Ex-owner of Katy gun business freed from jail after turning over store’s social media accounts.

Man complies with order to give new owner social media accounts

The ex-owner of a Katyarea gun store — who was jailed for weeks after defying a federal judge’s order to turn over access to social media accounts linked to his former business — was set free Wednesday after complying with the order.

Jeremy Alcede, who lost ownership of Tactical Firearms during bankruptcy proceedings last year, had turned himself in to U.S. marshals on April 9. Chief U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Jeff Bohm issued a bench warrant for Alcede’s arrest after he defied an April 3 order to give the business’s new owners access to social media accounts such as Facebook.

Alcede appeared Wednesday morning before U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Marvin Isgur and, according to online court records, Isgur said that Alcede had followed Bohm’s order to turn over social media access and ordered U.S. Marshals to release Alcede from custody. The Marshals Service confirmed that Alcede walked free out of Wednesday’s hearing.

Reached by phone Wednesday afternoon, Alcede said he spent his time in a federal detention facility reading the Bible and listening to Christian radio. He said he’d refused to give up access to the social media accounts in order to defend the U.S. Constitution, but said he had come to realize there was nothing left to protect because money buys political power.

‘Like a cubic zirconia’

“The Constitution is like a cubic zirconia,” he said. “It looks really pretty, but it isn’t real and it’s not worth anything.”

The news that a close friend has been diagnosed with cancer sealed the deal. After being released Wednesday, Alcede went to school to pick up his sons, who were surprised to see him.

“I feel really bad that I did that to my kids,” he said, choking up. “But I was doing it for them, too. It just shocked me that I couldn’t get a good, good attorney to step up in a case with clear violations of the Constitution.”

He said he is still committed to fighting Bohm’s social media ruling on appeal.

The new operators of Tactical Firearms, now called Boyert Shooting Center, could not immediately be reached for comment Wednesday.

The gun store, tucked behind suburban strip centers on Mason Road, gained a national Internet following after Alcede posted photos of a curbside message sign that featured biting attacks on President Barack Obama. The business has been restructured under Alcede’s former business partner, Steven Coe Wilson, who hired John Boyert to manage it under a new name.

In an April 3 ruling, Bohm ordered Alcede to turn over Facebook and Twitter passwords because he deemed the accounts and posts to be business assets.

The 30-page opinion acknowledges that social media is new territory for courts, and the case has drawn attention for its potential to shape future disputes about social media used for business.

Alcede’s jailing has gained steam on social media and conservative blogs, which suggest the case is really about free speech, not business ownership of “likes,” comments and posts.

In handwritten letters to supporters from the Joe Corley Federal Detention Center in Conroe, some of which are transcribed and posted in a Facebook group, Alcede had said he was fighting to protect free speech but argued that his business adversaries and the judge were trying to kill him. He said in one post that because he is diabetic, the prison diet would cause his blood sugar to spike high enough that his spleen would rupture.

“I will at least die knowing I stood up for the constitution that let me live free for forty years,” the post said.

Judge declined release

At an April 17 hearing, Alcede asked the judge to release him from detention on bail until his appeal on the order to turn over passwords was decided, citing health concerns and the fact that he was a single father of three boys.

Bohm helped arrange for Alcede to be transferred from a high-security facility in Houston to the facility in Montgomery County. The judge declined to release him on bail, saying it would undermine the authority of American courts.

“He holds the key to his jail cell,” Bohm said then, adding that Alcede just needed to let the U.S. marshals know he was ready to turn over the passwords and he could leave.

Earlier this month, Alcede told U.S. marshals he was ready to turn over access to the social media accounts and he was brought before Bohm for a hearing.

Alcede’s attorney said his client could not, in fact, turn over access to the accounts because of a twostep verification process that required his phone and he did not know where it was. He also said his client “was only willing to comply if the Court first allows him to erase what he believes to be his personal information from the accounts,” according to court records from the May 18 hearing.

The judge said he would not negotiate, noting that Alcede had turned down a previous opportunity to have an independent third party review the accounts for personal information that would be exempted from the business transfer.

Olson said then that his client would not comply with the order, so Bohm sent Alcede back to the detention center.