Remember Andrew?

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Gay-Hating Michigan Assistant District Attorney Sued by the Target of His Rants

4/7/11 at 08:55 AM

Remember Andrew Shirvell, the unhinged assistant district attorney in Michigan who spent seemingly all of his free time harassing an openly gay University of Michigan student in public and on the Internet? For a while it was Anderson Cooper's favorite crusade. He invited both Shirvell and his victim, Chris Armstrong, onto the show. Cooper eviscerated the strangely languorous lawyer and allowed Armstrong to defend himself from Shirvell's claims that he was "Satan's representative on the [Michigan] student assembly." (A relatively easy task.) Although Shirvell always insisted his barrage of abuse was "a political campaign" and "nothing personal against Chris," he engaged in tactics like standing outside of Armstrong's house, videotaping him, shouting him down in public, and abusing his parents and friends.

Shirvell was eventually fired for his lunacy. Now, months after the harassment started, Armstrong is taking action of his own. He's suing Shirvell for "defamation, intentional infliction of emotional distress, abuse of process, invasion of privacy, and stalking." The price tag attached to the suit is roughly $25,000 — not a ton of moolah. "At this point, it's not about the money," Armstrong's lawyer said. "Mr. Shirvell has refused to retract any of his bizarre and untruthful points. We want to set the record straight." Starting with the fact that Armstrong is not, as Shirvell once alleged, a Nazi. And also that whole Satan's student rep thing.

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