Posted on 01/29/2016 9:11:08 AM PST by Jeff Head
I have placed 42 still photos from the FBI video of the apprehension of the Bundy brothers and the individuals with them in Oregon in the very early morning hours of January 27, 2016, where Lavoy Finicum, one of the people protesting with the Bundys, was killed. All of those photos are on the following Flickr album:
Flickr Album: The Death of Lavoy Finicum
The video that was released by the FBI, showing the entire episode from the point of view of an unmanned drone which was circling overhead, can be found on YouTbue here:
FBI Video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAGxDWKrjPQ
It is a hard video to watch. Lavoy Finicum was a successful rancher in his mid fifties from Arizona, a father of eleven children, and a grandfather of numerous grand children. He was paasionate about the United states, its constitution, and his liberty and that of his family and fiends...and all Americans.
I am aware of, and am sympathetic to the issues that the Bundys, LAvoy, and the others raised. There is broad over reach by the Federal Government when it comes to property rights and other issues in the nation, and in the Intermountain West specifically. I was personally very involved in a similar incident at Klamath Falls, OR, in early 2001 that extended through the summer there. In our case we were not armed, but we were face to face with federal lawn enforcement who were.
In this case, the Bundys and those with them had occupied a Wildlife Refuge that was closed for the Winter near Burns Oregon. Thye were armed but indicated ovr and over that they sought no violence, but would protect themselves. They had been invited to a meeting in John Day Oregon, about 70 miles from where they were located, to meet with a sympathetic Sheriff there and other supporters. There are reports...that have not been confirmed...that they had been offered safe passage to go to that meeting. This would not be surprising because they had been allowed to come and go to and aattend other meetings in the area to that point.
A little after 12:25 AM, as the two cars containing eight of the group (a Jeep in the back with Ammon Bundy, the group's leader in the back, and a white four door pickup truck driven by Lavoy Finicum and including Ammon's brother in the front) passed a side road. In th epciture you can see several things right away that put to rest the bizarre notion advanced by the Sheriff in Harney County and the FBI that the Oregon Highway Patrol made a routine traffic stop of these vehicles.
At that point we see from the video that an aircraft, likely, an unmanned drone (UAV) with obvious infrared surveillance capabilities (this wa sjuts after midnight), was in the air in that remote area. Since when does such an aircraft patrol remote areas of Oregon? In addition, as the two cars pass the side road, you can see nine or ten State and Federal vehicles lined up on the side road waiting for them to pass. Since when are noine or ten Federal vechilces parked on a side road in remote Oregon just wainting for a routine traffic issue?
This was not routine. This was an ambush where the Bundys were lured out of the refuge and ewas set up to capture them. It speaks to betrayal, by the Sheriff, by the FBI, and probably by someone within the Bundy group.
Within a minute and a half both cars are pulled over. The video focuses on the lead car, but we know that after being stopped, the trailing car was approached and the three men in that car, including Ammon Bundy were peacefully taken into custody.
By then it had been several minutes. Before the officers, who can be seen with weapons drawn and surrounding their own vehicles behind the lead pickup truck can make specific demands of Finicum's vehicle (apparently they were waiting fo word that the other vehcile had beens secured before proceeding), Lavoy Finicum decides to rapidly drives away. It was a fateful...and ultimately fatal, decision.
A pursuit ensues.
It is not what you would call a hot pursuit. It does not appear that any shots were fired. You can clearly see the back window of the topper on the truck and its front windshield before it leaves and they are intact. The chaser vehicle is several seconds behind them.
Why? Because a mile up the road, as the video shows, law enforcement had already established a road block just in case. Three cars wait there, with approximately ten individuals.
As Lavoy approaches, he immediately veers to his left to try and pass. One of the law enforcement personnel gets out of one of the vehicles and positions himself next to the road, I am sure at the edge of the pavement, so that Lavoy would veer further into the snow. This was a dangerous move. It all happened in just 2-3 seconds. Finicum does veer further off the road onto the shoulder and into the snow which is piled up on the side of the road.
His vehicle comes to a rest, stuck in the snow drift at 12:34:53.
As Lavoy gets out, the law enforcement vehicle chasing them approaches the road block.
Lavoy by then is away the vehcile and has his hands up and is approached by one officer to the right of the picture who has a weapon drawn at 12:34:58.
Lavoy appears to reach for to his side, towards his his hip at 12:25:02. It does not appear that the law officer shoots. Some people believe the law officer had tased Lavoy at that point and that is why he appeared to reach down. We simply cannot tell from the video.
Another officer approaches Lavoy on the left at 12:35:03, from out of the trees, and Lavoy turns toward him.
Again, at this point, Lavoy appears to reach down at 12:35:05 as that officer extends his left arm and hand toward him.
Was Lavoy tased there? We cannot say from this video. Whatever the case, immediately after reaching down this second time, Lavoy appears to be shot at 12:35:06 by the pofficer to the left.
He then falls to the ground at 12:35:07. Except for one brief movement of his arm, Lavoy does not move again.
I do not see evidence in the video that he is shot multiple times after being down. I do see the officers lower their weapons and walk around him, keeping their eyes on him as they go to their vehicles to continue the apprehension of the other three people in the truck.
For the next several minutes several things occur. You see at least three flash bangs go off. One above and behind the truck at 12:35:27, another right next to the truck at 12:35:32, and a third in the air in front of the truck as 12:35:33. Here's the one going off to the side of the truck at 12:35:32.
Looking at the windows, you see what might be one or two bullet holes in the front window at 12:36:36...but it is hard to say. It certainly has not been shot out. The same is true for the rear window. Compare the pcitures here and on Flickr to the earlier ones showing those windows (front and rear) ealrier when there had been no shooting. You can see the same things sitting on the dash.
At 12:40:45, the second person (Ammon's brother) is getting out with his hands raised. Apparently he had been wounded in the arm by gunfire...either directed a Lavoy earlier, or directed at the vehicle at some point.
A picture soon after taht, at 12:41:13, makes it clear that the topper window on that side is shot out, and the back seat passenger window on that side has also either been shot out or rolled down.
At 12:42:55 the next person exits the vehicle and is then secured.
By 12:47:00 all three are out and it is then that the officers approach Lavoy's body. 12 minutes after he had been shot.
Once officer kneels down and removes Lavoy’s hat on the video, letting it fall to the snow. He appears to call another officer over who kneels down and takes a look at Lavoy too. I presume at this point they determined that he had died.
There are many who, in the emotion and anger of the moment, are calling this an assassination. As a person who has been on the front line in a similar incident, I honestly cannot say that it appears that way at all.
They Bundy’s vehicles were stopped. Lavoy, for whatever reason, chose to drive away from law enforcement who had stopped him. When reaching the road block a mile or so up the road about a minute, or a little more later, he tried to go around it through the snow.
One officer was put in mortal danger when he attempted to position himself on the pavement next to the road and force Lavoy further off. This all happened in about two seconds. I am sure Lavoy did not see that officer when he veered to the side, and it is clear that he made no attempt to run the man down. Rather, he veered further into the snow...which I believe was the officer's intent, and got stuck.
Lavoy immediately exited the truck. Though most of the time he had his arms raised, he did reach down to his side twice. Was he tased and that caused it. We simply do not know. At that point it was a mortally dangerous situation. In such a tense standoff, where law enforcement believes you are armed and dangerous, anything but getting down and spread eagled is a recipe for disaster.
What most certainly can be argued, and should be argued, is whether any of this takedown was necessary at all.
To that point the Bundys had not endangered anyone. They had not attempted to attack or threaten law enforcement. They had been allowed to come and go to various meetings...and apparently were supposed to be allowed to go to the one in John Day they were headed towards.
If they had been allowed to do so, one man would not be dad...a 56 year-old man, father of eleven, grandfather of numerous more, and a successful rancher from Arizona, and another man would not be wounded.
I hope and pray that the court proceedings focus on that. As with Ruby Ridge ad Waco, irrespective of whatever minor infractions, I believe we will all find again, that it was unnecessary and that lives were lost and people were killed that should have gone on living.
And the protests against the Federal encroachment will continue...and I hope they do, and I hope that more people are made aware of it and get involved...so that these people, including Lavoy, will not have died in vain.
Jeff Head
Idaho, USA
January 29, 2016
See the following links for some of my "straight talk" messages to all Americans:
The Stand at Klamath Falls
My Message on Islamic Terrorism
The Boston Marathon Terror Bombing
Sharia Law must be outlawed in the United States
Fast & Furios and the Obama Administration
Mass Shootings and Gun Control
Black and Latino Americans: For God's Sake Wake Up!
Ferguson Missouri and False Narratives
Secure our Southern Border
My Oath to the Constitution as a US Citizen
WHY was a spying drone there in first place, hmmm ???
-—==+==-—
Trophy footage of the ambush/assassination most likely.....
It bothers me that government law enforcement killed an American citizen, who was NOT a thug or terrorist.
They AMBUSHED ranchers! WTF?! Law enforcemnt is getting bottom of the barrel types who do not question corrupt authority.
Exactly. And these people were all in the middle of nowhere and bothering no one. There was absolutely no reason for this showdown. If they had been left alone eventually they all would have probably just drifted off back home.
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Correct, he had been shot when his hands were up, not because he reached for his abdomen.
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This event is an attempt by our government to win in the court of opinion what they cannot win in a proper court.
US government occupation of lands in the western states is completely unlawful. The treaty is clear; the arable lands were under private use, and that use was to be respected.
There are no western lands other than mountain ridges to which the US government has any defensible claim.
“the operation from start to finish was unnecessary. There was no reason those folks had to be confronted.”
We are in complete agreement. This entire operation resulted miraculously in only one death. It could have been much worse and just as in the case with WACO any arrests could have been made without this ridiculous scenario. I’ll only focus on one issue, the road block. Who was it that decided Lavoy would not run right into the middle of the roadblock with the potential to kill every officer using the stationary vehicles as “shelter”.
Looked to me just like a bowling alley, it would have stopped him but he sure could have taken a bunch out with him. I find that kind of thought process rather suspect. Had it been me driving, yea maybe I would have made the attempt to go around the road block but if you are a law officer are you going to bet your life on that.
Pretty stupid IMHO. Then there is the jerk that literally threw himself in front of the oncoming truck indicative of exactly what I am talking about. I’m guessing he couldn’t make up his mind in the heat of battle whether Lavoy was going to hit the ditch or actually not make it and hit the truck he was standing behind. Really really dumb on the part of LE, as was the entire operation. Who is the responsible party as if we will ever find that out.
Too bad they just couldn’t wait out the result, they just had to engage. Shows us just how much of a miracle it was that a massacre didn’t occur at Bundy Ranch.
One note of interest would be who IS NOT giving up their guns. They should take note that eventually they will retire. Then they join the sheep.
Meanwhile, mostly forgotten, the Hammond’s behind bars, where many of us believe they do not belong.
Another sad sad day in America.
Why not?
WHY was a spying drone there in first place, hmmm ???
Because it was a major law enforcement operation meant to capture the heads of the occupiers. The drone was probably tracking them from the time they left the federal facility. It kept filming during the confrontation.
Agreed 1000%
Rob, I believe Lavoy was not wanting to die...but he was passionate about his beliefs, as he should be, and he caome out of that car determined to try and either talk sense into the Leos, or (as I have heard) tell them he would only talk to the Sheriff.
But ina situation like this, where the personnel on the ground view you as armed and dangerous, and where your own actions of almost hitting the one officer who stepped out to try and stop you is going to be viewed (like it or not) by thos officers as an immediate beforehand threat to their life, the only recourse in such a situation, particularly when they believe you are armed and dangers (and as I have said, Lavoy was armed...but I do not believe he was dangerous...though the officers could not ascertain that from his immediate actions)...as I say, the only recourse is to get down pron on the ground with arms outstretched.
Had he done that...he would be alive.
It is tragic. Lavoy was a good man. He had eleven kids. He had numerous grandkids. I learned from a friend here in emmett who knows his family thaty he recently had been taking care of foster kids on his ranch in Arizona. He did not need to die. He did not deserve to die. bt he put himself in a positioon by making three decisions, that led to his death.
1) He drove away from the initial stop.
2) He tried to go around the roadblock almost hitting an officer.
3) He came out of the car and acted erratically, and appeared to reach for a gun.
In such circumstances, there was a very high probability that he would be shot.
I do not believe the Law enforcement personnel murdered Lavoy. I do not believe they had “blood in their eyes,”” or were looking forward to taking down and killing some “militia.”
If Lavoy had acted like the three in the first car, the one who got out earlier, and the three in his own car at the final scene...all of whom live...he would not have been killed, and probably not even injured.
it is a sad set of events, and tragic for Lavoy, his family, and friends.
The real culprits here are the people who decided to force this issue. There was no need for it. These people had harmed and threatened no one. Their presence at that remote refuge in Winter, when it is completely closed down, threatened no one. They had been allowed to attend numerous meetings, coming and going.
The wee lulled into this...and I believe falsely promised safe passage, in order for those in charge to end it as they desired...and without regard to the danger to either those people or their own personnel.
That’s okay if there is a critical, dangerous situation which has either already resulted in death and injury to American citizens, or threatens to do so at any time,. But that was not the case here.
So, IMHO, those managers are culpable in this death and should face criminal and hefty civil charges for it...and I believe they will, and most probably the latter.
AND that’s OK in your playbook ???
Jeff, Can you add in Victoia Sharp’s eye witness testimony
to the timeline. One thing that struck me was when she said Levoy said, “Just shoot me then”. That sounds like what someone would say after they had been shot and wounded.
Had ENOUGH Yet ?
Drones and regular “Traffic Stops”, please give me a break or get a life, hmmm!!!
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