Man Who Set Himself on Fire Outside Trump Trial Had History of Bizarre Florida Arrests

The man who set himself on fire near a Manhattan court Friday was a conspiracy writer with a history of arrests in St. Augustine, Florida, where he was detained three times in six days last year, once for blasting music in his underwear outside a hotel.

A conspiratorial essay on Substack and set of strange arrest records are providing a possible glimpse into the mindset of 37-year-old Florida resident Max Azzarello, who walked into a New York City park, poured accelerant on himself, and self-immolated on Friday afternoon.

Azzarello lit himself on fire while former president Donald Trump was on trial in the courthouse across the street in his New York hush-money case. Emergency responders doused Azzarello with fire extinguishers and transported him to a local hospital's burn unit in critical condition. He died hours later.

Police reports obtained by New Times (attached below) show that Azzarello was criminally charged in three incidents in close succession in his hometown of St. Augustine, a historical seaside city on North Florida's Atlantic coast.

On August 19, after dining at a restaurant at the Casa Monica hotel, Azzarello chucked a glass of wine at a frame-mounted autograph from former president Bill Clinton in the west end of the hotel lobby, according to an incident report. The glass shattered, and wine stained the wall and autograph.

Two days later, Azzarello allegedly returned to the hotel, stripped off his clothes, and began yelling at customers. Police arrived to find him in his underwear blasting music from a speaker and screaming. He walked away upon being confronted by an officer and hopped into a nearby fountain in front of a museum before returning to the hotel, according to the incident report.

Azzarello then began "yelling curse words about how the turpentine in the paint was going to kill him," police wrote. He was arrested on a disorderly conduct charge.
The third incident took place on the evening of August 24, when Azzarello was accused of breaking and defacing signs on Bridge Street in St. Augustine. He also allegedly climbed into the bed of a pickup truck at one point and sifted through someone's belongings.

When police approached him, he was holding a pest control notification sign and began "telling [an officer] that the pest control company was there to exterminate children and dogs," the police report states.

The police encounters followed an early August Facebook post attributed to Azzarello, in which he reportedly mentioned spending time in a psychiatric ward for three days.

Azzarello was charged with criminal mischief for defacing a United Way sign in the August 24 incident. A St. Johns County judge sentenced him to 180 days of probation on that count and the prior disorderly conduct charge, withholding adjudication. (Prosecutors declined to pursue a criminal mischief charge from the first incident.)

According to court records, Azzarello's probation was terminated in early April.

In a press conference held after Azzarello self-immolated, the New York City Police Department (NYPD) indicated that he had traveled from Florida to New York City in recent days. Investigators contacted his family members, who were unaware he had traveled outside of Florida, NYPD said.

Azzarello's August 2023 court records list an address along the Matanzas River at a St. Augustine house that is split into apartments. A property manager for the building told the New York Times Azzarello struck him as "an extremely nice person" who had unusual political views.

"If you met Max, he'd shake your hand, and you'd have a nice conversation," the property manager told the Times. "He'd treat you with respect."

Azzarello's friend from high school described him as highly intelligent, caring, and a good friend.

Shortly before Azzarello self-immolated, a user named "M. Crosby" published a piece entitled "I have set myself on fire outside the Trump trial," on the Substack page "The Ponzi Papers." The piece identifies the writer as Azzarello, a self-described investigative researcher who claims to have uncovered "a totalitarian con" in which "our own government is about to hit us with an apocalyptic fascist world coup." He calls the impending self-immolation an "extreme act of protest" against the plot.

The article discusses conspiracy theories centered around billionaire entrepreneur and PayPal cofounder Peter Thiel, the Silicon Valley Bank collapse, and Ponzi schemes. It describes cryptocurrencies as an "economic doomsday device."

"To my friends and family, witnesses and first responders, I deeply apologize for inflicting this pain upon you. But I assure you it is a drop in the bucket compared to what our government intends to inflict," the author wrote.

According to a LinkedIn profile in Azzarello's name, he graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2009 and later attended Rutgers University, where he obtained a master's in city and regional planning, technology, and community development in 2012.

The profile's last listed job was a solutions engineer at OpenTent from December 2020 to October 2021. Other jobs on the profile include work in energy consulting, data, and technology. Positions in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and California are listed.

A photo captured by Reuters shows a bright pink pamphlet reportedly dropped in Collect Pond Park by Azzarello a moment before he lit himself on fire. The cover reads, "True History of the World (The Haunted Carnival Edition)".