Schmidt Happens

Mad dog publicist and unsavory martyr David Hans Schmidt is free at last, free at last.

Schmidt was released from county jail just before Labor Day weekend after the Maricopa County Attorney's Office dropped charges of aggravated domestic violence against him.

His release came a week after a New Timesstory ("Pay Back," August 23) detailed Schmidt's questionable and belated arrest and incarceration for leaving a birthday card on his dead son's grave (Schmidt is involved in a nasty custody battle with the mother of his two daughters). The arrest reeked of retaliation, coming a week after another New Times story ("Spleen Man," July 26) that detailed Schmidt's raucous battle against the county to get $6.5 million for Jefferson Davis McGee, who had his spleen removed after a severe beating delivered by inmates in county jail who wrongly believed he was a child killer.

"We didn't believe the case involving the birthday card was something we wanted to pursue," says Bill FitzGerald, spokesman for the County Attorney's Office.

During his 26-day stint in jail, Schmidt suffered through solitary confinement, a race riot and a beating by five skinheads who wanted his commissary money.

He did, however, finish a 749-page book about his odyssey through the Valley's court and jail system. He also picked up some new clients for his burgeoning business of getting money from county risk management officials for wronged inmates.

Schmidt also plans to return to his apparently thriving business of brokering deals to get minor or fading female celebrities naked in the nation's top nudie magazines. He claims he just recently closed his biggest deal ever with a nearly forgotten 1990s teen pop star, whose name he would not allow to be printed.

Schmidt says he hopes one day to get rich enough "to bond out every poor bastard in jail who is in there because they can't afford to bond out."

Schmidt's attorneys have advised that he "lay low" and "keep his mouth shut," advice he is not heeding very well.

However, Schmidt says he does intend to buy a luxurious beach condo in Marina del Rey in which he plans to shield himself from cold ocean breezes "with beach bunnies I pick up outside my house." So, he says, he will be spending less time in the jurisdiction of local city and county officials.

"I definitely won't be around as much," he says.

But all is not yet Baywatch for Schmidt. He still has a hearing upcoming for a parole violation. The violation stems from nearly as questionable accusations that he maliciously bent his daughter's toes during horseplay at his Phoenix condo.

"It's just time for this insanity to end so we can all go on with our lives," Schmidt says.