Bundy Trials Update

The epic battle between ordinary people under attack by a federal government intent on stealing their land resumes in early February. Cliven Bundy and men who came to Bunkerville to protest the egregious abuse by the federal government, face up to 99 years in prison for standing up to illegal government land theft.

Motions are flying in both the Nevada Bundy Ranch case and the Oregon Refuge case. After the acquittal on all charges of the first group for their adverse possession and occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge case that resulted in the ambush death of LaVoy Finicum, it’s no wonder the public has been confused by the number of trials still pending in  both cases.

To recap — there are two cases and a total of five trials, with only the trial of Ammon and Ryan Bundy and their five co-defendants in Oregon completed.

On Feb. 7, the first group of defendants in the Bundy Ranch case go to trial in Las Vegas. Buoyed by the not guilty verdict in Oregon and by the complete lack of evidence in the discovery from federal prosecutors, political prisoners Eric Parker, Steve Steward, Scott Drexler, Todd Engel, Greg Burleson, and Rick Lovelien are anxious for the trial to get underway.

Although lawyers argued that they have seen 18 defendants tried all in one trial in the same courthouse, Magistrate Peggy Leen disappointingly broke the defendants up into three trials with the Cliven Bundy going second with his sons Ammon and Ryan along with Pete Santilli and Ryan Payne. The final group going to trial in August will include Bundy sons Dave and Mel, Micah McGuire, Joe O’Shaughnessy and Brian Cavalier. Each subsequent trial is slated to commence one month after the conclusion of the previous trial.

Clearly political prisoners, the first group of Nevada defendants will have been held in a private prison owned by the notorious Corrections Corporation of America in Pahrump, NV for nearly 12 full months, unable to effectively work on their defense. Claiming these men were a danger to the community, every magistrate read the exact same statement in denying them pre-trial release. Not one example of their dangerous behavior before or after the Bunkerville Standoff was cited as a reason to keep them imprisoned. These are the type of men most would want as neighbors —such as an electrician, Realtor, supermarket manager, pilot, all without prior convictions.

Only Ryan Bundy is fighting the detention, with his motion to re-open his detention hearing approved and now slated for Tuesday, Jan. 31. A win by Ryan would start an avalanche of motions by those remaining in the gulag.

Among the many motions, attorneys for Parker and Stewart filed a joint motion to force the government to exclude using the term “gunmen”, and announced their intent to call firearms expert Lt. Col. Arthur B. Alphin USA (Ret.). Alphin, a West Point graduate and founder of A-Square (manufacturer of hunting rifles), is a frequent expert witness in cases where firearms are an integral element of the trial. Alphin classifies himself as a gunman and will testify that the defendants were not gunmen, but only amateur gun owners exercising the right to own and carry firearms.

Keep in mind that then Clark County Sheriff Doug Gillespie had already announced that the Bureau of Land (mis)Management had agreed to release the Bundy cattle. When the protesters arrived on that side of wash where the cattle were held, they were shocked when the BLM had high caliber assault weapons trained on them and started announcing they were authorized to use lethal force. This is when Eric Parker chose to lay down for his safety, not as a “sniper”.

Although the court holds that the FBI masquerading as a video production company, Long Bow Productions, is perfectly acceptable, the defense feels the jury may feel differently since they plied at least one defendant with a known drinking problem with alcohol and chose to ignore the defendants whose narrative contradicted the government’s.

According to Eric Parker, the government’s indictment reads like the story that Ryan Payne and Brian “Booda” Cavalier, now recanted, once broadcast on radio shows. Whenever Parker would hear of such radio shows, he would call in and correct the story saying he never even met Payne, there was no organization and no tactical superiority. Parker’s Long Bow interview shows a true account of events.

Displaying the government’s desperation for a conviction, Comrade Gloria Navarro, federal chief judge appointed by Obama and nominated to the bench by Dirty Harry Reid, has refused to drop the same charges in the Nevada case that the Oregon court found void for vagueness and therefore unconstitutional in the Refuge case, although they are both in the same 9th Circuit.

The jury’s reaction to now Sheriff Joe Lombardo stating shortly after the standoff on a local TV news magazine that the reason no one was arrested at the standoff was because they weren’t doing anything illegal will be of great interest. Of course, the good sheriff has changed his tune since then.

The jury will not be allowed to hear that these men face 99 years in prison if convicted of these fraudulent charges, said by one attorney to be “the most evil indictment” he’s ever read. Nonetheless, the first group is confident of proving to the jury of 12 other human beings the deception and outright fabrication of the government’s case.

A wounded beast is a more dangerous beast. Fresh off their complete humiliation in the not guilty verdict, the final group of defendants in the Oregon Refuge case are facing a ramped up and rabid prosecution aided and abetted by the judge. After the jury found the leaders and two of the Final Four defendants, not guilty, it would stand to reason that the feds would move to dismiss against the lesser defendants and the other two of the Final Four.

But not with a wounded beast system. A superseding indictment of misdemeanor charges have been leveled at Jason Patrick, Darryl Thorn, Jake Ryan, Duane Ehmer, Dylan Anderson and Sean and Sandy Anderson. In a recent hearing, several defendants echoed Jason Patrick’s statement to Comrade Brown of “I understand that I have no rights.”

Again, this is evil intent by the government knowing it has no real case against the second group of defendants. They played their best hand in the first trial and the jury saw that they had failed to prove their case. Judge Brown has told the defendants that they will be tried by the jury on the original charges, but tried by herself alone on the misdemeanor counts. The defense argues they are entitled to a jury trial on all counts even the misdemeanors.

What Brown is attempting to do is find them guilty of even one misdemeanor charge so she can sentence them for all charges in the event that the jury finds them also not guilty. This outrageous practice is called Sentencing of Acquitted Conduct, which allows the judge to ignore the jury’s decision and rope the charges a jury acquits on, back into sentencing.

The remaining Refuge defendants have also requested that Ammon Bundy and Ryan Payne be brought to Oregon to testify for the defense. That’s looking probable, but a pouty Judge Brown has made it clear that she doesn’t want Ammon on the stand for three days again since this is not his trial. This will be the first time that Ryan Payne who has unsuccessfully tried to reverse his plea bargain will appear on the witness stand.

Reporting from Bolshevik Amerika,

Patricia Aiken