Posted on 05/12/2012 6:25:29 PM PDT by nickcarraway
One of the darkest times in our region's history ended with the deaths of a U.S. Marshal, a 14-year-old boy and a mother.
In August 1992, a white separatist family in northern Idaho ended up in a days-long siege with federal agents that would ultimately end in bloodshed. | Read more about the siege from Tru TV
Now almost 20 years later, Sara Weaver, who lived through it as a teenager is sharing her memories of Ruby Ridge.
The devoutly religious Weaver family had come to Ruby Ridge prepared for the End Times and they were armed. Federal agents believed Randy Weaver was dangerous, so when they showed up with arrest warrants, they came prepared for trouble.
It went bad from the start. As shots started flying, marshals shot 14-year-old Sam Weaver in the back, and a marshal was shot dead.
The government brought in reinforcements setting up their barricade at the bridge, and Weaver supporters showed up in force.
On day two, an FBI sniper shot into the Weaver cabin, shooting Sara's mom Vicki Weaver in the face. She was holding her 10-month-old daughter Elisheda in her arms, with 16-year-old Sara just steps away.
"It was very hard. I felt very hopeless. Scared. Lost," Sara Weaver said in an interview with KXLY-TV in Spokane, Wash. "The most important thing to me had been ripped away."
Instant family caretaker
Eleven tense days later, it was over. Randy went to jail, charged with the murder of a federal agent.
Sara Weaver, 10-year-old Rachel, and baby Elisheba left their home and went to live with family in Iowa.
"I instantly became the caretaker of my family," she said. "I was in the mind frame that, if I'm taking care of everyone else, no one can tell me what to do. I was very rebellious, very angry."
Sara Weaver went through the motions, graduated from high school and moved back to the mountains she loved. She settled in Montana, got married, had a son. But the scars of Ruby Ridge remained.
"I was miserable all the time, just sad and depressed," she said. "I had never dealt with all the feelings and emotions that came from the trauma I experienced. I just stuffed them and ran away from them."
But then Sara Weaver found comfort in something she'd abandoned years before: a Bible verse, one she'd memorized all those years ago.
" 'For God so love the world he gave his only begotten son, So that whomever believes in him would not perish but have everlasting life.' That moment, I felt God's love pour out from heaven," she said. "I started bawling, I knew Jesus was real. That he loved me."
'Not the legacy I wanted to leave my son'
Sara's life changed completely. She had a new reason to live, and a new challenge before her.
"Three or four years ago, I Googled my name and what was tied to that was not the legacy I wanted to leave my son," she said.
Hate groups and anti-government conspiracy theorists like to invoke the Weaver name. When Timothy McVeigh blew up the Federal Building in Oklahoma City, he said he did it with the Weavers in mind.
"I didn't want my name tied to - to give anyone reason to act out in any kind of violence in my name," Sara Weaver said.
Sara says she's still a work in progress, still close to her family who live nearby. And dad Randy, now a grandfather and cleared of the most serious criminal charges, is a frequent babysitter.
Sara Weaver speaks publicly at churches and other organizations about her experience. Her book "From Ruby Ridge to Freedom" will be published this summer.
You didn’t read what I said did you. Go back and very carefully analyze who I said it about and the conditions applicable.
My son and I were talking today about violent and abusive police, and their shooting dogs. My son said it was only a matter of time before someone shot back, and I remembered the Weaver boy. He shot at the feds because they shot his dog.
Stupid, stupid federal agents. Set up the father in a sting, couldn’t arrest him in a normal way, killed a 14 y.o. boy and a mother holding a baby.
All because they are so damn gun-ho.
“Most Americans are still sleeping.”
Or locked into backing bogus candidates from bogus parties. The real struggle is not left versus right so much as it is the Washington Lords versus the subjects. The fight is vertical, not horizontal.
Yes, small world.
And along with those who you would rather not know, there are the Giants that you meet that make you proud you know them.
I know more than a few. Those are the ones that make life an experience to relish. Every taste.
That would make it a Republican President George H. W. Bush operation? Hmmm...
I have never been able to locate the applicable information but I am convinced that the psychological tests that they administer to prospective LEOs try to determine the applicants' tendency to want to be a bully. And that's the kind of individual they want to recruit.
“The guys the federales (and everybody else) use as snipers are, for all practical purposes, sociopaths ~ not the kind who are trying to cheat everybody and his brother, or killing their wives and kids, but otherwise controllable guys who will kill on command.”
Yes, I read what you wrote, which is why I asked the question. “Everbody else” would include EVERYBODY else, which would include the military of my country, which would make you wrong. Correct your statement. Admit you were wrong and move on.
Soul? I wonder if he still is in possession of it or if something else owns it now.
Cut the barrels off some shotguns.
Cept Randy cut them over 18” long
where they got him was the stocks were
cut to where the overall length was still
too short.
A total screw up and the feds paid no price.
Waco and Ruby Ridge are the reasons why the government doesn’t want us owning automatic weapons. They want to have the upper hand.
Some did.
It seems that the majority of fed seiges against U.S. citizens end with fire. Makes sense. Its the best way to destroy the evidence of their screw-ups.
That shotgun was shorter only because the federal agent used a cloth tape to measure with and stretched it to the max bringing the shot gun one eighth of an inch short of the minimum lawful length. Randy was very careful and used a steel tape to insure the gun would be legal.
The feds then told Randy the court date was such and in the court had a different date that was earlier. When he did not show up they issued an arrest warrant.
The entire fiasco was a con job by the government.
MRKR
I suspect, the majority of them, will never wake up.
EXACTLY CORRECT!
When Ruby Ridge was actually playing out, there was a Freeper whose name I cannot recall, constantly defending Horiuchi and the Federales.
Hell we used to have plenty here denouncing Weaver and justifying Feds since Weaver wasn’t PC on blacks etc
Less of that here now but it aint gone....depends on the mod...how frank one can be
No doubt true.
Sadly, FR has a strong contingent of “Law enforcement can do NO wrong” goose-steppers.
No matter how egregious the abuse of citizens, law, and constitutional imperatives, scum LE will still be defended.
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