Posted on 04/27/2007 5:57:58 AM PDT by Howdy there
Simultaneous raids carried out in four Alabama counties Thursday turned up truckloads of explosives and weapons, including 130 grenades, an improvised rocket launcher and 2,500 rounds of ammunition belonging to the small, but mightily armed, Alabama Free Militia.
Six alleged members of the Free Militia also were arrested by federal authorities and are being held without bond.
Investigators said the DeKalb County-based group had not made any specific threats or devised any plots, but was targeted for swift dismantling because of its heavy firepower. The militia, which called itself the Naval Militia at one point, had enough armament to outfit a small army.
"We classify these groups as violent and anti-government," said Jim Cavanaugh, who supervises the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives operations in portions of the South. "They stockpile things and live off a fear, a paranoia they're going to need weapons and explosives because some event is going to happen when they will need them."
"Any time you have a self-appointed colonel or a self-appointed major and they've got weapons and explosives, it is a recipe for tragedy," Cavanaugh said.
The ATF investigation, launched about seven weeks ago, climaxed Thursday with more than 150 federal, state and local law enforcement officers carrying out raids in DeKalb, Marshall, Etowah and Jefferson counties beginning about 6 a.m.
The massive operation forced the closing of Collinsville High School on U.S. 11 because of traffic concerns. In Trussville, authorities rented a U-Haul truck to cart away the load of explosives and weapons from a house.
Agents encountered booby traps at one site. They found trip wires and two hand grenades rigged as booby traps at the Collinsville camper home of 46-year-old Raymond Dillard, who holds titles of both militia major and fugitive from justice on an unrelated federal case in Mobile.
"We were prepared," Cavanaugh said. "We suspect booby traps with these types of groups."
Arrested and detained in federal custody were Dillard, also known as Jeff Osborne, 46, of Collinsville; Adam Lynn Cunningham, 41, of Collinsville; Bonnell Hughes, 57, of Crossville; Randall Garrett Cole, 22, of Gadsden; James Ray McElroy, 20, of Collinsville; and Michael Wayne Bobo, 30, of Trussville.
All but Bobo are charged with conspiracy to make a firearm, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Bobo is charged with being a drug user in possession of a firearm, which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
The six men appeared Thursday afternoon in Birmingham's federal courthouse before U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert Armstrong Jr. The men were being held Thursday night in the Shelby County jail.
According to the criminal complaint, ATF and the Alabama State Fire Marshal's Office used a confidential informant to infiltrate the militia, using video and audio recordings to document their grenade-making exploits. The informant met Dillard at a DeKalb County flea market called "Trade Day" in the late fall and Dillard told him about the Free Militia.
The informant was eventually accepted into the organization and given the title "sergeant major." In the following weeks, the informant provided agents details of the group's activities.
In one instance, the complaint described how Dillard grabbed one of four grenades from a coffee table, quickly put a fuse and shotgun-type primer inside and said, "That's how easy it is. This one's ready to go."
Guns and ammo:
All six men were taken into custody without incident.
"We took them by surprise," said DeKalb County Sheriff Jimmy Harris.
Authorities wouldn't pinpoint a leader, but said Dillard called himself the major. In addition to the booby traps, authorities recovered a long gun and a pistol from his home.
Recovered from Cunningham's Collinsville home were stolen commercial fireworks, improvised hand grenades, fuse assemblies and a half-dozen guns. At Hughes' Crossville home, agents found 100 improvised hand grenades, 70 improvised hand grenades fired from the 37 mm rocket launch, a submachine gun and two silencers.
An SKS rifle was found at McElroy's home.
In Jefferson County, authorities said they had to rent a truck to handle the bomb-making material from Bobo's home, as well as 2,500 rounds of ammunition and 12 guns.
Bobo was living with his adoptive parents in the Lancshire Brentwood neighborhood in Trussville, a fairly new subdivision near the Cahaba Project with tree-lined streets and brick homes that cost upward of $600,000. He worked for his family's pest control company.
His red pickup truck, usually parked at the house, displays bumper stickers such as "Welcome to the South, Now Go Home," "The Second Amendment: `You do not know you need it until they come to take it away' - Thomas Jefferson" and "Work Harder, Millions on Welfare Depend on You."
Common profile:
In general, militias and patriot movements are anti-government and given to conspiracy theories and paranoia, said Mark Potok, director of the Intelligence Project for the Southern Poverty Law Center. The organization keeps track of hate groups and their activities throughout the country. They also are known for stockpiling illegal weapons and even manufacturing them, he said.
The militia movement in Alabama and the rest of the country hit a peak in the mid-1990s, as the groups rallied after the bloody 1993 siege at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, and the 1992 shoot-out in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, between former Green Beret Randy Weaver and federal agents. The number of militia or "patriot" groups in the United States dwindled from a high of almost 900 in the mid-1990s to fewer than 200 by 2005.
A combination of factors, including the Sept. 11 attacks, caused many groups to draw back from the extreme acts of Olympic Park bomber Eric Robert Rudolph or Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber.
"It became less popular for someone to rail against America," Cavanaugh said. "It's not so sexy for them to be around, and therefore they don't get a lot of public attention."
Cavanaugh said militia groups still pop up from time to time, and authorities' goal is to intercept them before the threat becomes a tragedy.
"Whatever their paranoia was, whatever their reasons were, we think we've taken their weapons, the majority of them, certainly," Cavanaugh said. "The good news is hopefully today Alabama is free of the Alabama Free Militia."
Isn't that exactly what the Second Amendment is about?
Is 2500 rounds of ammo considered excessive? Heck, I have that much for my squirrel rifle.
Paranoia.
2500 rounds of ammo? That’s not even a good Saturday at the range for the number of people involved.
For that matter it could be prescription pain medication.
Maybe we should each register a gun in the name of an illegal alien, or donate one to some La Raza sort of organization, that REALLY wants to overthrow America, and then watch the govt take THEM to the cleaners.
“Is that fear and paranoia or just good planning?”
“Paranoia.”
Well we just disagree I guess. Sounds like planning ahead too me.
That figures. But how many per mosque or madrassa?
Problem: officious feds with too much time on their hands.
Solution: have the ATF switch job descriptions with ICE.
Yea, it could be anything. I bet that is why they didn't list the drug. It wouldn't sound as ominous as "Drug User".
No Hate group can be bigger than the Federal Gubbermint.
Take that peons! Your mere existance is a threat.
That 2nd Amendment bumper sticker is a dead giveaway to your threatening intentions. Say nothing more.
Although home made bombs are a little different issue unless you are blowing up tree stumps.
And firearm possession by a felon is a no no.
Do you think they watched Jericho?
If they only found 2500 rounds of ammo, they didn’t find the ammo ;)
Anyone with half a brain ought to be shared skitless by this bit or news. Talk about paranoia. This raid and the reasons for it as explained could be a sound basis for wacoparanoia. To know that there are people in powerful places with ideas regarding citizens of the United States of America as enemies of the state, ought to give rise to a renewed vigilance.
Anyone check under the sink or in the garage recently using the governments “bomb making materials” list? Got more than one gun? That my friends is spelled Arsenal. Got more than a box of shells, good for 5 minutes at the range? You are hoarding. So shut up and sing, but don’t let anyone know what goes on behind closed doors.
To say this type of action by “law enforcement” agencies out looking to justify their existence is action against citizens deemed dangerous, could be the very same prohibited profiling needing to be done nation wide against known enemies of the state, but for Constitutional, or rather legal reasons, is not allowed.
Here is the law that is probably being applied to these arrests. (BTW, TITLE 26 is the Internal Revenue Code):
TITLE 26 > Subtitle E > CHAPTER 53 > Subchapter C > § 5861
§ 5861. Prohibited acts
It shall be unlawful for any person—
(a) to engage in business as a manufacturer or importer of, or dealer in, firearms without having paid the special (occupational) tax required by section 5801 for his business or having registered as required by section 5802; or
(b) to receive or possess a firearm transferred to him in violation of the provisions of this chapter; or
(c) to receive or possess a firearm made in violation of the provisions of this chapter; or
(d) to receive or possess a firearm which is not registered to him in the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record; or
(e) to transfer a firearm in violation of the provisions of this chapter; or
(f) to make a firearm in violation of the provisions of this chapter; or
(g) to obliterate, remove, change, or alter the serial number or other identification of a firearm required by this chapter; or
(h) to receive or possess a firearm having the serial number or other identification required by this chapter obliterated, removed, changed, or altered; or
(i) to receive or possess a firearm which is not identified by a serial number as required by this chapter; or
(j) to transport, deliver, or receive any firearm in interstate commerce which has not been registered as required by this chapter; or
(k) to receive or possess a firearm which has been imported or brought into the United States in violation of section 5844; or
(l) to make, or cause the making of, a false entry on any application, return, or record required by this chapter, knowing such entry to be false.
Link : http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode26/usc_sec_26_00005861——000-.html
Well, just because you are paranoid doesn't mean they are not out to get you.
On the other hand. The article implies that and the fear is unreasonable and excessive. One can stockpile weapons and explosives because some event is going to happen when they will need them, without being Paranoid.
So they’re busting up these little ole white boy militias and Terrorist sleeper cells are still untouched? The sleeper cells that are actually waiting for the words to attack Americans? Yeah those
...and the story of the SPLC is a thread or three unto itself. For anyone in the media to give this excuse for anything legal or related in anyway to poverty, other than poverty of right thinking, is to give airtime to agencies contrary to good order and discipline.
You noticed too. The FBI and the BATF love to talk about “terrorist” groups that are made up of Whites. Meanwhile the Muslim Men’s Prayer Luncheon at the university go unmonitored.
That's because FedGov fears armed peasants.
Investigators said the DeKalb County-based group had not made any specific threats or devised any plots, but was targeted for swift dismantling because of its heavy firepower. The militia, which called itself the Naval Militia at one point, had enough armament to outfit a small army.
I will be very interested in hearing their probable cause. henceforth I will have no more comments on this case.
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