No names on this one, but he was usually the victim of bullies in his younger years. In eighth grade (that's about twelve to thirteen years old, for non-US readers) he took a new stance: he let it spread that he was insane and would kill anyone who attacked him. No one tested it.
I recall that this same kid was mocked by someone, so he took a piece of notebook paper, wrote a coded message on it, folded it and gave it to the mocker. The mocker looked at it and asked what it was. He answered that it was a curse, and that it was now going to take effect. He got in a lot of trouble for that one, even when he decoded the perfectly innocuous message for the school authorities; but people left him alone after that.
It came back to haunt him, though. In high school, people started to believe that he was crazy and dangerous, and he felt like everyone was muttering about him behind his back (which they might or might not have been). It made the social situation there intolerable.
King David pulled such a stunt in a different context, though. He was being pursued by King Saul, and fled into the country of one of Israel's enemies, where his name was already known for his prowess in the wars against them. He was seized and dragged before the king there, but he put on an act of being a complete imbecile, and that king was persuaded that the great warrior had lost his mind and was no threat to anyone, so he let him go.
So the image of crazy can be useful, but it can also create trouble for you. If you get people to believe things about you that are not true, you can't be surprised when they believe other things about you that are not true.
--M. J. Young