Dennis Shaw says the U.S. government has, for more than a decade, perpetrated a “controlled demolition” of his life.

PROVIDENCE, RI—Citing “overwhelming evidence,” 9/11 Truth movement adherent Dennis E. Shaw, 53, told reporters Tuesday that he believes the U.S. government has orchestrated a secret, intricate plot to systematically destroy his entire life over the past 11 years.


Shaw, who since 2001 has lost his job, seen his marriage end, and, according to friends, completely alienated himself from mainstream society, argued that there are “serious reasons to doubt” the commonly accepted explanation that his slide into reclusion and paranoia was his own fault.

“The official story is all too familiar,” said Shaw, a self-identified 9/11 Truther who hands out pamphlets at Kennedy Plaza from 2 to 6 p.m. every day. “On Sept. 11, 2001, terrorists crashed three planes into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. Then, over the ensuing months and years, my obsession with the truth behind those events supposedly led to the gradual collapse of my personal and professional life. But this convenient little narrative requires us to believe a series of highly improbable coincidences.”


“Open your eyes, and you’ll see the puppet masters’ fingerprints are all over my pathetic, seemingly self-destructive existence,” he added.

Pointing to a detailed timeline scrawled on poster board affixed to the wall of a studio apartment cluttered with 9/11 paraphernalia, Shaw reviewed the events that, he believes, “happened too perfectly to be anything but the intentional, controlled demolition of [his] life.”


“In January 2004, my wife said she wished I spent more time with her instead of on Internet Truther forums, yet somehow, in April of that very same year she complained that it was ‘becoming unbearable to be around me,’” he said, showing reporters a day-by-day account of the couple’s failed relationship. “It simply doesn’t add up that Melissa would say she wanted to be with me both more often and less often—unless, that is, an outside party like the U.S. government wanted her to say it.”

“Meanwhile—and this is where it really gets interesting—on four separate occasions in 2002 I recorded my mother saying she thought my research was ‘interesting’ and ‘worth thinking about,’” continued the man, who confirmed he has watched the film series Loose Change seven or eight times in the past week. “How was it, then, that by November of the following year she was calling it ‘crazy’ and ‘sad,’ a complete reversal of her original stance?”


Shaw went on to present a chart showing the “suspiciously” rapid disintegration of his friendships since 2001, noting the disparity between the 258 social interactions he shared with his best friend, Stephen Danforth, in the years before 2001 and the mere 17 interactions they’ve had since then, a decline Shaw said “can’t be explained by pure, random chance.”

Recently, the 53-year-old created a website dedicated to “uncovering what really happened to Dennis E. Shaw’s life,” in which he posits the existence of a shadowy government conspiracy whose sole purpose is to engineer his downfall.


“Everyone’s in on it—Bush, Cheney, Bernanke, Israel, and now Obama,” said Shaw, claiming that an entire life and career “couldn’t just collapse like this all on its own.” “Not a single one of them has ever come forward to deny their involvement in the destruction of my life.”

Even ignoring the rest of the evidence, Shaw remarked, the fact that he lost his job as a reporter for The Providence Journal mere weeks after writing articles in which he described 9/11 as an inside job was, in itself, “a smoking gun in Uncle Sam’s hand.”


“On the evening of October 28, 2005, I handed in an article exposing Bush and Cheney’s cover-up of the real 9/11 Commission report. Well, what a surprise that the very next morning I was fired from my job by my editor, a man I have reason to believe has connections to the FBI, the CIA and, yes, Dick Cheney,” said Shaw, whose former employer cited “repeated breaches of journalistic integrity” and “erratic behavior” as the reason for Shaw’s dismissal. “Fast-forward three years and my rent has shot up, my credit score has dropped, and Melissa is no longer taking my calls. You think that was all some kind of magical coincidence? Think again.”

Smoking cigarette after cigarette, Shaw then proceeded to show reporters a homemade videotape he shot of his ex-wife returning to his apartment to pick up her toaster, rewinding the tape over and over again to spot what he believed could be “government surveillance devices” concealed in her clothing.


“The facts speak for themselves—I’m just connecting the dots,” said Shaw, reiterating that only the “sinister machinations” of the U.S. government could make a formerly happy, stable human being “totally fall to pieces.” “We must keep fighting for the truth, if not simply out of respect for justice, then at least out of respect for the innocent victim of this calculated crime.”