top post of the website says, “I have set myself on fire outside the Trump Trial.”
Azzarello was known for his support of social justice during his time at Rutgers University, where he received a master’s degree in city and regional planning in 2012. He had a career in marketing, sales, and technology, and even worked on a political campaign in 2013.
According to the New York Times, Azzarello had walked around Lower Manhattan earlier in the week, holding a sign on Wednesday critical of New York University before moving to Collect Pond Park. There, Azzarello was seen with a placard reading: “Biggest scoop of your life or your money back!” One of his signs claimed that Trump and President Biden were “about to fascist coup us.”
Azzarello’s was arrested three times in 2023 on misdemeanor charges in Florida, and he posted online in August that he had just spent three days in a psychiatric hospital. Later that month, he reportedly threw a glass of wine at a framed photograph of former US President Bill Clinton and had also stripped, while shouting profanities.
He was arrested on charges of defacing a property and breaking signboards.
