Extremist radio
By JJ MacNab | January 21, 2010
Listening to online talk radio is like trying to navigate the Los Angeles freeway system at the peak of rush hour while hitting your forehead repeatedly with a hammer. Even if you make it to your final destination without shooting anyone, you worry that you’ll emerge from the car just a little bit dumber than when you climbed in.
The typical right-wing extremist show goes something like this: The host introduces himself and describes in titillating detail his most recent victimization at the hands of the evil feds – the US government apparently has an endless supply of silent, black helicopters and wastes billions of dollar annually bugging the homes and phones of small-time radio hosts – all because he’s determined to share “The Truth” with his vast army of listeners. His fans, all 42 of them, are thrilled to think that they’re in on some secret truthiness, and are therefore more than happy to overlook the obvious lies and exaggerations the show host slips in next. Just when you think the fibs about the topic du jour are so outrageous that the listeners will have to slap their knees and admit that the whoppers being told are truly funny stinkers, the show breaks for commercials.
And for pure entertainment value, there’s nothing better than the advertisers who peddle their goods on the extremist talk show circuit.
Worried about the impending apocalypse? Just buy gold coins, freeze-dried food, and a few dozen cases of ammunition from us and you’ll be the king of your county when the world economy collapses. Have the Jews rigged the Federal Reserve to ensure your financial failure? Here’s a $3,000 debt elimination package that guarantees you’ll never have to pay off your mortgage and credit card debt to those evil Jew bankers again. Cash only, please. Feeling like you’re coming down with the flu? A little colloidal silver in your water will make you right as rain again. Just because your skin turns permanently blue, it’s a small price to pay for thwarting the government’s plan to kill you with those sinister flu vaccinations. Angry with Uncle Sam for taking 191.4% of your hard-earned money each week? Quick, buy our detax toolkit and you can be a tax-free hero, just like the founding fathers, Ross Perot, and the Kennedy clan. Call now and we’ll throw in an offshore Ponzi scheme for free!
After the break, the host continues his lengthy rant on whatever news event or paranoid fantasy pissed him off that day, punctuated with occasional calls from supporters who tell him that he is obviously correct because they can’t find anything on the topic in the Illuminati-controlled, mainstream media.
The show invariably ends with an impassioned request for donations. Taking on the entire US government ain’t cheap, you know.
The topics may be racist and hate-filled, and the medical and financial advice may land the listener in a god-awful mess, but in general, most online talk radio shows are relatively harmless. Few of the hosts openly advocate violence, and even fewer have more than a couple dozen scattered listeners, many of whom are too paranoid to leave their homes because the black helicopters are hovering in the shadows and the airplanes overhead are spreading mind-control chemicals through their condensation trails. A host’s success is measured in terms of donations with the ultimate goal of having enough money come in to avoid that depressing get-a-real-job alternative. After all, it’s easier to collect unemployment or disability if you don’t have an employer reporting your earnings to those jack-booted thugs at the IRS.
But then there are the rare birds – the hosts that manage to gain a significant following measured in the thousands rather than dozens – who believe that the only solution to their paranoid problems is to hunt and kill the perceived enemy. Primary targets may include Jews, blacks, immigrants, UFOs cleverly disguised as famous people, gays, state and federal employees, and even strategic government buildings. While gathering donations is still a fundamental objective, these gurus have an ultimate goal of inciting others to do their dirty wet work for them, for free.
They’re not as funny as the other guys.
Topics: Right wing extremists, Tax Deniers | 2 Comments »
Illuminati Alert!
By JJ MacNab | January 20, 2010
I received the following email from Republic Magazine yesterday. Conspiracy theory, a tax denier scheme, and a get-rich-quick plan all in one convenient place!!!!!
See, what I just wrote must be true because I used lots of exclamation points!!!!!
!!!!!!
Ok, I’ll stop now.
Email:
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!! TUESDAY !! 3pm EST William H. McIlhany!!!
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Tuesday, 1/19/10, 3PM EST: “Exposing Manifestations Of The Illuminati’s Hand In Major Areas Of Our Lives!”
Phone # to Dial: 949-333-4806 Use Conference ID: 733552# Live Web Stream: http://www.republicmagazine.com/webinar
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!! WEDNESDAY !! 3pm EST Michael-Edward
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Wednesday, 1/20/10, 3PM EST: “Take Back Your Power Now While Stopping Major Intrusions Into Your Liberties!”
Phone # to Dial: 949-333-4806 Use Conference ID: 733552# Live Web Stream: http://www.republicmagazine.com/webinar
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!! THURSDAY !! 3pm EST Sue Barrow
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Thursday, 1/21/10, 3PM EST: “Learn The Dynamics To Live A Free & Prosperous Life With The Liberty Wealth Club!”
Phone # to Dial: 949-333-4806 Use Conference ID: 733552# Live Web Stream: http://www.republicmagazine.com/webinar
Topics: Tax Deniers | No Comments »
Utah “sovrun” arrested for threatening to kill an IRS employee on MySpace
By JJ MacNab | January 18, 2010
Contrary to public belief, most right-wing extremists don’t spring from the womb with a Constitution in one little hand and a loaded firearm in the other, gurgling and cooing anti-government rhetoric and crying about gold fringe on the hospital diapers.
Sure, a few have extremist parents to blame, but usually, they’ve chosen to walk the “patriot” path as adults. There’s almost always a triggering event such as a bankruptcy, a business failure, or an ugly divorce that somehow turns off the common sense switch in their brains, and turns on the narcissistic rebel switch.
And once that common sense switch is thrown, there’s no flipping it back. After all, the world of the extremist is a glorious place, at first. It’s not your fault if you’re struggling to pay your credit card debt. It’s those evil Jewish bankers that have conspired to keep you down. The court says you have to pay child support for your three little kids? Pfui. You’re a sovereign entity and the court has no jurisdiction over you. The ex-wife that dumped you and took the kids can starve, for all you care. Are taxes keeping you from the lifestyle you know you deserve? Not anymore, because the 16th Amendment was never ratified, so you’re tax free for life! Anyone who still pays is a chump.
Without that pesky common sense around, your failures are never your fault, and your responsibilities can be conveniently sidestepped with a legal-sounding excuse.
Of course, without that common sense around, you are also gullible to every con artist that comes calling. As long as the tax scam, medical quackery, debt elimination scheme, or sovereign citizen package is wrapped in suitably angry, right–wing, paranoid rhetoric, the typical extremist will believe even the most absurd get-rich-quick scam.
Case Study: Michael Lee Wight
Michael Wight has a long history of tangling with the courts. His rap sheet includes driving under the influence, driving without registering his car, carrying a dangerous concealed weapon, driving with a suspended license, a red light violation, driving without a license plate, driving without car insurance, theft, and interfering with a legal arrest. Whenever he went to court on these charges and lost, he sued the arresting officer and/or agency in state or federal court. And when he inevitably lost those cases, he filed an appeal. All at taxpayers’ expense, of course.
Here’s an example of what the Judge had to say in Wight v. Utah, 1999 Colo. J. C.A.R. 5822:
Appellant’s complaint consisted of a plethora of incoherent, unsupported constitutional and other allegations arising out of sundry traffic infractions and the towing and impoundment of his vehicle. Appellant had provided no facts in support of his claim for relief.
According to public records, Wight also filed UCC statements against himself in 1999 in what is commonly known as a “redemption” scam. The general belief in this scheme is that a sovereign citizen can magically separate his flesh and bone sovereign self (Michael Lee Wight, expressed in a mix of upper and lower case letters) from his corporate strawman self (MICHAEL LEE WIGHT.) Since criminal indictments are usually typed out in ALL CAPITAL letters, a sovereign can doing anything he wants, and never be prosecuted. That’s the theory, and they’re sticking to it no matter how many times they lose.
And in the true litmus test of any right-wing extremist, Mr. Wight is even less keen about paying income taxes than he is about registering his car. Two liens, dating back to 2004 and 2006, show that he owed the federal government at least $12,400 and another five liens filed by the State of Utah total more than $3,000.
When the IRS tried to collect these back taxes, he expressed his displeasure on the internet, in such places as MySpace and on survivalist forums.
When most people get behind on their income taxes, their options are usually difficult, but doable. They can file for bankruptcy, arrange an installment plan with the IRS, or find a second job. Mr. Wight took a slightly different approach. He vented his frustration on his MySpace page and threatened to murder the IRS employee who pissed him off.
The federal government, of course, does not take kindly to death threats against their employees, and Mr. Wight was indicted in December 2009.
Here’s an excerpt from the FBI’s Affidavit in support of the Complaint in Wight’s criminal case:
As recently as November, 2009, your affiant saw … [a] photograph on WIGHT’s MySpace page showing a number of firearms laying on the bed … [T]he following writing appeared underneath the aforementioned photograph of the firearms on the bed: “Dedicated to the Assholes and Government Tyrants who Fuck with me and the other REAL Americans!” WIGHT continued: “I was just thinking about this video today and I have this song on my MP3 App on my Blackberry phone..I dedicate this to the Bitch and her Husband that cause me Lifetime injuries when the Bitch hit me with her Car and THEY HAD NO FUCKING INSURANCE and then LIED about the Accident to try and Blame me! I also dedicate this to the INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICES ACS Collection Manager, [name deleted for purposes of this Affidavit] in Fresno, Califuck-Ya who steal My money every Month for the last 2 ½ Years I got Your Vengance and Justice Coming to You all with My Guns Bitches!!!! These Guns and others like them will Insure Your Death and the return of Freedom in America!…” (sic)
Mr. Wight, of course, is using a taxpayer-funded federal public defender in his upcoming trial.
If convicted on the two felony counts, Wight faces a maximum sentence of eight years in federal prison. For his sake, I hope his common sense switch turns back on in time to cut a deal. I’m not going to hold my breath…
Topics: Michael Wight, Tax Deniers | No Comments »
37 years in prison for Ed Brown, and not one drop of remorse
By JJ MacNab | January 13, 2010
Summary: In short, Ed Brown was found competent to participate in his sentencing and the judge sent him off to spend 444 months in federal prison. Not that it matters, but this prison term is in addition to the 63 months from the tax-related case. Even if he qualifies for the maximum time off for good behavior, Ed will be 100 years old at the time of his release.
Bottom line, it sucks to be Ed. But my guess is that anyone reading this blog already knew that.
The big day
8:00 am, Monday morning. Security was fairly high, as it has been throughout the Ed and Elaine Brown-related trials. There was no sign anywhere of Joe “You Ruin People’s Lives” Haas, who had been threatening all week to intercept the prison van as it delivered Ed from the Strafford County Jail to the courthouse for the hearing. A cute but tail-less bomb sniffing doggie was there, as well as several law enforcement officers, court security staff, and oodles of US Marshals.
I had expected six-foot walls of snow in New Hampshire in mid-January and was surprised that the accumulation was only slightly more than what I had in my yard at home in the DC area. It was, however, very very cold. While I have experienced single digit temps three or four times in my life, this is the first time that I’d ever gone below the dreaded zero mark. It was so cold that water oozing through the cracks in the granite walls lining the freeway looked like frozen waterfalls. It was so cold and dry that when I brushed my hair, it formed a ball of static on my head. It was so cold that a few seconds after I’d used my windshield wipers to clear away the ice, the glass surface flash-dried into an opaque layer of crystals.
I once had a federal prosecutor I’d never met, walk up to me and ask somewhat imperiously, and with no introduction whatsoever, how I chose which trials to blog. When I replied, “I go where it’s warmest,” she mumbled something about Wyoming in February, looked relieved, and walked away without ever telling me her name.
I made an exception for Ed Brown. His case is an excellent example of the worst things the right-wing extremist world has to offer – conspiracy theories, tax denial, threats, delusional beliefs, violence, sovereign citizen myths, bombs, paranoia – heck, this case has it all. So I bundled up and headed north.
The courtroom was full as everyone waited for the judge to come in. Roughly forty or so people were in the audience section of the room, mostly government employees and press, with only one Brown supporter in attendance. Ed clanked into the room in his khaki prison jammies and leg shackles, and almost immediately got belligerent with his defense counsel. He kept waiving around a manila envelope as if its mere presence were proof that he was right, and his experienced lawyer was just too stupid to understand. During this childish display, the room was absolutely silent as everyone simply watched Ed’s tantrum play out.
The Competency Hearing
The judge took his seat, and the prosecutor introduced their only witness, a Bureau of Prisons forensic psychologist named Shawn Channell.
Ed: Objection!
Judge: Sit down, Mr. Brown.
Dr. Channell sported a prison-chic, “van dyke” beard, and was comfortable on the stand. He has done more than 300 competency evaluations in the past, including six or seven sovereign citizen exams.
He said that Ed was surprisingly compliant during his exam, but was irritated that he’d been referred for a psychiatric evaluation. Ed had made several unusual comments about the government and his trials, and the doctor explained that Ed had an atypical level of “suspiciousness and paranoia.” Ed, for example, claimed that he had been tortured with chlorine bleach gas following his arrest. When the doctor looked into the allegation, no such event had taken place. This caused Ed to jump up and start yelling at the doctor, so the judge had Ed hauled out of the courtroom for a 5-minute time-out, “just like a 6-year old child.”
As he was leaving, Ed yelled out to the audience.
Ed: Jesse Ventura is correct. It is not a conspiracy; it’s a fact.
Fifteen minutes later, the hearing resumed. The doctor said that he’d spent more time than usual with Ed.
Dr. Channell: He’s very talkative but is not amenable to a question and answer type of interview. He only wants to talk on his terms, so I let him talk and gathered information that way.
By the end of the 30 day evaluation period, the Dr. had ruled out mental illness, but had determined that Ed met the criteria for Narcissistic Personality Disorder, as predicted in my earlier blog post.
Ed: The narcissistic part of it is probably a little bit true.
The witness said that Ed suffered from grandiosity (Ed laughed out loud in delight), and was boastful, patronizing, arrogant, and tended to exaggerate his achievements (Ed nodded his head in agreement.)
Dr. Channell: He believes he is superior in many ways and said that I should be ashamed of myself and the role that I play at the Bureau of Prisons.
Dr. Channell: Ed claimed that he was fired from his previous jobs because he was so skilled that he was a threat. For example, he believed he could eradicate roaches worldwide.
Ed made a number of claims to the psychologist. When Karen Carpenter was dying of anorexia, Ed said he had contacted her agent with a cure. He also said he provided his expertise to law enforcement during the Waco standoff.
However annoying and arrogant a person with a narcissistic personality disorder may be, it is not a mental illness, according to the witness. Ed understood the charges against him, the role of the prosecutor, the role of the defense attorney, and the duties of the judge.
Dr. Channell: According to Mr. Brown, the judge should be there with the Bible in one hand, and the Constitution in the other.
Cross examination was brief but interesting.
Dr. Channell again explained that there was no record of Ed being gassed or put into “a 50 degree cell with a 10 knot wind.”
The defense attorney pointed out that some of Ed’s beliefs were original – the US Attorneys Office was secretly behind the Waco standoff, the Ruby Ridge standoff, the World Trade Center bombing, 911, the Oklahoma City bombing, and millions of deaths around the world. Ironically, Ed never mentioned the one theory that would actually have been true – that the US Attorneys Office was indeed behind his criminal indictment and conviction.
The Dr. said that these beliefs were consistent with his anti-government theories and the narcissistic personality disorder, and explained that having strong beliefs in something that was unbelievable to outsiders did not mean that someone was incompetent. He compared the sovereign citizen movement to a subculture or organized religion in that regard.
Every time the psychologist mentioned one of Ed’s pet theories (flag fringe, the Illuminati, UCC bonds, and so forth) Ed proudly waived his manila envelope around in the air and smiled knowingly.
During his examination, Ed had taken a 300+ question written exam, and a couple of the answers did raise red flags: Ed believed 1) that he was the target of a conspiracy, and 2) that others sometimes could hear his thoughts.
The judge found Ed competent to participate in his sentencing hearing, and so the proceedings move on to the next and final act of this melodrama.
The Sentencing
Throughout the proceedings, Ed turned to the audience to address his followers and explained to the judge that the people acting as his counsel were seated there as well as some of his fans.
In fact, only one person had actually shown up to support Ed that day – Marie Miller, who some of you may remember as the mother of both Bill “Ed is worth more to me dead than alive” Miller, who ended up institutionalized in a mental facility following his brief stay at the Brown house, and John Miller who is currently doing time in prison for threatening to kill the family of a witness in his brother’s criminal case. Marie was quick to tell reporters after the sentencing that she was not Ed’s “counsel.” There were no family members there to provide emotional support. There were no Freestaters there to sponge off Ed’s press coverage.
The federal prosecutor gave a brief speech detailing what was found in the Brown house (guns, ammo, bombs, explosives, tripwires, etc) and said that they agreed with the pre-sentencing report. The recommended sentence was 570 to 622 months.
Throughout the presentation, Ed tried to talk to the Chief Deputy Marshal in the audience and when the judge told him to be quiet and wait his turn, he started to pantomime his reactions for his fans.
Again, the judge warned him to be quiet.
Ed: I’m going to address the public, not the court.
When the prosecutors reminded the judge that the Special Operations Group sniper had established a sight on Ed’s temple and was ready to pull the trigger, Ed laughed aloud in derision.
The Allocution
When it was finally Ed’s turn to talk, he started reading from the US Constitution Ranger’s manual, which continuing to refer to his friends and counsel in the audience.
The judge interrupted and asked that Ed please use the microphone since no one could hear him.
Ed: I will not, and I won’t do anything the court asks.
His defense counsel turned the microphone in his direction, and Ed thanked him.
Ed claimed that he was just doing research all those years to “expose a cell within the criminal government that will murder millions of Americans.” That cell was the US Attorneys Office.
Ed said that he had always admired the US Marshals Service.
Ed: I thought they were pretty good dudes… And women.
He pointed out that the Zionists were responsible for the world’s problems and hastened to add that he was referring to “Zionists, not Jews,” because “Jews are my brothers.”
In fact, Ed blamed everything on the US Attorneys Office – “they orchestrate everything” – along with the Order of St. John, the Illuminati, the Bilderberg Group, the Knights Templar, the Jesuits, the Moose Lodge, the British Accredited Registry, Internal Order of Police, and the Freemasons.
Judge: Did you say the Moose Lodge was responsible?
Ed: Yes, I did.
Ed said that a US Marshal had spent three days in his house and he knew who the person was the whole time. He also claimed that on the infamous Dogwalker Day in June 2007, he knew that there were five special ops snipers in the woods.
Ed: Those US Marshals that came to my land that day are alive because I made a quick decision. I could have killed all five of them.
According to people who have spent time at the Brown house, Ed was such a bad shot, he’d have a hard time shooting the side of a barn.
Ed: I don’t lie. I don’t lie about anything, ever.
He again detailed the evil deeds of the US Attorneys Office – Waco, Ruby Ridge, Flight 800, 911, Oklahoma City.
Ed: They’re murdering people all around the world right now through the State Department.
As Ed’s time ran out for his allocution, I think he realized that this would be his last stand. Towards the end of his speech, Ed’s personality morphed quickly from pompously self-righteous / kind of goofy to malignantly evil. He finally gave us a taste of the private side of Ed, and all I could think about is how Elaine must have felt when this side was turned on her.
He accused the judge of being filthy rich and protested that he was a miss-labeled.
Ed: I am not anti-government, sir. I am the government.
The Sentence
It was now the judge’s turn to speak. He explained that a sentence must serve multiple purposes, including a “need to promote respect for the law.”
Ed stood up mid-sentence, and demanded to be removed from the room. The Judge agreed and the Marshals escorted him out. That will likely be the last time that anyone but law enforcement, prison guards, and fellow prisoners ever see Ed.
The Judge continued his speech. He said that he found Ed to be entirely unrepentant.
Judge: He prides himself for his ability to kill multiple Marshals but didn’t out of the goodness of his heart.
Judge: Mr. Brown confuses the ability to promote his views with his decision that everyone must agree with him.
The judge outlined what had happened to the many people who believed in Ed Brown – lives effectively ruined by long prison sentences – yet Ed didn’t care about or feel remorse for any of those ruined lives.
Judge: Mr. Brown, throughout his life, never quite garnered the status he felt he deserved.
The Judge then sentenced Ed to 444 months in federal prison and the proceedings were over.
Interesting bits:
Danny Riley’s proffer statement contained a number of intriguing items:
- Danny claimed that Ed abused Elaine.
- He also believed that Ed and Elaine had a suicide pact.
- Danny overheard Ed on the telephone telling an unknown person to “take GILLENS (Chief Plainfield PD) out if he gets hurt.”
- Both Danny and Bob Wolffe’s proffers described a series of trip wires surrounding the home where the explosives got progressively more dangerous the closer an outsider got to the house.
What next?
Stay tuned. There are some really big trials coming up this winter in places with deliciously warm climates…
Topics: Cirino Gonzalez, Daniel Riley, Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Jason Gerhard, Robert Wolffe, Tax Deniers | 10 Comments »
Ed Brown’s Judgment Day
By JJ MacNab | January 10, 2010
Almost two years to the day after Ed Brown decided not to return to court to defend himself in his federal income tax case, he’ll appear before a federal judge in Concord, NH to learn his sentence in his kill-as-many-US Marshals-as-possible case.
Bright and early on Monday, January 11, 2010, the judge will first hold a competency hearing, requested by Ed’s defense attorney as a last ditch effort to do something for his client. My prediction? A Bureau of Prison psychologist will have examined Ed for a minimum of 30 days and found that, while he is a cranky and abusive jerk, his delusions are not particularly consistent or original, which means he’s mentally competent for the purposes of sentencing. If the doctor does provide a diagnosis beyond “fit to be sentenced”, my guess would be narcissistic personality disorder. If you read the DSM-IV description of NPD, they might as well rename it EBD (Ed Brown’s Disease.)
Since the minimum sentence Ed faces for building bombs, zip guns, and other IEDs is 30 years, the judge doesn’t have a choice other than to send Ed to prison for the rest of his life. Realistically, he’ll get more time than Elaine or any of the other defendants – being the head of the conspiracy and the one who made the most violent threats, that’s a given. Assuming he gets a sentence of 40 years, for example, the earliest he could possibly be free is October 2045, at which time he’ll be 102 years old. The federal prison system doesn’t have parole, and I’ve already factored in the maximum time off for good behavior.
Ed’s lawyer has asked for a reduced sentence of 361 months, but even that would effectively be a life sentence. Here’s my favorite bit from the lawyer’s filing:
C. The Defendant Should Receive a Two Point Reduction for Acceptance of Responsibility
The Defendant testified in this case. Although he may have been at times surly and disorganized in his testimony he testified truthfully. In fact he admitted essentially every element of each offense when examined by the prosecutor.
Hmmm. I’m pretty sure that taking responsibility for your crime means saying you’re sorry and that you were wrong…
And for those of you who are feeling sorry for Ed right now, let me refresh your memory about some of the things he promised during the standoff:
Source: Ed Brown on the DezertOwl radio show 2/2/2007.
This is the beginning of one very huge movement. I’m not quite sure you understand the ramifications of what’s going on right now. This is massive. This is international. We are fed up with the Zionist Illuminati. That’s what this is all about. Loud and clear. Zionist Illuminati. Lawyers, whatever they are, ok, it’s going to stop. And if the judge is a member of that, I know that McAuliffe is, I know that US Attorney Colantuono is, they’d better stop. This is a warning. You can do whatever you want to me. My job is to get the message out and I’m getting the message out, and I’m warning you guys (not you guys [referring to the show hosts]) them to cease and desist their unlawful activity in this country and every other country because once this thing starts, we’re going to seek ‘em out and hunt them down. And we’re going to bring them to justice. So anybody wishes to join them, you go right ahead and join them. But I promise you, long after I’m gone, they’re going to seek out every one of you and your bloodline.
Source: Ed’s 2/4/2007 telephone conversation with an attorney
Minute Mark 2:14
Ed: I don’t surrender to criminals. I don’t even talk to them, hardly. This is a total, total violation of all laws of this nation. These people need to be strung up, they’re so criminal. Well, why would I even talk to these people first-hand? They are beneath me — they are my public servants – they are my employees — I have fired them for treason and sedition, so why would I communicate with them under any circumstances?
Minute Mark 3:00
Ed: They don’t have a choice, because if they go any further than what they are, then they’re going to bring this whole thing to another level. That’s their choice. I did give them a choice: Go away, I don’t negotiate with my enemy.
Minute Mark 3:26
Ed: I’ll tell you what. We won’t arrest them if they bother to go away. For now. Because they are subject for charges of arrest right now, there’s no question about it.
Minute Mark 3:55
Ed: I’m not interested in living and dying and all that crap. I’m interested in what the law is supposed to be and I will stand by that lawful law at any cost. Period. Why don’t you understand that? You think that I’m afraid to die?
Minute Mark 4:45
Ed: You can record this and give it to them. This is a warning to them. They really don’t want to do this. They do it to me, and I wouldn’t want to be this U.S. attorney. I wouldn’t want to be this judge or these other people. This James John or anybody else that decides to come down here. Their names are already out there, just like my name is in their books.
Minute Mark 5:39
Ed: They are just as vulnerable as I am. And if they’re so foolish and stupid to think that they’re not, hey, doom on them. So if they don’t want to negotiate properly, in a lawful manner, they’re going to be surprised at how many people whose lives they’ve destroyed that’s going to get back up and kick their ever loving asses. I don’t say that lightly, you know damn right well I don’t say that lightly. You know how many people are pissed off at them and how many lives they’ve destroyed. A lot of people would love the opportunity to rip out their hearts and shove them back down their throats.
Minute Mark 6:16
Ed: I suggest they take their money and go away. It’s the last chance they’re going to get. Because if they decide to make that move against me, go ahead, watch. It ain’t going to be as easy as they think it is.
Minute Mark 6:33
Even if I lose the battle, all it’s going to do is infuriate a hell of a lot more people. I guarantee you, McAuliffe and Morse and Colantuono and the rest of those people down there will join me. That’s their choice.
Minute Mark 7:23
I have no illusions about living or dying with these people, these evil SOBs. But that’s ok, I forgive them, but my friends won’t.
Topics: Ed Brown | 2 Comments »
Domestic Goddess vs. Domestic Terrorist: the Sentencing of Elaine Brown
By JJ MacNab | October 3, 2009
Yesterday, “Elaine Alice: of the Family Brown, spelled in upper case and lower case letters” was sentenced to 35 years in federal prison.
Keep in mind that that’s 35 years in addition to the 63-month sentence from the earlier, income tax-related charges. Even if she’s a model prisoner, and earns the maximum amount of “time off for good behavior,” the earliest she can ever hope to see a world without bars and guards is January 31, 2042, at which time she’ll be two weeks shy of her 101st birthday. She’ll likely be housed in a maximum security facility for women, in their “administrative” unit to ensure that she doesn’t try to retaliate against government employees by filing phony liens and other such sovereign citizen silliness.
Had she accepted the plea agreement offered to her when she first decided to flee her income tax trial in 2007, her estimated release date would have been October 30, 2009, just a few weeks from today. Much of that time would have been spent in a minimum security camp à la Martha Stewart, with an early release to a half-way house.
Of course, had she never met Ed Brown, she’d be a wealthy and successful professional with a long and prosperous retirement ahead of her, free from the notion of a life behind bars, with a jelly cupboard full of stuff like jelly, rather than bombs and explosives.
During yesterday’s sentencing hearing, however, Elaine blamed everyone but Ed and herself. It was the court’s fault for not recognizing that while ELAINE BROWN had been convicted, “Elaine Alice: of the family Brown” had not. It was the local press’ fault for making her and Ed look like crooks, thus stunting their mission to spread the religion of tax denying on a nationwide scale. It was the government’s fault for daring to impose those evil income taxes.
The Hearing
When Elaine was escorted into the courtroom at 9 am, she looked haggard, old, and hardened. She was wearing navy blue deck shoes and a long-sleeved, white shirt under khaki prison scrubs. Her legs were shackled, which caused her to amble awkwardly when she walked.
For the first several minutes of the hearing, the defense counsel entered his objections to the pre-sentencing report into the record. According to the defense attorney, Elaine didn’t assemble the many pipe bombs and explosive devices around the Plainfield house, and of all of the dozens of guns found at the residence, only one belonged to her for the purpose of self defense.
The judge didn’t buy it. He pointed out that Elaine was very much aware of the bombs and guns in her home, and that she had “constructive possession” of the firearms. They were everywhere, all she had to do was pick one up and use it. Furthermore, it was her income and savings that financed the purchase of the guns, explosives, and bomb parts.
In July, 2009, Elaine had been convicted by a jury on six felony counts, one of which had a minimum sentence of 360 months in federal prison attached to it. According to the presentencing report prepared by a Bureau of Prisons probation officer, the federal sentencing guidelines for these six counts resulted in a sentencing range of 495 to 528 months. The defense attorney requested a sentence of 361 months, and the prosecutors endorsed the recommended range from the report.
When it was the federal prosecutor’s time to speak, he gave an eloquent monologue. He reminded the court that while Elaine may have been claiming her acts were in self-defense, to anyone grounded in the real world, her acts were obviously “aggressive conduct”, and pointed out that giving her a below-guideline sentence, even if she was highly unlikely to outlive that lower sentence, would send a message to future wingnuts and kooks that engaging in an armed standoff with lethal bombs and explosives was somehow justifiable self-defense.
OK, the prosecutor didn’t actually say “wingnuts and kooks,” but anyone who listened to Ed and Elaine rant on their daily radio show about the worldwide Zionist Jesuit Illuminati conspiracy behind their tax charges or the odd teachings of the guru who called himself The Body of the Lord, understood that that’s who the prosecutor was referring to when he euphemistically said “others.”
He pointed out that, in Elaine’s mind, since no one was hurt in the standoff and arrest, there was no harm done. While no one may have been hurt, he continued, that was only because the Marshals were patient and professional. He paraphrased Elaine’s argument as, “Please be compassionate because I didn’t have the opportunity to kill anyone.”
Good stuff, that.
He then moved on to the theme of the day. Elaine was an odd mix; an educated, polite, matronly woman who knowingly engaged in a violent, and bomb-filled standoff. She lived in a home that was a “fortress” even prior to her arrest.
She was carrying a 9 mm Glock pistol at the time of her arrest that was equipped with a large capacity magazine. This meant that she was capable of firing 17 hollow-point rounds before reloading. A second, loaded, high-capacity magazine was stored in her fanny pack. She slept in a bedroom that had 22 pipe bombs, explosive devices, guns, and ammunition side by side with her stuffed animals. She slept a few feet away from night-vision goggles, a shotgun, a 50 caliber rifle, his and her Scott Air packs, Kevlar helmets, and more. There were explosive devices in her laundry room and jelly cupboard.
Prosecutor: This was a house you walk into and say “Holy Expletive Deleted.”
According to the prosecutor, Elaine acted as a mother-like figure to 21-year old Jason Gerhard, which resulted in the young man throwing away his life. (Jason was recently sentenced to 20 years in federal prison as a result of his association with the Browns.)
Throughout all of the oral arguments, Elaine sat still. Her legs were crossed, her right hand lay limp on the chair arm, and her left hand supported her chin, covering her mouth. She stared fixedly at a piece of paper on the table in front of her, never looking up, and rarely reacting to anything that was said about her.
When the prosecutor talked about her willingness to kill US Marshals, she picked at her fingernails. When he mentioned her vulgar outbursts following her arrest, she pursed her mouth slightly. Otherwise, nothing.
Elaine’s lawyer answered by pointing out that she had worked hard for 65 years without any criminal record, and had put herself through dental school at age 30 with the help of a scholarship and loans. She and Ed had committed no “overt acts of aggression” and had never left the property once the standoff started.
Then it was Elaine’s turn to speak.
Elaine: My name is Elaine Alice of the family Brown spelled in upper and lower case letters.
She then followed with the typical UCC nonsense that had trickled into the court docket since her arrest two years earlier. She claimed that she and Ed chose to go down the tax denying path because they wanted to “awaken the public to the corrupt and unlawful practices of the US government.”
Elaine: We didn’t submit to the courts because Moses did not submit to Pharaoh, and the founding fathers did not submit to King George.
She then referred to the standoff as an act of “civil disobedience”, cited the New Hampshire Constitution right to revolution, and the New Hampshire state motto of Live Free or Die. She recited the standard Edmund Burke quote (“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”) and complained that her patriotic efforts had all been thwarted by a local New Hampshire reporter.
Elaine: Those Americans who do something are ridiculed and vilified.
She ended with a bitter promise:
Elaine: I will continue to expose the fraud from prison. I will always resist.
Two supporters clapped loudly at her grand finale. One (the financial analyst from Rhode Island who testified during the trial) was escorted out of the courtroom, and the other left voluntarily.
The judge’s ruling was particularly interesting. He talked about the difficulty in reconciling the fact that someone who appeared so normal on the surface had committed such serious crimes. On one hand, Elaine was a “person next door,” and on the other, she was promising to send US Marshals home in body bags.
The Judge disagreed with Elaine’s characterization of her acts as civil disobedience and contrasted her acts to those of Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr..
Judge: The conduct engaged in by Mrs. Brown was purely criminal. She wanted to kill without trial, attorneys, due process, or the protection of the law. She wanted the immediate execution of law enforcement officers who were trying to enforce a warrant.
Judge: It’s difficult to imagine a person who sleeps near both stuffed animals and explosive devices.
Judge: She fully understood what she intended to do, and in the end, the US Marshals gave her more consideration than she gave them.
Judge: When Mrs. Brown was talking earlier, she excused herself politely when she paused for a drink of water, but gave no excuses for her crimes.
The judge then sentenced Elaine to 420 months, considerably less time than the federal sentencing guideline range.
Throughout the judge’s monologue, Elaine sat emotionless. She stared at and straightened the piece of paper that contained the text of her final speech, and looked up at the ceiling once. When the judge asked her if she understood that she had a right to appeal, she answered yes so quietly and meekly, I could barely hear her.
Epilogue:
A few mornings ago, and without prior warning, Ed Brown was whisked away to a Massachusetts prison for a 30-day psychiatric evaluation. This means that Ed and Elaine had little or no opportunity to say goodbye, and they will likely never see each other again.
Ed, Elaine, Danny, Jason, Reno, Bob, and so many others – all in prison because they bought into a fairly ridiculous and obvious scam. Instead of working towards the reduction or elimination of the federal income tax, Ed and Elaine tried to argue that there were no income tax laws that applied to them. Instead of engaging in real civil disobedience and just refusing to pay taxes, they maintained a smirking facade of “if you just show us the law, we’ll cut you a check today.” And instead of going to prison when they were shown the law during their first criminal trial, they escalated the situation to a nine-month standoff, armed to teeth, just itching to murder anyone who tried to arrest them.
What a freakin’ waste.
Interesting bits:
- Throughout the hearing, Elaine’s defense attorney called her Dr. Brown. Everyone else called her Mrs. Brown.
- The government informed the Judge that Danny Riley (aka “Dogwalker” in my earlier blog entries) had participated extensively in the prosecution of the Browns and, as a result, the DOJ would be requesting a reduced sentence on his behalf on a later date. This gave the Judge some flexibility in choosing a sentence for Elaine that was lower than the 36-year sentence he’d doled out to Danny.
- The courtroom was fairly full, a mishmash of press, supporters, and government employees.
- Ed’s sentencing will realistically take place this winter. Winter… in New Hampshire. Oh joy.
Topics: Cirino Gonzalez, Daniel Riley, Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Jason Gerhard, Robert Wolffe, Tax Deniers | 6 Comments »
Post-Trial Housekeeping
By JJ MacNab | July 11, 2009
A note to the Brown jurors
For those of you who may have stumbled on to this blog after the verdict, welcome. And thank you. It may have been a bit intimidating for some of you to have been assigned to such a bomb and gun intense trial, but to those of us scribbling away on our notepads in the audience, you looked like a serious and resolute bunch.
I would love to hear what you thought. Please drop me a line at info@redcrayons.net. If you’re nervous about using your real name, and to be honest, I think you’d be wise not to publicize your names, just use your juror number, and I promise not to divulge your personal information to the public. If you want to know more about who I am and what I do before you feel comfortable contacting me, you can read about me here.
A note to the US Marshals
Ed Brown gloated and taunted and smirked at you for 9+ months. You guys didn’t even gloat for 30 seconds. You kept your cool in and around the courtroom – no high-fives, no simmering looks at the guy who wanted to kill you during the standoff, not even so much as a whispered “yes” when the first guilty verdict was read aloud. It was pretty chilling for me to see all of the guns and bombs in courtroom, and I wasn’t Ed and Elaine’s intended target. You guys were, and your professionalism rocked. The US Marshal Service should be proud.
A note to Zoe the Dog
It has come to my attention that I may have falsely accused Zoe of a hideous crime. Apparently, I missed a moment in the arrest video where a Marshal slipped Zoe the Dog a piece of pizza. She did not steal it.
Also, in an exclusive interview with Chief Deputy Gary DiMartino, I was provided additional information about Zoe the Dog’s whereabouts. After the arrest, Zoe was taken to the Upper Valley Humane Society in Enfield, NH where she was quickly placed in a nice home. Elaine’s cat was also taken home by a family. No more booby traps with trip wires, no more exploding baggies in trees, no more scary gunfire, and no more being sent into the woods by Ed Brown to sniff out potential snipers.
Topics: Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Tax Deniers | 4 Comments »
Brown Trial July 9, 2009: The Verdict
By JJ MacNab | July 9, 2009
At 1:35 pm, word spread through the courthouse that it was time to skedaddle up to Courtroom 4. The jury had a question. It turned out that they wanted to hear an excerpt of the trial transcript – the one I reproduced in a recent blog entry where Elaine threatened violence.
Elaine Brown: You’ve got to use force.
Ed Brown: How?
Elaine Brown: To the death.
Elaine Brown: We don’t know how this will end. But there are only two ways we are coming out of here. Either as a free man and as a free woman or in body bags. That has not changed, and that’s the stand that everyone must take. Because if we come out in body bags, there’s going to be a few more, too. That’s not a threat. That’s just noticing them that this is the stand that we will take. We have not changed our minds.
The jury returned to their deliberation.
Based on the question, all was not well for Elaine’s defense. Within 10 minutes, everyone was called back into the courtroom for the verdict.
There were no family members or supporters in the room, just seven or eight reporters from the press and roughly 60 government employees.
The jury looked solemn and two of them were looking at the defendants.
The judge quietly reviewed the verdict form and for a couple of minutes, the only sound in the full courtroom was the turning of the verdict pages.
The Browns held hands during the lengthy verdict reading – Ed stared ahead stone-faced and Elaine had that deep, pinched frown that you get when you’re about to cry.
The verdict was guilty on all counts (details of the courts are at the bottom of this post.)
The jury sounded serious and firm when polled by the defense counsel, and when the judge thanked the jurors for being diligent in their duties, Ed chuckled and smiled knowingly.
Sentencing was set for 9/3/2009. Ed’s will be in the morning, Elaine’s in the afternoon.
Ed and Elaine both remained seating when the jury was dismissed and the judge exited the courtroom.
After the judge left, the audience was free to sit down or leave or talk to each other, but no one did for a several minutes. There were 60 some odd people in the room but no one talked or moved right away, They just watched while Ed and Elaine picked up their belonging from the defense table and were escorted from the room.
As Ed was walking out, he leaned over to Concord Monitor reporter Margot Sanger-Katz, smirked when he smiled and said, “You did a good job for your masters.”
What a maroon.
|
Max Sentence |
Ed |
Elaine |
|
| Conspiracy to Prevent Officers of the US from Discharging Their Duties (Count 1) |
6 years |
Guilty |
Guilty |
| Conspiracy to Commit Offense Against the United States (Count 2) |
8 years |
Guilty |
Guilty |
| Carrying & Possessing a Firearm in Connection with a Crime of Violence (Count 3) |
Life * |
Guilty |
|
| Carrying & Possessing a Firearm in Connection with a Crime of Violence (Count 4) |
Life * |
|
Guilty |
| Felon in Possession (Count 5) |
10 years |
Guilty |
|
| Felon in Possession (Count 6) |
10 years |
|
Guilty |
| Obstruction of Justice (Count 7) |
10 years |
Guilty |
|
| Obstruction of Justice (Count 8 ) |
10 years |
|
Guilty |
| Failure to Appear for Trial (Count 9) |
5 years |
Guilty |
|
| Failure to Appear for Sentencing (Count 10) |
5 years |
Guilty |
|
| Failure to Appear for Sentencing (Count 11) |
5 years |
|
Guilty |
*mandatory 30 years minimum
Topics: Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Tax Deniers | 7 Comments »
Brown Trial: July 8, 2009 Closing Arguments
By JJ MacNab | July 9, 2009
I am not a patient person, I tend to say whatever I want, and I’m just not that good at following rules.
I would suck as a federal prosecutor.
Contrary to Ed’s belief that government lawyers get to say anything they want all the time, and get all their motions and objections passed with a big, rubber stamp (in ALL CAPS with red ink, no less,) the truth is that the judge only appears to give them what they want because they tend to know the court rules and usually stick to them.
Please note: I use safe, comfy hedge words like “usually” and “tend” because there will always be evil prosecutors out there just like some cops are crooked and some priests are pervs. The evil prosecutors, however, were not assigned to the Brown trial. Maybe they were all on vacation or hanging out in their Illuminati clubhouse. Either way, they weren’t flaunting their evilness in Concord, NH this week.
Because of zillions of pesky court rules, watching a federal trial is a bit like watching a movie on a high def tv that’s covered with a really thick layer of dust. You know the high def picture is underneath there somewhere, and you just want to wipe away the dust to better enjoy your movie.
Witnesses can only talk about what they personally know, and physical evidence can’t speak to motive. Bombs and IEDs don’t have lips, after all. Juries see a lot of dots on a page, but lack guidance in how to connect those dots into a cohesive picture.
Until closing arguments, that is.
Federal Prosecutor Terry Ollila
Ms. Ollila picked up a cloth and polished the jurors’ tv screen to a nice, glossy shine.
She told the story of the Brown’s initial arrest, tax trial, standoff, and capture with a steady stream of pictures of the relevant evidence playing on the courtroom screens for the jurors to watch. She reminded jurors about the guns, the bombs, the booby traps, the threats, the 60,000+ rounds of ammunition, the cash, the Tannerite baggies in the trees, the supporters, the how-to books, and much much more.
She painted Ed as the guy who built the bombs, and Elaine as the woman who earned the money to finance the operation. When push came to shove, it was Elaine’s goal to stand by Ed, gun in hand, and kill anyone who tried to arrest them.
Prosecutor: The battle never happened because the Marshals had Ed and Elaine’s number. They acted with patience and deliberation. They knew the fringe players would gradually fade away to find another cause or simply disappear into the wind. At the end of the day, the Browns’ plans fell flat because they were up against true professionals.
The closing argument ended with a brief excerpt of Ed, standing in handcuffs, with a Marshal wiping his face with a tissue.
Dang.
Elaine’s Defense Counsel
Mr. Lang’s closing statement was brief. He asked the jury to use common sense, and tried to separate Elaine from all of the bombs and rifles sitting in a pile on the evidence tables.
Lang: Yes, she knew about the [bombs and explosive devices] but did not mean she had dominion or control over those items.
He said Elaine returned home to Ed because “home is the place you go where they have to take you in.”
Lang: She did what she had to do as a loyal wife. It was not a conspiracy, and there was no evidence that she had anything to do with any destructive devices.
Ed’s Legal Counsel
I can’t imagine what it’s like trying to defend a client who keeps admitting his crimes under oath and acts like an immature ass throughout the trial.
Iocapino: No matter what you think of Ed’s beliefs or ideologies, he’s still a living, breathing human being.
Too bad Ed didn’t think of the Marshals and the people he threatened the same way.
The lawyer focused his presentation on the burden of proof and the notion of willfulness.
Iacopino: His intent was to live, not to commit a crime. You may not have liked Ed Brown. You may not have liked what he said on the witness stand. He told you things on the stand that really didn’t help his case too much. But what does that tell you? That he’s telling you the truth.
He accused the prosecutor of making a strawman argument in her closing statement. I swear on my favorite cat that Ed’s ears made a little “perk” sound at the word “strawman”.
In the end, the resounding theme of Ed’s defense was that he wanted to live.
Rebuttal by Arnold Huftalen
Prosecutor: Ed wanted to live, but he wanted to live his way, and if anyone got in his way, he’d kill them. Nothing I say now will change your mind about Ed so let me talk about Elaine Brown. A conspiracy is an agreement, spoken or unspoken. Your common sense and the evidence in this case will make it clear to you than she was a member of this conspiracy, she just was. There’s no evidence that she touched or built [bombs and explosive devices] but there’s a whole lot of evidence that she knew they were there.
Throughout the closing statements, Elaine sat still while Ed kept turning around and mouthing comments to the militia chic guy in the audience. He mock slit his own throat a couple of times, hamming it up for his tiny group of supporters.
Jury instructions were long and tedious, as usual, and you could all but see the jurors doing a mental checklist in their heads as the judge read each count into the record. Elaine followed along the pages with her attorney while Ed fidgeted.
Half-way through, militia chic guy started snoring loudly in the audience but the Marshals woke him up.
Realistically, the jury can’t come up with immediate decision since the verdict form reads like an algebra test: If 1 or 2 = guilt, then 3. If neither 1 nor 2 are guilty, then neither 3 nor 4. They look like a sharp bunch, though, and there could be a verdict within two or three hours.
The jurors got the case at 4:15 pm and were told by the judge to stick it out until 7:30 pm. Eleven hours is a long day for a juror.
Interesting bits:
Several books from Ed’s library were introduced into evidence. I looked but didn’t see any Oprah labels:
- “Guerilla Warfare and Special Forces Operations Manual”
- “Unconventional Warfare Devices and Techniques”
- “Unconventional Warfare Devices and Techniques - Incendiaries”
- “Booby Traps”
- “The Anarchist Handbook”
Topics: Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Tax Deniers | 2 Comments »
Brown Trial: July 8, 2009: From Make the Stand to Take the Stand
By JJ MacNab | July 8, 2009
If you want to convince a jury that you’re not a militia guy, it’s probably best if your supporters don’t show up wearing militia chic – you know the look: camouflage pants, black t-shirt, suspenders and hiking boots. One supporter even used an infamous “International Driver’s License” to gain access to the courthouse today.
The general mood in the court was a mix of tired and hopeful. It seems that everyone (other than Ed) is ready for the Ed Brown mess to finally come to an end so they can move on to “normal” stuff.
Ed Brown Cross Examination (Continued)
Ed took his place back at the stand to be poached, marinated, and grilled by the prosecutor. He wasn’t carrying his UCC book this time, so he’ll probably blame any and all guilty verdicts on the lack of suitable sovrun citizen protective gear.
The prosecutor asked Ed about his daily radio show on Republic Broadcast Network (RBN) called “Ed Brown under Siege.”
Prosecutor: Is it fair to say that the purpose of this radio show was to make comments to supporters?
Ed: No, it was to make comments to the world. The statements were to warn the world of the danger we are in, the same way JFK did before he was assassinated.
Ed didn’t remember a particular RBN radio show dated 3/20/2007, and the prosecutor quoted a few lines to refresh his memory
Elaine Brown: You’ve got to use force.
Ed Brown: How?
Elaine Brown: To the death.
Elaine Brown: We don’t know how this will end. But there are only two ways we are coming out of here. Either as a free man and as a free woman or in body bags. That has not changed, and that’s the stand that everyone must take. Because if we come out in body bags, there’s going to be a few more, too. That’s not a threat. That’s just noticing them that this is the stand that we will take. We have not changed our minds.
Ed agreed that Elaine may have said that, and explained what she meant: “We live in the Live Free or Die state. Do you know what that means?”
Ed was asked about the Jamboree and BBQ and he said that he never invited or wanted supporters to come to the home those days.
Ed had a tantrum or two, and the judge sent him out of the room to count to ten and think about what he’d done. It’s interesting; when Ed is at the defense table he acts out like a pre-teen (he can’t sit still, he’s always talking to his lawyer, Elaine, or people in the audience, and he makes a lot of faces. When he’s on the stand, though, he’s pure teenager – smirking, making sarcastic comments, and erratically rebellious. For example, at one point, Ed smirked at the judge and said “Good job” sarcastically when the judge denied Ed’s attorney’s motion.
Defense Witness Christine Arvizu
Ms. Arvizu is a dental patient of Elaine’s who lives in White River Junction, VT. She originally went to Elaine’s dental practice in West Lebanon, but ended up having her teeth worked on in the Plainfield home. She felt a little apprehensive about going to the home, and never saw any guns or explosives. She also attended one of the concerts.
Defense Witness Shaun Farnsworth
Mr. Farnsworth is a contractor who worked on the Plainfield home for two years. He was at the home in 2006 when the Marshals and the Probation Officers showed up to collect Ed’s guns. The Marshals asked the witness “a lot of quirky questions” at the time about whether he’d seen guns or explosives, which he hadn’t. The witness stuck around the rest of the day to watch the trial.
Witness Susan Berge
Ms. Berge has lived in Burrillville, RI “Lordy Lou, since 1976.” Of all of the witnesses in this trial, I’ve found her to be the strangest. Ms. Berge writes a stock analysis newsletter for institutional investors. She looks the part, dresses professionally, and appears to be an educated woman.
In 2007, Ms. Berge was sitting at her computer when she saw a scrolling headline that said something along the lines of “Elderly couple in standoff with feds”. She started following the story in local NH newspapers but became concerned when there was a period with no news.
She got worried, but instead of picking up a phone and calling, she got in her car and drove 175 miles to Plainfield, NH in late June. She didn’t even know how to get to the house, and had to stop at several businesses and ask.
She was surprised that there were no roadblocks or signs and was anxious because she’d heard there were Marshals hiding in the woods. Since the Browns didn’t know she was coming, she parked near the front door so they could see her and not be afraid. She stayed and chatted with the Browns for three hours and drove home.
Ms. Berge returned for a Jamboree and was excited to meet her hero Randy Weaver. She found the helicopter buzzing around the concert to be unnerving and claimed that there were people at the concert who were in their 60s and 70s who were WWII vets.
She returned again to the home in late August / early September.
Witness Dave von Kleist
Mr. Von Kleist was the singer who ran the first Brown Jamboree and who sang at the second. He met the Browns briefly in 1997 and had Elaine on his “Power Hour” show in 2007.
The witness was wearing a suit in court but is usually seen in a red, white and blue “stars and bars” shirt. He claimed to have a dozen of those shirts in his closet.
The first Jamboree attracted 40 to 50 people, and the second one had roughly 100 people in attendance.
When the defense attorney played a video of the second Jamboree where a helicopter was circling overhead, the witness literally burst into tears. “It breaks my heart,” he said watching the video.
While weeping, he said he saw Ed wearing a gun, but not Elaine, and kept coming back to the helicopter.
Witness: We just saw what happened with the helicopter. It should strike fear in the hearts of every American.
After he was dismissed, Von Kleist walked by the jury, leaned in, and told them “God save us all.” The judge was not amused and he was detained temporarily by the Marshals.
Witness David Hatch Bernier
Mr. Hatch-Bernier is Elaine’s son. He’s the one she stayed with in Massachusetts when she was released pending her sentencing in 2007. He helped design the Plainfield house and said it was eco-friendly, not heavily fortified or geared towards survivalist mentality. He said he never saw firearms at the house but assumed the couple had them. He is anti-guns.
The defense rested.
Closing arguments will be covered in a separate post shortly.
Topics: Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Tax Deniers | 3 Comments »
Brown Trial: July 7, 2009: Ed Brown takes the stand
By JJ MacNab | July 8, 2009
Whew! It’s just been one of those days.
The mystery of the elevator was solved, the prosecution rested their case after two witnesses, another juror has dropped out, leaving only one alternate, and it’s raining again in New Hampshire.
Oh, did I forget to mention that Ed Brown took the stand?
Silly me.
Witness Jamie Berry (Continued)
Mr. Berry continued his testimony with an email from Danny Riley to Reno in August 2007 outlining what supplies were still needed at the house. Considering that Reno was kicked off the Tax Denier Island in June, the timing of this correspondence seemed odd. Danny requested cardboard, nails (the bigger the better), two way radios, night vision goggles, motor oil, scanners, video cameras, throw away pre-paid cell phones, clothesline rope, and other various and sundry items that no good domestic terrorist would stay home without.
The last item on the list was … precious.
People to come and make a stand, to their death, if necessary.
Isn’t that sweet?
Mr. Berry then testified about the ongoing problem with the surveillance camera. When I heard that they were relying on a 56K modem connection, I had the sudden unexplainable urge to don leg warmers, lounge around in an off the shoulder sweatshirt, and comb my hair in a sideways ponytail. Who says the ‘80s are dead? I wear my sunglasses at night …
This witness repeated the prior testimony about Jason’s car accident and his colorful comments about the punishment for treason being death.
Witness Ken Nunes
Mr. Nunes is now a Senior Inspector with the US Marshals and was a Deputy US Marshal during the 9+ months of the standoff. His specialty is fugitive investigations. Can you really read that without thinking Tommy Lee Jones? Be honest, now.
This witness testified that Ed was always armed, that the witness obtained mid-standoff photos of Ed from a Walmart kiosk showing Ed wearing a gun, and that Jason said stupid violent stuff when he crashed Elaine’s car. Note to self: Do not get embarassing photos developed at a Walmart kiosk.
The Prosecution rested.
After some basic criminal trial housekeeping – striking superfluous stuff in the indictment, introducing redacted items into evidence, and the Rule 29 Motions to Dismiss – Mr. Iacopino put Edward-Lewis punctuation Brown on the stand.
Witness Edward-Lewis: of the family or clan Brown©
Still wearing his khaki prison pajamas, blue deck shoes, and grey sweatshirt, Ed was quite the sight as he took the stand clutching his Bible in one hand, his Uniform Commercial Code book in the other, and a red pen in his pocket.
When asked by his counsel to introduce himself, Ed carefully spelled out his name, emphasizing which letters were capitalized and which were lower case, and making sure that the court record reflected that he had a full colon.
His nerves were showing when he confused his age and his year of birth.
Ed has a GED level education, with a college level course in philosophy. He was born in Massachusetts but was a ward of the state from age 6 to age 16. He’s lived in MA, CA, FL, PA, and the northeast, and even spent five years homeless in his car.
His job history is a hodge podge of short term employment: he’d worked in a hat shop, a shoe store, a linen mill, and moved from job to job every month or so because he got bored. His goal was to wear a suit, and be a real businessman.
He got involved in Fuller brush sales, Amway, comb sales, a restaurant named The Lobster Trap, two beauty salons, Ed’s Bait Shop, and a collection agency before hitting it big time as a cockroach exterminator. He liked sales, and developed a pheromone-based “sex trap” for cockroaches, and he “hit the streets of Los Angeles” with the contraptions, but they didn’t really work. He claims to have worked with two professors from UCLA and UC Riverside to develop a toxic free insecticide for cockroaches – boric acid. Considering that boric acid has been used as an insecticide since 1948, it was hard to share Ed’s excitement about his big discovery in the 1980s.
By then, Ed had a plan: International Cockroach Busters. When he approached the Long Beach navy base to get a contract to kill their cockroaches, they said no, and Ed testified that this “first encounter” with the federal government scarred him forever.
You’d think that being court marshaled by the Navy after his assault with a deadly weapon conviction might have been his first government experience, and might have played a factor in why the Navy didn’t want to hire him. But he didn’t think to tell the jury about that stuff.
He moved to New England and met Elaine when he wiped out an “almost complete infestation” in an apartment building that she owned. They “lived in sin” for a few years, married, and move to New Hampshire to settle down.
Ed: She was up-and-coming as a dentist and I was up-and-coming as an exterminator.
They eventually bought the Plainfield property and started building their home.
Ed said that he’d been a survivalist all of his life, and accumulated food, water, wood burnings stoves – “everything was taken into account since day one”.
Ed: We believed there was a coming crisis in this country.
He said that he was a member, and then leader of the US Constitution Rangers, but denied that the group was a militia. He said that that was “just a misconception put out there by the ADL.”
He complained that a small army was sent to Elaine’s dental practice in 2004 to search her books and records, and when he was arrested in 2006, he remembers taking the magazine out his pistol, and leaving it in the glove box of his car before the Marshals arrested him.
Ed: I could swear I unloaded by 45 and left it in the car. I thought, “This was not a time to be armed.”
Sure, Ed.
Ed talked about the first arrest in 2006, the first criminal trial, the beginning of the standoff, Dogwalker Day, and his eventual arrest without adding much new or interesting to the story already told by others in court. The general theme was that the government had wronged him repeatedly, that he was doing what “any American would do” and that he was scared on Dogwalker Day which is why he picked up that 50 caliber rifle.
He claimed that his opinions about government came from his interest in Ruby Ridge and Waco. He said that he’d called the Attorney General’s office in DC during Waco and told them to use sleeping gas but the feds ignored him and used deadly gas instead.
Sure, Ed.
Ed’s depiction of his pre-raid life with Elaine was pastoral and full of smiles and puppy dog tails.
Ed: We were a happy couple, living the American dream. We’d paid all of our debts and taxes.
The defense attorney asked several questions about Ed’s experience with the press and the standoff.
Attorney: Did you ever make any broad threats during those interviews?
Ed: That’s impossible.
Attorney: Did you try to arrange a public meeting with the Marshals?
Ed: Yes, several times.
Ed said that he had never pointed his rifle at the Marshals when they were unloading the pick up truck.
Ed: That’s impossible.
Ed said that the guns that had been removed at the time of the 2006 arrest was a modest collection (30 or so firearms), that he’d had the Goex cans of black powder for years, and that he hadn’t asked any of the supporters to purchase guns for him. Most of the guns belonged to other people and he didn’t touch other people’s guns.
He admitted building the pipebombs, the Goex grenades with nails, and the zip guns, but denied using the zip guns as booby trap devices. He thought the Tannerite baggies in the trees were “kind of benign”, the “safest way to do it without anyone getting hurt.”
He said he didn’t fire at anyone on June 7th because “no one put a gun in his face.”
Attorney: How id events that day change your life?
Ed: I had lost total faith and confidence that day in the US government. I had lost total faith and confidence in the local law enforcement. They were going to kill us.
Other than taking too fast, and the occasional foray into side issues like how the BOP was trying to kill him via his TB tests, Ed worked very well with his lawyer.
Cross examination wasn’t quite so congenial.
The prosecutor pointed out the US Constitution Ranger handbook refers to the group as a militia and asked Ed if they were trying to take the law into their own hands.
Ed’s first tantrum was over a very simple yes or no question about whether the Long Beach Navy Yard had hired Ed to kill their cockroaches. Ed didn’t want to say “no” he wanted to talk about how the government didn’t want to save 90%.
The Judge let the jury go for a few minutes and warned Ed that he need to answer the questions that were asked. Ed and his lawyer argued at the defense table where Ed complained, “He’s out to kill me, sir.”
Ed claimed that his tax bill from the first trial was $13,500,000 and that he’d paid it off with a promissory note. He held up the Uniform Commercial Code for the jury to see.
Prosecutor: Did you hide $100,000 in cash in the elevator shaft?
Oooh.
Ed said that his 60,000+ rounds of ammunition “is not much by today’s standards” and complained that the prosecution has been misinformed by the ADL if he thinks otherwise.
The prosecutor brought up Ed’s prior testimony about not touching other people’s guns and pointed out that Ed had violated that rule when he picked up the 50 caliber rifle on June 7th.
Ed: I’d have grabbed a spear, a flamethrower, a guided missile, or a nuclear bomb that night.
The prosecutor learned that Ed slept on the right side of the bed (where the baggie of hundreds was stored) and Elaine slept on the left (where the money bag held only ones.) Ed got pissed when the prosecutor asked if the pipe bomb closet was closer to Elaine’s side.
Ed then got in a fight with the judge:
Ed: This is a bogus trial. It’s professional courtesy that I’m even here. [He taps his beloved UCC book.]
He admitted that he placed the guns around the house and put the Tannerite in the trees, and while he said he held a rifle when “those bounty hunters” were unloading the truck, he denied pointing it at them.
Ed got excitable one last time, so the judge let the jury go home for the day, and gave Ed his final warning. He’d either behave himself and answer the questions or all of his testimony would be struck from the court record.
Ed sat down at the defense table and his two witnesses (Constitution Ranger Scott Dion and his wife) came in and took the Fifth. Ed has no other witnesses.
Cross examination will continue tomorrow.
Interesting bit:
- Free stater Kat Kanning was in the audience today. She refuses to stand for either the jury or the judge.
Topics: Daniel Riley, Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Tax Deniers | 10 Comments »
Brown Trial, July 6, 2009: The Elevator Shaft Mystery
By JJ MacNab | July 6, 2009
The prosecution zipped through 14 witnesses today, mostly on the subject of explosives and firearms. The jury must be getting numb from the steady parade of freaky stuff designed to kill other human beings. There were at least 16 rifles (including those three massive 50 caliber monsters), three handguns, 21 pipe bombs, a couple dozen handmade black power with taped nails grenades, explosive devices in the trees, tear gas canisters, 10+ booby trap devices, and more than 60,000 rounds of ammunition in and around the Brown house at the time of their arrest.
While Elaine made good money as a dentist – especially considering that she paid no taxes on that income – the amount that the two of them must have been spent preparing for this standoff dwarfs any profits she may have made from the dental practice. Where did the money come from?
Witness Gregory Klees
Mr. Klees is a Firearms Examiner with the ATF. During the standoff, various supporters purchased and brought guns to the Plainfield residence. This witness tried to restore the serial numbers on two of the rifles and determined that all of the weapons in the house were operable.
Witness Alison Rees
Ms. Rees is a fingerprint expert at the ATF. She found 48 latent prints on the various items collected by the ATF and matched 40 of them as Ed’s. Ed’s fingerprints were found on the scope for a 50 caliber rifle and on various pieces of tape holding roofing nails to the black powder IEDs.
Witness Albert Lindquist
Mr. Lindquist is retired but worked for the Alstead Gun Shop in Alstead, NH. On 7/20/2007 and 7/23/2007, he sold three Ruger Rifles to Jason Gerhard. Jason paid by American Express card.
Witness Richard Tatem
Mr. Tatem works at the Stoneagle gun store in Newport, NH. On 5/23/2007, he sold two Serbu 50 caliber rifles to Danny Riley and Reno Gonzalez. Reno picked his gun up on June 1st and Danny on June 5th. In other words, the big guns were brought to the house just days prior to the June 7th aborted attempt to arrest the Browns (“Dogwalker Day”.) Danny paid by cash, and Reno paid by check.
Witness John Francis DiBernardo, Jr.
Mr. DiBernardo works at the Alstread Gun Store and sold three guns to Jason Gerhard. On 1/21/07 – just a few days into the standoff – Jason purchased a Bushamaster Carbon 15 assault-type rilfe. On April 4, 2007, he purchased an M44 rifles, and on July 25, 2007, he purchased an enormous 47-pound Serbu BMG-50 rifle. When the DOJ investigator stands next to the gun in the room with the gun butt resting on the floor, the rifle comes up to his chin.
Witness Ernie Yerrington
Mr. Yerrington is a Special Agent with the ATF. His job was to take the various weapons into custody after the Plainfield home was cleared by the bomb guys (go Malboro Man!) and everything was photographed. He detailed all of the various rifles and handguns found in the home and pointed out which were manufactured in New Hampshire (the three Rugers) and which involved interstate commerce (everything else.) Upon hearing the phrase “interstate commerce,” Ed got excited. I guess he figured that his “commercial law remedy” scam was finally rearing its ugly head in the trial.
Witness Barton Shane MacDonald
Mr. MacDonald wanted to rent office space from Elaine after she’d gone home to join the Plainfield standoff. He and his two partners met Reno at the dental practice and couple of time and then drove up to the Plainfield home to negotiate the terms with Elaine.
When he got near the home, Mr. MacDonald called ahead and let the Browns know he was driving down the driveway. Since he was arriving in a blue Suburban and didn’t want to be confused a federal agent. Ed came out to meet them and was armed.
Witness’ partner: What in hell are we doing here?
Elaine was friendly and knowledgeable, but Ed was off-putting since he placed his gun on the dining room table between them.
Witness: So I thought, “He’s probably got a better negotiating position than I do.”
Reno was standing guard in the kitchen, also armed.
The deal fell through when the US Treasury seized the building on June 7th.
Witness: With everything covered in yellow ribbon, that wasn’t going to be a good real estate office any more.
Witness Sean Harrington
Mr. Harrington is a trooper with the NH State Police. He pulled Jason over for speeding during the standoff and saw a rifle in the back seat.
Witness Christopher Edward Waskey
Mr. Waskey is a Special Agent with the Criminal Investigation division of the Internal Revenue Service. Several miscellaneous items were introduced through this witness, such as a bullhorn, a couple of industrial spotlight, night vision goggles, and gas masks.
Witness Michael Charles Powell
Mr. Powell is a Firearms Enforcement Officer with the ATF in West Virginia. His testimony addressed the booby trap devices that were being assembled. A trip wire would remove a cotter pin and the device would fire. One set of such devices was built to hold a 12 gauge shotgun shell, the others were made for 410 shells. The witness was apparently not to discuss whether these booby traps qualified under federal law as “destructive devices” but Elaine’s lawyer asked the question, so the topic was raised.
Witness Aaron McIntire
Mr. McIntire is the Battalion Chief of the Concord Fire Department and he explained to the jury what a Self Contained Breathing Apparatus was. Ed and Elaine had two of them at a cost of $3,000 each.
Witness Daniel J. Tanner
Mr. Tanner is the manufacturer of Tannerite, a binary explosive that is designed to be used to let a shooter know when he’s hit his target in long range target practice. Prior to mixing, Tannerite is inert, and after mixing, it is a powerful explosive that can only be detonated when hit with a high velocity round.
When used properly at a safe distance, you shoot it, it make a loud boom, it explodes into a big white cloud, and the shooter enjoys himself a little too much in public.
When put up in Ziploc baggies in the trees and on the carriage house around your driveway, you shoot it, it creates a nasty concussive force, sends nails, splinters, and plastic nasties flying, and does a lot of damage to anyone standing nearby.
Danny ordered the Tannerite from Mr. Tanner in late May, 2007, and immediately after Dogwalker Day on June 7th, called Mr. Tanner to cancel the order since the Marshals just didn’t see the use of high explosives as fun and games. It was too late; the Tannerite had already shipped to Danny’s home in New York, and the dumb dumb still took it to the Browns, even though the Marshals were aware of Danny’s purchase.
Witness Cathy Smith
Ms. Smith is another Special Agent with the IRS Criminal Investigation division. She was at the house supervising the installation of a security alarm system in late October, 2007. The installation guys needed to go into empty elevator shaft to run some wiring and lo and behold, what did they find there but a …
Defense Lawyer: Sidebar, your honor.
The witness was dismissed.
Witness Jamie Berry
Mr. Berry is a Deputy US Marshal and is apparently the last witness in the government’s case. He was among the Marshals who went to the Brown home in 2006 to remove the guns as a condition of Ed and Elaine’s pre-trial release. When Elaine opened the gun safe, he saw a shrink-wrapped block of cash, roughly 12 inches by 12 inches by an unknown depth.
Mr. Berry was also in charge of monitoring the internet and the supporters’ computers. He showed the jury a series of email messages between Danny Riley and Reno Gonzalez discussing the purchase of guns and ammo for Ed.
Mr. Berry will return to the stand tomorrow, and the prosecutors have indicated that they will rest tomorrow morning.
The jury hasn’t heard any of the big splashy threats made by both Ed and Elaine over the months, but perhaps the government is waiting to introduce that evidence as part of their rebuttal case.
Interesting bits:
- Elaine’s birthday if Valentine’s Day, Danny’s is Christmas Day, and Reno was born on the Ides of March.
Topics: Cirino Gonzalez, Daniel Riley, Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Jason Gerhard, Tax Deniers | 11 Comments »
Sunday, July 5th
By JJ MacNab | July 5, 2009
I was checking out antique stores in southern New Hampshire this morning and ran into something fun: It was the very first tax bill signed into law by President Washington on July 13, 1789. The sales price was $85,000 and it’s located in a small, glass-enclosed booth at the New Hampshire Antique Co-op in Milford.
I didn’t buy it.
I spent the three-day weekend driving all over the lovely state of New Hampshire and found the scenery beautiful and the locals ever-so-friendly. (Hat tip to the biker guys who gave good directions back to civilization…)
No matter where I went – from the Shaker Village in Canterbury to the Barley House Tavern in Concord – everyone I spoke to was familiar with the Brown standoff. The typical conversation with sales clerks, waitresses, and tour guides went something like this:
Local: Where are you guys from?
Me: The Washington, DC area.
Local: Are you here for business or pleasure?
Me: Mostly business – I’m in town for a criminal trial.
Local: That must be the Brown trial?
Me: Yes, indeed.
Local: For those of us who lived here, what the Browns did was awful. The Marshals did a fine job being so patient and arresting them without it turning into a big violent mess.
It’s now the end of a three-day weekend, and the jury has had all this time to stew and chew on Thursday’s bombshell testimony.
Some questions the jury might have at this point:
- The descriptions of what a 50 cal round will do to a human body and armored vehicle were graphic and startling. What would the explosives like pipe bombs and Tannerite do if set off when Marshals were in close range?
- What were the actual threats made against the Judges, the prosecutors, the Plainfield Chief of Police and the US Marshals?
- How many guns were in the house and how did Ed and Elaine get them?
- Is Elaine really just a mild-mannered dentist who got spooked by Dogwalker Day (June 7th) or did her decision to make a stand backed by force actually start much earlier?
- For that matter, is the timing of Dogwalker Day even relevant to this case at all?
- Ed’s been acting like a petulant and angry jerk in the courtroom. Does he abuse Elaine?
- What are zip guns and what do they do?
- What were Ed and Elaine planning to do? What was their plan to get themselves out of this impossible situation?
- Will Ed and Elaine take the stand and explain themselves?
- What really happened to Zoe the Dog?
Topics: Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Tax Deniers | 1 Comment »
Where are they now?
By JJ MacNab | July 4, 2009
A brief survey of Brown Supporters:
- Danny “Dogwalker” Riley: Danny was convicted on several criminal counts related to the Brown standoff last spring and was sentenced to 36 years in federal prison. He is currently housed at the medium security prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, and has a projected release date of 1/22/2039. Danny is expected to testify as a government witness against the Browns later in the trial, presumably as a rebuttal witness if Ed and/or Elaine take the stand.
- Jason “Gun Porn” Gerhard: Jason was also convicted on multiple counts involving the standoff and was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison. He is located at the medium security prison in Fairton, NJ and his projected release date is 2/12/2025.
- Cirino “Reno” Gonzales: Reno was sentenced to 8 years in federal prison for assisting the Browns and is located at the aptly named El Reno facility in Oklahoma with a projected release date of 8/31/2014. While in prison, Reno had part of the Declaration of Independence – the bit about the right to throw off a destructive government – tattooed on his right forearm.
- Robert Wolffe: Bob cut a deal and testified against the other supporters in 2008. As a result, he received a reduced prison sentence of 30 months in federal prison. He’s been serving his sentence at a relatively relaxed prison camp in West Virginia, and is scheduled to be released in 11/16/2009. Based on his recent letter from prison, there’s some indication that Wolffe is still drinking the sovereign-flavored Koolaid, despite his cushy deal with the evil Feds.
- William “Ed is worth more to me dead than alive” Miller “: After suffering from an apparent psychological meltdown during the standoff, Bill left several hours of incoherent raving audio files on the official Brown blog – all of which were deleted quickly by the mods – and was later institutionalized in a mental facility pending his trial for threatening to kill the Chief of Police of his home town. His criminal trial started on June 29, 2009. Bill’s email at the beginning of the standoff show that the threats against the Judge and US Attorney started at the very beginning of the standoff.
- John Miller: Bill Miller’s brother was arrested and convicted in December, 2008 of threatening to kill the family of a witness in his brother’s criminal case. He was sentenced to up to six years in state prison. Here’s a video of John and his mother Marie, hanging out at the Brown house in February, 2007.
- Timothy Logsdon: Free State Project member Tim Logdson shocked many regular onlookers of the Brown family circus when he took his little children to an armed standoff in January, 2007. In February, 2009, Losgdon was indicted on two counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault involving a minor under the age of five. He is currently awaiting trial.
- Aaron Hemingway: Another Free State Project member, Aaron spent time living in the Brown’s garage early in the standoff. In February of 2009, he drove up to a random electricity substation in St. Louis, Missouri and opened fire on two electric company linesman before shooting and killing himself.
- Rob “Powershooter” Jacobs: While I was watching the Brown standoff unfold, this Free State Project member had my vote as “Most Likely to Kill a Judge or other Federal Employee.” In addition to making numerous threats of violence, Rob’s girlfriend claimed that he threatened her and she obtained a restraining order against him. According to David Ridley of the Free State Project, Rob was subsequently shunned by the local NH free staters and has returned to his prior home in the Midwest.
- Anthony “Peace” Sciarrone: Anthony lived with the Browns for approximately two months in the winter and spring of the 2007. He left the home quietly and never returned. “Peace” has outstanding arrest warrants in multiple states involving grand theft and gun crimes. How peaceful…
- Russell Kanning: Free staters Russell and Kat Kanning spent weeks holding signs advertising their website in front of the courthouse and at the Brown home. In 2008, Russell was arrested for non-payment of child support. He spent a couple of weeks in prison protesting his situation before capitulating and agreeing to begin payment to his ex-wife.
- Albert & Lorraine Martin: The Martins traveled from Rhode Island to visit with the Browns in July, 2007 and Al was an active supporter on the blog and MySpace pages. Al and Lorraine were indicted and convicted on tax evasion charges in early 2009, and are scheduled to be sentenced in October of 2009.
- Shaun Kranish: Shaun is the supporter who runs the Makethestand.com website and who introduced Dutch the Bounty Hunter to the Browns. (Way to go Shaun!) Shaun was charged with various fraud and gun charges, and pled guilty to a lesser count in 2008.
- SonneofMan and BodyoftheLord: BodyoftheLord was the wacky Hawaiian religious guru who stayed with the Browns and convinced them that he was in direct contact with the Queen of England over their tax case. He disappeared midway through the standoff, but his cult-mate SonneofMan showed up at the Brown home after their October 2007 arrest. The police caught him squatting on the property and he spent a couple months in the local jail before leaving town with him mom.
- Zoe the Dog: There has been some concern about the fate of the Brown’s cute thieving puppy, Zoe. For her own protection, the US Marshals have allegedly whisked her into the Witness Protection Program (WitSec) and rumor has it she is living in an undisclosed location as a pug named Quatloos.
Topics: Cirino Gonzalez, Daniel Riley, Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Jason Gerhard, Robert Wolffe, Tax Deniers | 13 Comments »
Brown Trial: Thursday, July 02, 2009
By JJ MacNab | July 2, 2009
In a nutshell, today really sucked for Ed and Elaine Brown.
The prosecution’s case didn’t just take shape, it sprouted wings and flew.
The jury learned that:
- The marshals bent over backwards to ensure a peaceful end to the standoff
- Zoe the dog is an nice puppy and a thief
- The undercover marshals who eventually arrested the Browns must have titanium bits in their tool drawers
- 50 caliber rifles are uber-scary
- Ed learned that on June 7th, he came powerfully close to being a notch on a sniper’s rifle
Witness Ken Erickson (Continued)
It must be fun to have the coolest job ever.
The day began with the introduction of the remaining pipe bombs and Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) into evidence. Many medium–sized white boxes were place in front of the witness and it was like Christmas Day at the Malboro Man house. One by one he opened all his presents and peaked expectantly inside.
Cross examination was minimal; the only point made was that the components used to make the various IEDs were legal when they were purchased. I doubt the jury will be confused by the option that purchasing a pipe is ok, but making a pipe bomb out of it isn’t.
Witness David Robertson
Mr. Robertson is the head of the Special Operations Group (SOG) of the US Marshals, an elite tactical team that was brought in to assist in the arrest of the Browns. He joined the Marshals in 1987, moved to SOG in 1990, and became the commander of SOG in 2006.
In 2007, SOG worked with Chief Deputy DiMartino to formulate a plan to arrest the Browns. Since Ed was in the habit of riding his ATV to the end of his quarter-mile driveway each morning to collect the mail, they decided that the safest place to arrest Ed would be at the end of the driveway.
The SOG team recreated the driveway at their headquarters in Louisiana and trained for five days in preparation for the June 6th date. Four two-man sniper teams would encircle the home, an arrest team would wait near the mailbox, and a blocking team would be positioned 50 yards up the driveway. After Ed was arrested, they would further surround the home and use a bullhorn to talk Elaine into surrendering.
At 2:30 am on June 6th, they all moved in to take their positions, but Ed never came down that day to pick up the mail. Instead, a supporter drove in and stopped at the mailbox on his way to the Brown house.
At 2:30 am on June 7th, they tried again. This time, Danny Riley walked Zoe the Dog down to the mailbox area and stumbled upon the arrest team hidden there. The arrest team told Danny to stop, but he took off running, yelling that the Marshals had arrived. Two members of the arrest team fired plastic “less than lethal” rounds at Danny but missed, and he was finally stopped by the members of the blocking team waiting further up the drive (kind of like a pickle situation in a baseball game.)
After Danny was arrested, there was movement at the Brown house. Someone used a vehicle to block the driveway, and Ed was seen moving around. When the sniper /observers saw that Ed had a 50 cal rifle, they called for significant backup at that time, including armored personnel carriers.
Prosecutor: What would happen to an armored personnel carrier if it’s hit by a 50 cal armor piercing round?
Witness: It would puncture right through it.
The SOG teams withdrew over several hours on June 7th and went home.
SOG was called back in October to support the undercover Marshals in the next and final arrest attempt. Immediately after the arrest, they swept the residence to make sure it was empty and set up a perimeter for the next two and a half to three weeks.
The jury was shown a video of the SOG team going through the Brown home. Their job was to render every weapon safe and to secure the house. Poor Zoe the Dog looked very nervous and very eager to please her new Marshal friends.
Cross examination of this witness focused on the enormous number of people and equipment involved in the June 6th/7th arrest attempt. The defense attorneys also tried to imply that SOG team members had had the opportunity to tamper with evidence in the home.
Ed’s lawyer has a recurring theme that he’s hitting too often: the only shot fired in the 9 month standoff was by the Marshals, but they’re quick to point out that they only shot plastic non-lethal rounds.
Witness Leigh Marchegiana
Mr. Marchegiana has been a US Marshal for 21 years and was with the Secret Service before that. He’s been a member of the SOG team for the last eight years. He and was part of the four two-man sniper teams stationed near the Brown home on June 6th and 7th and his post was lying prone behind an 8 inch rock wall next the carriage house.
The first morning that he was there, Ed walked around the driveway and came towards him. The witness had a handgun in his hand but his rifle was collapsed because it was too tall to hide behind the small rock wall. Ed had a rifle on his shoulder and a pistol in his waistband and was trying to coach the poor dog into exploring the woods but she wasn’t interested. When the dog did see something in the woods, Ed took out his gun.
Witness: If he’d fired into the woods, we’d have stayed still. If he’d fired at us, we’d have fired back.
Prosecutor: Why didn’t you just shoot him when he was at 30 yards?
Witness: That wasn’t our plan.
Witness Edward Recor
Mr. Recor has been with SOG since 1998. He too was in one of the two-man sniper teams in June 6th and 7th. He started out to the left of the home, but it turned out to be an active streambed and he was literally lying in water while the outside temperature was in the high 30s/low 40s. So he moved.
On the morning of the 6th, Ed was mowing the lawn just six feet away from where the witness was lying prone. He was so close that the small rocks kicked up by the lawnmower were hitting him.
When the arrest didn’t happen on the 6th, he returned to his position before dawn on the 7th. From his hiding place, he had a clear view of the home’s watchtower. He heard noises from Danny’s encounter with the arrest and blocking teams further down the driveway, followed by the sound of car doors and voices closer to the home.
5 or 10 minutes later, Ed appeared in the watchtower holding a 50 cal rifle and aimed it towards the driveway.
Prosecutor: What is the effective range of a 50 caliber rifle?
Witness: About 1 mile.
Prosecutor: And what effect does a 50 caliber round have on a human body at 70 yards?
Witness: It will effectively blow a human body apart. It would remove limbs.
As if that information wasn’t graphic enough, the jury then heard the most chilling words in the trial so far.
When Ed pointed his rifle at the driveway, the sniper aimed at Ed’s left temple with the safety off, and pulled the trigger back part way. He waited for Ed to make a “cheek weld” (move the rifle up to his cheek to aim) at which time he would have fired and killed Ed. Ed never made the move.
Hearing this testimony put Ed into a highly agitated state that lasted the rest of the day. Elaine, in comparison, looked battered. Her posture was slumped, she avoided Ed’s eye contact, and she ignored his overly loud commentary to his lawyer.
Cross examination focused on the fact that no one ever fired a 50 caliber rifle during the standoff.
Defense Attorney: No one put a 50 caliber up to his cheek?
Witness: No. If he had, I’d have fired.
Witness Jeffrey Mertes
Mr. Mertes has been with the US Marshals for 24 years, and with SOG for 22 of those years. The guy is extremely likeable in a kind of Buzz Lightyear kind of way, and both jurors and audience members alike were smiling while he testified. That kind of charisma must be devastating with the ladies!
Mr. Mertes was the leader of the arrest team during the June arrest attempt and was the Marshal who stood up and confronted Danny when he was walking Zoe the Dog. He was also one of two SOG team members to shoot a less than lethal plastic round at Danny’s legs to keep him from running toward the house.
Witness Michael Allen
Mr. Allen has been with the SOG for 5 years. He was on the same arrest team as Buzz Lightyear and was the second person to fire a plastic round at Danny’s legs. He also missed.
Witness Joseph Buchanan
Mr. Buchanan is a former SOG member. He was on the blocking team that stopped Danny from running back to the house and telling Ed about the Marshals’ presence. He told Danny twice to show his hands and get down. When Danny refused, he tasered him.
When Elaine’s lawyer started to ask questions about the pain and suffering and fatality rates involved in using a taser, the judge grew impatient.
By this time, Ed was so agitated that he was talking loudly to his lawyer and the judge asked him to keep it to a whisper.
Witness William Robertson
Mr. Robertson works for the US Marshals as the supervisor of the regional task force in Georgia. His job is to seek out and arrest fugitives.
In October of 2007, Mr. Robertson worked with a confidential informant who went by the name “Dutch” to infiltrate the Brown house as a supporter. The plan was fairly simple.
Elaine and Ed wanted some of the dental supplies and a refrigerator from the West Lebanon dental practice brought to the home. Since the property had been seized by the US Treasury in June, Dutch and his four friends (undercover Marshals) would have to break in and steal it.
Three of them rode in the pickup truck and Mr. Robertson rode in the bed of the truck to hold on to the refrigerator since they had no straps. They left one Marshal behind at the dental practice.
When they got to the Brown home, Ed – wearing a pistol in his waistband – had them pull around to the garage to unload. When Ed opened the garage doors from inside, the team found him holding an AK47 at elbow height pointed directly at them. He told them he didn’t trust them and they unloaded the truck into the garage at gunpoint.
Ed went back into the house and they met him again at the front door. Ed noticed that they were missing one person and told two of the Marshals to go back to West Lebanon to pick him up.
Ed: You can’t leave him behind. You don’t ever leave a soldier behind. Bring him here and we’ll celebrate.
Throughout all of this, Mr. Robertson, Dutch, and one other Marshal were all unarmed. The third had a pistol and the fourth, a taser.
Elaine appeared in the doorway holding a Glock pistol aimed at the Marshals. She went back inside and returned with both the Glock and a cellphone. Dutch and one Marshal arrived back from Plainfield with pizza and the person who’d been left behind and they all sat on the porch, ate pizza, and drank Sam Adams Light.
The witness asked Ed why he hadn’t been arrested.
Ed: They’re afraid to arrest me. If they try, a lot of people are going to die. The Marshals, the Chief of Police, the Sheriff are all going to die.
Zoe the Dog was on the porch as well and the witness was feeding her pizza. Once he felt that they were positioned appropriately (he sat between Ed and Elaine close to Ed’s gun arm), he used the code word “party” in conversation and both of the Browns were grabbed, tasered, and handcuffed.
Ed put up a fight and warned the Marshals, “You don’t know what you’ve done.” Elaine became very animated and was yelling profanities.
The jury was then shown a brief video of the scene taken just after the arrest. Dutch’s face is blurred out, and Zoe the Dog darts into the house in fear when Ed tries to talk her while he’s standing handcuffed. A minute later, she’s seen stealing a pizza slice and running.
The video shows Ed from behind, standing in handcuffs. His right hand is squeezing his left index finger, and he looks exhausted and disheveled. He sits down and grimaces when they put ankle restraints on him, so they adjust the restraints for him.
The end of the video has a moment that, if the jury watched carefully, says a lot about this standoff. Ed is standing between two Marshals and his nose is running. He leans over and wipes it on the Marshals shoulder. The Marshal says something (there’s no audio for the footage), takes a Kleenex out of his pocket, and wipes Ed’s face for him.
Cross examination was brief and contained an unintentional funny.
Defense attorney: You rode in the bed of the pickup on the way back from Lebanon?
Witness: Yes, I did. There were no straps to hold the fridge.
Defense attorney: Did you know that was illegal in NH?
Witness: No, I did not.
Topics: Daniel Riley, Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Tax Deniers | 10 Comments »
Brown Trial: Wednesday, July 1, 2009
By JJ MacNab | July 2, 2009
I know what you’re thinking. Timelines and arrest warrants are so boooring. When is she gonna’ get to the bombs?
Patience, young grasshoppers. Hmmm…. Great big bugs with gooey innards, the other white meat…
But I digest.
Witness Chief Deputy Gary DiMartino (Continued)
Cross examination of this witness was brief and relatively unenlightening. Defense counsel confirmed that DiMartino spoke with Elaine at length after she violated the terms of her release by going home to Plainfield, but that he usually conversed only with Ed by telephone. The witness characterized these conversations as “cordial but guarded.”
Ed’s attorney made a couple of attempts to ask the witness about Ed’s opinions regarding the 2007 tax trial, but kept bumping into hearsay objections.
That really pissed Ed off.
He jumped to his feet and yelled angrily at the jury, “This is exactly what happened in the first trial.”
The judge called for an immediate 15-minute recess and the jury left the room. During the break, Ed got into a heated argument with Elaine’s lawyer, and it was interesting to watch Elaine deal with Ed in pissed-off jerk mode. When she spoke to Ed, she stared down at the floor and controlled her voice but she talked to the attorney, she made eye contact and her voice was animated.
After the break, DiMartino said that Ed had never asked him to “show [Ed] the law” but that Ed had made the statement that if anything happened to either Ed or Elaine, the people responsible would “get theirs” which concerned the Marshals.
Witness Jeffrey White:
Mr. White has worked as a Deputy Marshal for 10 years. In 2004, he was called in to assist the IRS in executing a search warrant for Elaine’s books and records. When it came time to arrest the Browns in 2006 on their tax-related charges, the Marshals surveilled the Brown’s remote and heavily-wooded home , learned that Ed was always armed and was an active militia leader, and decided that a ruse was the best and safest tactic.
Ed always wore a handgun tucked into his pants next to his US Constitution badge, and kept a rifle in his dark SUV which bragged a shiny, big Ranger star badge on the side.
The Marshals tricked Ed into coming into town early one morning by telling him that there was a water leak at Elaine’s building. When they arrested Ed, he reached for his gun, which was loaded with a round in the chamber. He also had two loaded magazines in his pocket.
Elaine was arrested later the same morning, and she too was armed at the time of her arrest.
The Marshals were ordered to remove all of the weapons from the Brown house as a condition of their release pending trial, but they waited until Elaine returned home for fear that the home was booby-trapped.
This witness effectively set the scene for the Marshals’ state of mind in dealing with the Browns. The couple was armed, the house was a potential deathtrap for federal law enforcement, and a simple ruse had worked well before.
Cross examination was minimal; the witness didn’t know whether or not Ed had a concealed weapon permit and agreed with the defense attorney that no gun charges had been filed regarding the 2006 arrest.
Witness Ken Erickson
Mr. Erickson has been an Explosives Enforcement Officer with the ATF since 2001. Prior to that, he worked for the US Army for 18 years, with 12 of those years in explosives. He’s traveled to more than 200 bomb scenes with the ATF, most of them “post-blast,” where his job is to assess the risk of the situation, and safely collect and dispose of any explosives.
Ok. Who am I kidding? This is Chuck Norris we’re talking about here. Or at least Mr. Erickson used to be Chuck Norris, back when Chuck Norris was cool. You know, back before Chuck started stumping to become President of Texas in places like Glenn Beck’s show and Wing Nut Daily.
Well, since Chuck Norris is so last year, and since Mr. Erickson has the coolest job ever, it’s time for a rename. Malboro Man has a nice ring to it…
Malbo got the call that the Browns had been arrested on the evening of October 24th, and the next day he packed his van and drove 10 hours to the New Hampshire home to do his bomb thang.
Much of his testimony so far has been a duplicate of what we heard (and you read about here, of course…) during the 2008 supporter trial – 21 pipe bombs, lots of big guns, trip wires in the tree line, and can after can of gun powder with a fuse on top, covered with deadly strips of roofing nails.
It is a blast to listen to this guy testify. He’s an obviously well-qualified witness, he stays on topic, he clearly describes what he saw and did, and he’s dealing with a subject matter that is fascinating to everyone in the courtroom.
So far his testimony has included the same walk-through video played in the first trial and the introduction of the pipe bombs (or what’s left of some of them) into evidence. If you want to experience the full force of what the jury is seeing and hearing, you can read my summary of the earlier testimony here.
What strikes me most about his testimony this time is the lovely use of understated jargon. When Malbo says something like “if there is an energetic event in the house,” all I hear is “if something big goes boom.”
|
Malboro Man-speak |
Red Crayons Translation |
| Explosives are “rendered safe” | They took deadly bombs apart. |
| “Disruption” | Little boom to prevent bigger boom. |
| “The home’s sub-basement” | The crazy guy’s bunker |
| “mitigate the risk” | Stay alive, with all the important bits intact |
| “it’s a dynamic approach” | We blow something up |
| “the round is made for large game” | Very uncool ammo, considering the situation |
You get the idea.
Some new observations from the testimony this time:
- Ed had purchased some very interesting, very expensive, and very disturbing equipment: night vision goggles, infrared spotlights, military grade ballistic vests, chemical protection masks, ballistic helmets, parachute flares, smoke grenades, tear gas canisters, body armor, and much more. According to the physical evidence still piled up on the carts in the courtroom, there’s much more to come.
- If you look at my bedside nightstand, you’ll find books, a chapstick, a box of Kleenex, a mangled and pathetically abused alarm clock, a couple of pens, a highlighter, cat treats, and stuff from my pockets. When you look at Ed and Elaine’s bedside table, you find none of those things. Instead, you’ll see a shotgun, flashlights, ammunition, cash in a baggie, emergency air supply, a knife, military bags, night vision goggles, and chemical protection masks. I guess Elaine doesn’t get chapped lips.
Favorite quotes so far today:
Prosecutor: What is the item to the left in the changing room?
Bomb Guy: I believe it’s a hyperbaric chamber?
Prosecutor: Do you know what that is?
Bomb Guy: [wrinkles brow and frowns] Not for certain.
and
Prosecutor: Did you make note of the bedding in the room?
Bomb Guy: If it didn’t have explosive tendencies, we didn’t look at it.
Malboro Man will be returning to the stand with much more tomorrow. Cool.
Topics: Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Tax Deniers | 4 Comments »
Ed and Elaine Brown on Trial: Tuesday, June 30, 2009
By JJ MacNab | June 30, 2009
Greetings, all ye red crayon fans!
I’m back in the land of Dunkin’ Donuts, minimum speed limits, and lily white jurors.
It’s June 30, 2009 and New Hampshire tax deniers Ed and Elaine Brown are finally having their day in court. Over the next two weeks, they’ll learn what fate awaits them as a result of their nine-month standoff with the US Marshals.
Background:
Here’s a quick and dirty review for those of you who don’t know or remember the Browns. Elaine is a rich, well-educated, and successful dentist who married Ed, a high school drop-out, retired cockroach exterminator with a violent criminal history. While Elaine financially supported the family, Ed ran a militia group called the US Constitution Rangers and generally made a name for himself (granted, it was “asshole”) among the angry, gun-guy clique.
As a result of Ed’s not-so-learned “research” into federal income tax laws, they stopped paying federal and state taxes roughly 15 years ago and spent considerable time and effort making sure they never, ever read Section 1 of the Internal Revenue Code. A search warrant for their books and records was executed in 2004, they were indicted on tax-related charges in 2006, and they were convicted on all 17 counts in 2007.
Ed went home half-way through the tax trial, while Elaine stuck it out alone in front of the jury. Despite the guilty verdict, Elaine was released to live with her son pending sentencing but, a few weeks later, she violated the conditions of her release and returned to live with Ed in their Plainfield, NH home.
Supporters brought guns, Ed built bombs, and Ed and Elaine made dozens of explicit threats against two judges, a federal prosecutor, the US Marshal, an IRS employee, the Plainfield Chief of Police , and anyone else they thought they could blame for their predicament. It was ugly.
They threw three large concert/barbeque events called Jamborees over the nine-month standoff, their website generated as many as 7,500 hits per day, and their official MySpace page topped off at 5,400 supporters. They found religion in a kook from Hawaii named “Body of the Lord” and then found it again in a commercial law scam called “Redemption.”
By September, 2007, the party started winding down. Supporters were getting bored with the fading press coverage, the US Marshals set up a road block to stop Jamboree #3 (rumors of bombs in trees and trip wires in the woods tend to make Marshals a little grumpy), and four of the key supporters were arrested and indicted.
Finally, on October 4th, four undercover Marshals bearing pizza and beer arrested Ed and Elaine without any violence or injury (yea, Marshals!)
The Trial: Jury Selection
I did not attend jury selection on June 29th. Frankly, I’d rather eat a bug. A big bug, with gooey innards – because jury selection is just that dull.
Margot Sanger-Katz’ article from the Concord Monitor describes the day well:
June 30th: Opening Arguments + two prosecution witnesses
While Elaine dressed nicely for her day before the jury (dark blazer and slacks), Ed took a different approach to courtroom fashion – khaki prison jumpsuit, long-sleeve white undershirt, and navy deck shoes, apparently in some misguided form of protest.
Before the proceedings started, Ed and Elaine sat together in the courtroom and whispered in agitated terms. Words like “UCC” and “strawman” (part of that commercial law scam they bought into) escaped from their tête-à-tête.
When the judge came in, Ed’s lawyer announced his withdrawal from the case, and Ed gave a lengthy monologue complaining about his lawyer, his and Elaine’s inability to formulate an appeal in their prior case (he doesn’t seem to understand that the deadline for that passed two years ago), the prosecutors, the judicial system, the press, and even the jury. By Ed’s estimate, 80% of the jurors have already made up their minds about his guilt.
According to Ed, the court simply can’t understand the “commercial remedy process” (and boy, is that an understatement – judges don’t speak gibberish) and that everything he’s done up to today has been for a reason.
Ed: No one can re-present me. This all started because I made statements exposing the criminal elements of this government. Remember, I am a member of an organization called the US Constitution Rangers.
The judge denied the attorney’s request to leave the case, told Ed to “Be quiet,” and the jury was brought in.
The Jury:
There are ten men and four women. There had been one additional female juror chosen the day before but she became ill. All are white, most are between the ages of 40 and 55.
Ed became extremely agitated during jury instructions, leaning over to talk to his lawyer, and then turning back to talk to Elaine when his lawyer ignored him. When the judge told the jury that Ed is represented by Mr. Iacopino, Ed loudly interrupted:
Ed: I object!
Judge: Be quiet, Mr. Brown. The jury will disregard that last statement.
Ed wriggled, he squirmed, he rocked in his chair, he smirked, he said things like “That’s a lie” to his lawyer, he wrote angry things on his yellow pad, he turned to glare – twice – at a reporter in the audience, and then he smirked and wriggled some more. Elaine sat quietly and listened to the proceedings.
Prosecutor Opening Argument
The main thesis of the 45-minute speech was two-fold:
1) What may have started as a peaceful tax protest turned into a “training camp for something else”
2) Despite ample opportunity to kill Ed and Elaine, the Marshals went above and beyond to ensure that the arrest would be non-violent
The original plan had been to arrest Ed when he picked up his mail at the end of the driveway on June 6th but someone else got the mail that day. They tried again on June 7th but this time Danny the Dogwalker Riley stumbled on to their plan. Riley was shot at with non-lethal rounds, tasered, taken into custody, and released. Meanwhile, the Marshals had several men in the woods in close range to Ed but none took the shot. Instead, through their surveillance, the Marshals learned that day that Ed had acquired a .50 cal high-powered rifle and was pointing it into the woods from his watchtower.
On another occasion, there was a Marshal so close to Ed that when Ed drove by in his lawnmower, the rocks spit up by the mower hit the Marshal. He also did not shoot.
On October 4th, the Browns were arrested by undercover marshals with the assistance of a confidential informant.
Elaine’s Lawyer’s Opening Argument
It’s gotta’ be tough to defend a client who not only bragged about her crimes to others, but also audio and video taped all the best bits to post on the internet.
Mr. Lange’s presentation was brief and at times, so contentious that the judge stopped him. His basic premise? “It isn’t about what happened, but why.” Elaine believed she had been unlawfully convicted in the first trial, she had suffered emotionally and physically when she was separated from Ed, and she had only obtained a firearm after the infamous June 7th Dogwalker Day.
He also claimed that Elaine had never threatened anyone (which the prosecutors will likely easily disprove) but that she had a right to defend herself.
Ed’s Lawyer’s Opening Argument
Mr. Iocopino claimed that the events on June 7th “scared the living daylights out of the defendants.”
Mr. Iocapino: Give my client a fair shake. You’ll learn that he is passionate in his beliefs and his principles. His beliefs and principles are unusual, and you’ll hear that there are others who share those beliefs, although they are a minority. The visions that are etched in his mind are the killing of Randy Weaver’s wife and the flames of Waco.
Considering what he had to work with, the attorney was doing a very competent job, but then he wandered off into the weeds:
Mr. Iacopino: If you listen carefully, between January and June of 2007, you’ll hear that there are really no threats. When you listen to [Ed’s] statements, you won’t hear threats against individuals, you’ll hear him expressing his opinion that the country is doomed.
He claimed that Ed had told supporters not to come to the house, because “they didn’t want to ratchet things up.” Hmmm.
Mr . Iacopino: Ed Brown had a right to defend himself… He maintained the peace the entire time.
Well, I don’t envy the lawyer his job.
Witness: US Marshal Stephen Monier
Marshal Monier set the time line for the entire case. He outlined the search warrant, first case indictment and arrest, trial, and standoff.
He described the numerous attempts to talk the Browns into surrendering while simultaneously developing a plan – a “ruse” – to arrest the Browns peaceably. The Marshals didn’t stop supporters from going to the home because it gave them the opportunity to go in themselves, posing as supporters.
Witness: Chief Deputy Marshal Gary DiMartino
Much of DiMartino’s testimony was a repeat of what Marshal Monier had said earlier on the stand. DiMartino’s role was more directly involved with Ed since he was the one who spoke with the Browns on a regular basis in the early months of the standoff.
Cross examination of this witness will take place tomorrow.
Interesting bits:
- The Special Operations Group set up a mock driveway/mailbox/Ed-on-his-ATV scenario in Louisiana so they could practice the arrest.
- The secret word used by the Marshals as a signal to arrest the Browns was “party.”
- When Elaine was arrested on the tax charges on her way to her dental office in 2006, she was armed.
- I have a US Constitution Ranger mousepad
Topics: Daniel Riley, Ed Brown, Elaine Brown, Tax Deniers | 4 Comments »
Yet another sentencing delay and 14 months in prison for the DC detective
By JJ MacNab | January 15, 2009
Source: DOJ Press Releases
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 14, 2009
WWW.USDOJ.GOV
TAX
(202) 514-2007
TDD (202) 514-1888
D.C. POLICE DETECTIVE SENTENCED TO PRISON FOR TAX EVASION
WASHINGTON – Eighteen-year veteran of the District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) Michael C. Irving was sentenced to 14 months in prison by U.S. District Judge Paul L. Friedman in the District of Columbia, the Justice Department, Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and the D.C. Office of Tax and Revenue (OTR) announced today. Irving, a homicide detective, was convicted in May 2008 of two counts of tax evasion for tax year 2005 following a jury trial.
According to evidence introduced at trial, Irving fraudulently arranged for his employer, the MPD, to stop withholding taxes from his paychecks for years 2003 through 2005. For those same years, Irving failed to file tax returns with the IRS and the OTR. Despite receiving wages from the MPD totaling $155,211 in 2002, $152,153 in 2003, $136,962 in 2004 and $181,913 in 2005, Irving did not pay any federal or D.C. income taxes. The total tax loss for those three years was more than $130,000.
As part of the scheme, Irving filed false documents with the IRS and OTR in an effort to obtain refunds for taxes paid in a previous year. Irving filed a late 2002 tax return on which he claimed he made zero wages, despite evidence introduced at trial showing that Irving earned wages of $155,211 during 2002.
During the same time period that Irving failed to file returns or pay taxes, he spent money on, among other things, custom-tailored suits, jewelry for his wife, Redskins tickets, dining out, renovations on his $805,000 home, apartment building investments, and vitamins and nutritional supplements.
“As today’s sentencing shows, those tax defiers, like Detective Irving, who engage in fraudulent schemes to evade payment of taxes; face severe consequences including being convicted felons for the rest of their lives, imprisonment and having to pay back all the taxes with steep penalties and interest,” said Nathan J. Hochman, Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department’s Tax Division. “Under the National Tax Defier Initiative, the Tax Division has committed to vigorously investigate, prosecute and convict those who engage in tax defier schemes to evade payment of taxes, regardless of their profession or whether they wear a badge.”
“The public trusts police officers and other civil servants to not only enforce the law but also expects them to comply with the law. Mr. Irving’s disregard for the tax laws is blatant disrespect of his position of trust,” said Eileen Mayer, Chief, IRS Criminal Investigation. “Today’s sentencing reinforces that there is a heavy price to pay for ignoring your tax responsibilities.”
“I would like to commend the hard work and diligence of the DC and federal authorities who worked together so effectively to bring this case to its conclusion today,” said Stephen M. Cordi, deputy chief financial officer for the District of Columbia’s Office of Tax and Revenue.
Assistant Attorney General Hochman thanked Tax Division trial attorneys Karen E. Kelly and Michael P. Ben’Ary who prosecuted the case. He also thanked the special agents of the IRS and OTR whose assistance was essential to the successful investigation and prosecution of the case.
Additional information about the Justice Department’s Tax Division and its enforcement efforts may be found at http://www.usdoj.gov/tax/.
Topics: Michael Irving, Tax Deniers | No Comments »
To be Continued…
By JJ MacNab | November 7, 2008
It’s the final game in the US Giants vs. DC Tax Dodgers world series…
Crack. The batter hits a line drive straight into the waiting glove of an attentive outfielder. It’s the bottom of the ninth, and if the runner at third makes it home, his team wins the game. So he runs like there’s no tomorrow, his fans cheer him on, but, as he slides towards home plate, the glove of the catcher tags him on the shoulder. All eyes turn to the umpire.
The umpire flashes his best Hollywood smile at the crowd. His pearly whites go “Ting” in the sunlight. He takes a dramatic moment before speaking.
“I’m afraid there are just too many variables for me to call the play today,” says the umpire. “Come back in six weeks for my decision.” He smiles winningly.
The managers from both teams rush up from their benches.
“Umpire Dude, the runner is still three feet away from home plate. He’s obviously out,” declares the US Giants manager.
The manager is clearly irritated at yet another delay in this interminable game. The same umpire had already turned the seventh inning stretch into a six-month waiting marathon, and all of the players and coaches were feeling a tad rusty and anxious to resolve the game.
The umpire frowns. “I know the vast majority of umpires would agree with you, but I’ve never really liked the idea that the runner has to actually touch the base. It just seems so unfair to me.”
The US Giants manager whips out his rule book. ”Section 7.02 of the MLB rules clearly states, ‘In advancing, a runner shall touch first, second, third and home base in order.’ With all due respect, Umpire Dude, this runner was tagged before he touched the home plate.”
Realizing that the umpire is leaning in his direction, the DC Dodgers manager plays it safe.
“I agree with you, Umpire Dude,” he claims, nodding his head sagely, “and if you don’t mind, I’d like to introduce some of the runner’s fans to you at this time.”
The umpire agrees, and one by one, roughly 40 fans step out on to the field and state their names and occupations. They all declare, sometimes through tears, just how much they think the runner is a really cool guy.
Bolstered by the endorsements of the fans, the umpire continues his stubborn quest to find the runner safe.
“Even if it’s in the rulebook, I’m the umpire. I can decide to call him safe, just ’cause I want to.”
The DC Dodgers manager gets excited that he might actually win what had appeared to be a losing play. “It’s happened before, you know, Umpire Dude. In the 1998 game of Seahawks v. Jets, the ref there ruled that a player named Testaverde was close enough to score.”
The Giants’ manager replies cautiously, “That’s football, not baseball, and that ruling was considered so egregious it brought back the instant replay. The only rules that matter in this call are baseball rules.”
“Well, I suppose that might be a valid point,” concedes the umpire. “So, before I rule on the play, I would like the Giants manager to put together a comprehensive list of games for me which illustrate their contention that a runner who is tagged before he touches home plate is actually out. Besides, by delaying my decision for the next six weeks, the runner can have a far more pleasant Christmas holiday!”
And so, all of the players, managers, and fans return home to wait an additional six weeks for the umpire to make up his freakin’ mind already.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
So what happened yesterday in the criminal case of USA v. Michael C. Irving?
To put in plainly, the judge does not want to sentence the defendant to prison. The law, the sentencing guidelines, and literally 100% of relevant cases clearly call for a prison sentence to be imposed; he just doesn’t want to do it.
Usually, sentencing takes place two to three months following conviction. It’s been almost six months in this case, and the judge still wasn’t prepared for the big day. He hadn’t read the letters from the defendant’s friends and family, and he hadn’t reviewed the trial transcripts. Instead, he is now telling the prosecutors to prepare a list of similar tax cases where the defendant has been sentenced to any time in prison.
By my estimate, 100% of similar cases have resulted in prison time. While quite a few criminal tax cases have resulted in probation, these were the result of plea agreements and/or cooperation with federal prosecutors, which simply doesn’t apply in Detective Irving’s situation. As of fiscal year 2007, 68.5% of all tax criminal cases resulted in prison sentences, and the average prison time doled out for those cases was 23.8 months. These numbers include a large number of plea agreements are so are artificially low.
The judge has the power to simply decide on no prison time, but he is desperately seeking the justification to back up that decision. He is looking for ways to minimize the tax loss in the case, thereby reducing the federal guideline sentence range, and he is looking for similar cases where no jail time was imposed in order to show that his use of discretion did not result in any sentencing disparity.
The judge has indeed postponed the sentencing until December 18th. That way, according to the judge, the defendant can be home for the holidays, even if the judge does decide to impose a prison sentence.
Topics: Michael Irving, Tax Deniers | 3 Comments »
Tax Denier / Detective Michael Irving will be sentenced tomorrow
By JJ MacNab | November 5, 2008
It’s been a busy month in tax denier land. Danny Riley was sentenced to 36 years in prison, Robert Beale and his fellow common law court fanatics were convicted on multiple felony counts in Minnesota for threatening a federal judge, Irwin Schiff lost his civil case, and Sherry Peal Jackson lost her criminal appeal.
You’d think all these stellar losses would trigger some kind of maybe-this-crap-doesn’t-work-after-all reaction, but no. They just keep diving off that high cliff yelling, “Gravity is a scaaaaammmm… Thud.”
Tomorrow, it’s DC Homicide Detective Michael Irving’s turn. To recap briefly, Detective Irving and a handful of other DC detectives fell for a variation of the Irwin Schiff zero return scam peddled by a local DC promoter named Stephen Harris. The jury found the defendant guilty on two counts, not guilty on others, and could not reach a consensus on the rest. Bottom line, he was convicted on two felony counts and faces a maximum of 15 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. To read the full story of his trial, just click on his name under Topics on the left of this page.
The government is asking for a sentence within the federal sentencing guideline range of 33 to 41 months.
The defendant is asking for no jail time whatsoever.
The judge has an interesting choice to make: he may cut a police officer slack because of the detective’s past service, or he may put the defendant in prison in hopes that this unsuccessful cliff diving attempt will effectively warn future divers that gravity is not just a good idea, it’s the law.
Considering that a growing number of law enforcement seem to be falling for frivolous tax denier arguments, whatever the judge decides will be watched carefully by the tax protest movement. No jail sentence will be heavily touted as a victory and offered as “proof” that their foolish schemes somehow work.
Topics: Michael Irving, Tax Deniers | 2 Comments »