Independent Minnesota US Senate candidate Marisa Simonetti, 32, has been sentenced to three months in the Hennepin County workhouse after throwing a live tarantula onto the staircase leading to her tenant’s living space in Edina. She was convicted of gross misdemeanour harassment and misdemeanour domestic assault and will serve her 90-day sentence on school and work release. The court also ordered her to serve two years of probation and submit a written apology to the victim.
Simonetti’s sentence comes as she campaigns for a seat in the US Senate, hoping to replace Tina Smith in the November 2026 Minnesota election. Her candidacy has drawn further attention after a video she posted of herself confronting a Girl Scout and the child’s mother over selling cookies without a permit went viral, putting her own conduct under public scrutiny.
You know, I think headlines like these might be getting to the point where they don’t even qualify as onion-like. The Onion headlines are at least clever jokes that make sense when you think about them. This is more like someone playing “yes and” with a bunch of crazy people.
Change society. We need to stop letting these people continue their paths of destruction.
Things like this should prevent you from ever being able to hold a job again. We just need stronger laws against this kind. A new country would fix this shit so fast. I’d rather be in a place where we celebrate each other and kick out those who choose to oppress others.
In my country, this would be cause for deportation. Send the monsters to an island. Idc.
It may sound harsh, but our only currency is time and these people continue to rob us of our time. We all have to work to support a system that allows people like this to carry on with a slap on the wrist.
the Hennepin County workhouse
the what now?
some places never really had that veneer that slavery ended.
It’s Minnesota, so maybe they’re just choosing to be honest about it?
For a politician it’s probably the first contact with real work.
Facts buncha actual welfare queens
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She was convicted of gross misdemeanour harassment and misdemeanour domestic assault
I guess tarantulas aren’t cute enough to warrant an animal cruelty charge :(
if it was a venomous spider that can seriously harm people, it wouldve assault with a weapon.
But it was a tarantula.
Here is another article on this that I found a little bit clearer in terms of what happened. So basically her tenant asked her to fulfill a basic responsibility that landlords are supposed to handle and she had an absolute fucking meltdown? Honestly the tarantula is the tamest part of it. I hope the tarantula is okay and also that the tenant is okay, not because the tarantula was a real danger but because of every other fucking thing this woman did. Good lord.
This is so much worse than “neighbor”.
Also, how fun:
Simonetti “intercepted” groceries ordered by the individual and refused to return them until officers told her to do so
Attempted murder… yikes
There’s a whole video of this floating around on the internet. I usually don’t go in for videos that look like the old Cops show, but that one is worth a watch.
The woman she was harassing was renting out the basement of the house through Airbnb because she was fleeing domestic violence.
Simonetti didn’t even own the property. She was illegally subletting the basement. The cops showed up and Simonetti was so crazy that the cops weren’t having it.
a karen in its feral state.
I’ve seen this too, these people are terrifying. Here’s the link to the full body cam. Get ready for a whole helping of crazy eyes
That was fucking insane, like, Jesus christ, don’t let this bitch control ANYTHING!
I skipped on the other videos, but got sucked in by the crazy eyes comment. What a ride!
Poor Tarantula.
I know they’re not fucking toys. They’re lovely animals too.
Smarter than some dogs.
If recent times are any indication, people too.
Humans set the bar real low
No?
Well I happen to know some pretty fucking dumb dogs.
yeah, i like to go visit the local sheepdog trials. it’s always hilarious when the sheep outsmart the dog. or shepherd, really not sure.
if all of my encounters with them (and all the stories i got from my second boss, who fled a sheep farm for the city) were consistent with normal sheep behavior, sheep are godsdamned idiots. even more stupid than ducks.
I wonder why she’s running as an independent. Couldn’t be more qualified to be a Republican.
Although she initially launched her political career as a Republican and lost two Hennepin County Board races in 2024, the local 3rd Congressional District GOP committee withdrew its endorsement following her 2024 arrest, stating she ‘does not reflect our values’.
The GOP kicked her out for bad behavior. She’s too much for the addicts and pedophile warmongers.
Sounds like a charmer…
The bodycam footage of the incident is wild. She’s a complete and total piece of shit.
She’s perfect for US Senate except for being about 50 years too young.
And yet 17 years too old for Trump to molest.
Perfect for the next 50 years. They’re not elected old, they just stay in office till they die, because of cronyism and corruption.
Wait…does the Girl Scout organization not secure legal clearance at all for its scouts to sell? Or is she just a complete moron?
And she’s a 32 year old landlord too.
She was illegally subletting the basement, too. There was an ordinance against hosting temp rentals like AirBnB, iirc.
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also blared loud Christian music
Simonetti, a local real estate businesswoman who runs a house-buying firm
Jfc this article just gets worse and worse
AI slop thumbnail though
Really not fair to the tarantula, who asked for none of this.
Tarantula are wildly intelligent. Like, smart dog intelligent.
Hey I love tarantulas (we keep over 60 of them currently) and think they deserve our appreciation and respect. However there isn’t any evidence that they are particularly intelligent, and certainly no indication that they are “smart dog intelligent.”
One could make an argument for jumping spiders tho: https://youtu.be/_QF6kaOAuYg
This is a 100% lie and literally anyone here with a single minute to spare could fact check and learn they aren’t very intelligent at all. Nowhere remotely close to a dog or cat, and aren’t even known to be the smartest types of spiders. It’s kind of sad that 28 people straight just blindly up voted this comment without a single one of them knowing it wasn’t true and didn’t bother to check.
They’re super cool, but they’re still dumb.
Not as dumb as some dogs.
How the heck did you come up with that?
Tarantula are wildly intelligent. Like, smart dog intelligent.
Yeah I’m gonna go ahead and call bullshit on that bullshit. There is zero chance of that being true.
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There is zero chance a spider is as smart as even the most mediocre dog. Stop it.
I don’t find tarantulas yucky and have had one as a pet.
They aren’t smart. They aren’t like dogs. You can’t teach them anything. The most you can get out of them is that they will learn you’re not gonna squish or eat them and be cool with you.
You can look this up “on the internet”. They aren’t even as smart as jumping spiders.
So yeah. He right on calling bullshit. Because it is bullshit.
Yeah, jumping spiders is where it’s at when it comes to intelligence in spiders, and even then only in highly specific ways (i.e., hunting, and calculating jumps), and a significant portion of their apparent intelligence is just them having very good eyesight for a spider; dogs, cats, birds, rats, and even probably bees are still much more intelligent than them.
Tarantulas on the other hand aren’t much smarter than your average politician or CEO.
I love tarantulas. My first-ever job was at a pet store and I used to let a large rose-hair chill with me at the register, crawling on my shoulder or head or whatever. Watching people coming in to buy dog food and shakily throwing their money in my direction was a bonus.
For this reason I still get uneasy feelings whenever I watch Home Alone and Kevin grabs the tarantula. There’s a scene after it’s on Joe Pesci where you can tell it got injured during the shoot because it’s limping.
I’ve only had one tarantula experience and it was at an “animal party” for kids. Snakes, lizards, etc were all there. The kids are all really calm, sitting cross legged in a circle and being really gentle with any animal they were offered.
Anyway it’s tarantula time and none of the kids are biting so I immediately raised my hand. Omg, what a beautiful creature and I got to hold it 😍
you can tell it got injured during the shoot because it’s limping.
Oh God that’s awful. I’ll have to keep an eye for it.
Oh no poor baby :(
Never knew Tarantulas were that smart. Don’t suppose you could teach them tricks?
Like, “sit”, “stay”, and “fetch me a cigarette”?! I want video of this
They aren’t. They’re pretty dumb. Way dumber than a dog or cat. Learning you aren’t a threat to them is about as advanced as a tarantula can get. They aren’t even the smartest spiders.
I was wondering where the animal abuse charges were in all this.
