Baby QAnon Was Just Arrested
The feds arrested the self-proclaimed QAnon founder after he
posted images of NFL players’ brain scans.
Published Apr. 07, 2020 8:35PM ET
"In the bizarre world of QAnon conspiracy theorists, 29-year-old Austin Steinbart was a rising star. A segment of the pro-Trump conspiracy theory group believed he was the mysterious “Q,” the anonymous internet figure whose clues have convinced a portion of the president’s base that Donald Trump is engaged in a shadowy war against pedophile-cannibals in the Democratic Party.
Steinbart—dubbed “Baby Q” by his fans—claimed he could get away with anything because he was a super-spy for Trump. In online arguments, Steinbart insisted he should have been arrested “100 times over” for his actions. And the fact that he hadn’t been arrested for, say, threatening to kill the Queen of Denmark was proof that Trump had given him immunity from prosecution.
“Seems like I should have been ARRESTED by now, eh?” Steinbart tweeted to one of his foes in late March, adding a sarcastic thinking-face emoji.
A few days later, FBI agents arrested him.
Steinbart now faces an extortion charge over his online antics, all apparently committed in an attempt to convince gullible online conspiracy theorists that he’s an all-powerful intelligence agent. As part of his attempts at self-promotion, Steinbart allegedly posted the confidential brain scans and medical files of former professional football players online—images he was able to obtain while allegedly getting a scan of his own.
Steinbart’s arrest marks just the latest time a QAnon believer has been charged with a crime. Two others have been charged with murder, including one accused of murdering the head of the Gambino crime family. The conspiracy theory has also surfaced in two child kidnapping plots, and a 2018 terrorist incident near the Hoover Dam.
Online, Steinbart had amassed nearly 20,000 Twitter followers and 23,000 YouTube subscribers, even as he infuriated more established QAnon hucksters with his brash attitude. In rambling YouTube videos, Steinbart claimed that he was “Q,” was somehow in communication with a time-traveling version of himself, and would soon be appointed to run Trump’s Space Force — a nonsensical narrative that nevertheless won him the devotion of a number of QAnon believers.
But prosecutors and the FBI paint another picture of Steinbart in court documents, describing a young man with "unaddressed behavior or mental health issues" willing to commit crimes to build up his profile in the online conspiracy theory world.
Steinbart first came to law enforcement attention in mid-March, when he posted footage he had shot at a Los Angeles mental health clinic on YouTube. While getting a brain scan at the clinic at his parents’ request, according to prosecutors, Steinbart gained access to a computer and started filming the screen as he went through other patients’ records.
"Steinbart gained unauthorized access to protected patient information on the clinic's computer and recorded the patient information in a video," prosecutors wrote in a court record.
Those files included a folder marked “NFL,” which contained entries about dozens of former professional football players. Steinbart filmed himself going through doctor’s notes and a brain scan for football commentator and former player Terry Bradshaw before posting the video on YouTube.
“You tell me whether or not I’d be in huge trouble for hacking these famous people’s medical records if I wasn’t Q,” Steinbart said in the video, before describing another player’s brain as a “little hole-y.” "
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https://www.thedailybeast.com/baby-qanon-was-just-arrested