Jack "Ziz" LaSota made an appearance in court yesterday and did his best to communicate that he had no respect for the judge or the courtroom. LaSota also took the opportunity to accuse the Trump administration of racism and genocide against trans people.
The alleged leader of a cultlike group linked to several killings made her first appearance in federal court Monday, denouncing the government and its case against her as a “genocide” against transgender people.
Ziz LaSota, who was originally charged under what her attorney referred to as her deadname, gave meandering answers at her initial appearance and arraignment in U.S. District Court in downtown Baltimore related to a Western Maryland gun arrest, which ended what had been a cross-country search.
She refused to stand when the judge entered the courtroom, or when entering her plea of not guilty.
Andy Ngo has more on the appearance.
“Your government is currently going around scooping up brown people and disappearing them,” he said, repeating accusations from left-wing activists.
He mocked U.S. Magistrate Judge Douglas R. Miller as he was being questioned, accusing the judge of being part of an “organized crime ring” involved in “slavery.”
When the court clerk asked him to state his name for the official court record, LaSota said his name was “Justice” and that his age was “Timeless.” Asked when he was born, LaSota stated: “I have been born many times.”
Ngo mentions that we've seen something similar before. Back in April another member of this cultlke group appeared in a California courtroom. Alexander “Somni” Leatham is also trans.
As Leatham was led into Solano Superior Court in Fairfield, California, in chains and flanked by multiple armed officers from the Solano County Sheriff’s Department on Tuesday, she loudly spoke over the judge, reading what appeared to be a statement from a piece of paper, SFGate reported.
Leatham said that a specific officer had threatened her life, telling her that she “deserved to be shot for being transgender while he had a gun and I was in chains.”
“The court has been hormonally detransitioning me for quarter of a decade as part of a state-sponsored conversion therapy program,” she told the court. “I am not suicidal. I have never been suicidal.”
“If I am killed in police custody, it was murder!” Leatham shouted as the courtroom descended into chaos.
Leatham and another member of the group, Suri Dao were facing murder and attempted murder charges for an attack on their former landlord, Curtis Lind. Lind was planning to throw the group off his property because they hadn't been paying rent and they attacked him and stabbed him with a samurai sword. Leatham was allegedly the one with the sword. Incredibly, Lind survived the attack but was allegedly murdered by another member of the cult, Maximilian “Audere” Snyder, in January of 2025.
Another more recent court appearance by Leatham, this one in September, also devolved into shouting.
“I am an innocent woman! I have done nothing wrong! This is a show trial to coordinate the genocide of transgender people! What will you do when they come for you?” Leatham said with a raised voice, reading from a piece of paper in her shackled hands.
Leatham also accused prison guards of denying her estrogen while in custody, saying she had been “kidnapped” by a “gang of dead-eyed brutes.”
“Where have the good men gone? Where are the gods?” she questioned.
The prosecutor in that case has suggested that the defense seems to be trying to delay the case indefinitely. Since Lind, the victim, was murdered, the prosecutor only has one witness left and that person is 80 years old.
Jack "Ziz" LaSota pleaded not guilty to the federal gun possession count he was facing. There's doesn't appear to be a court date set for him yet.
