Over the weekend, a memorial service was held in Tacoma, Washington for the two Powell boys, Charlie and Braden. On Saturday, hundreds of people showed up to pay respects to the tragic loss of life in these two children. Charlie and Braden died to the murder/suicide blazing inferno their father, Josh Powell, had set into motion Feb. 5.
This time of mourning for the Powell boys was almost tainted by the anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church. Allegedly, Margie Phelps tweeted the intentions of protesting the memorial service to “remind” Gov. Christine Gregoire “they died because of her rebellion.” The embittered Westboro Baptist Church leader Phelps didn’t stop there, including remarks like “This is why God’s cursed you w Josh Powells blowing up kids,” referring to the legalization of gay marriage.
On Thursday, responding to Westboro Baptist’s threats to protest the Powell boys’ memorial, LulzFinancial launched a campaign of digitally dismantling the anti-gay hate group’s church websites. Both church websites repeatedly suffered constant hacking from the tangent Anonymous hacktivist group.
This was then met with the promise of around 1,000 people preparing a counter-protest. Many felt Westboro Baptist’s plan to protest the Powell boys’ memorial to be blatantly inhumane, even drawing the attention of the Occupy Seattle Movement.
It would be radio personality Bobby D that brought a private peace to the memorial, sacrificing air time on his weekday morning “The Bobby D Show” as incentive to keep the Westboro Baptist Church away from the Powell boys’ memorial. The deal made between Fred Phelps Jr. and Bobby D was that the anti-gay hate group would cancel their protest in exchange for a spot this morning to express their views. If Westboro made their presence at the memorial, the worldwide radio show will destroy the recordings.
Westboro Baptist Church did not make an appearance at the Powell boys’ memorial. The Bobby D show announce this morning that they would be covering the recording and interview with the anti-gay group in the third hour.