David B. Stone Sr. and his wife, Tina, made no secret about the fact that they were part of a militia, neighbors say. The couple frequently let visitors in military fatigues erect tents in front of their trailer home at the intersection of rural dirt roads, and the sound of gunfire was routine. “In Michigan, I don’t think it’s that big of a deal to be in a militia,” said Tom McDormett, a neighbor. He added: “They would practice shooting, but that’s not a big deal. People do that all the time out here.”Rico says "I don’t think it’s that big of a deal to be in a militia" pretty much sums up the difference between them and most people he knows... (Also, if your neighbor's front lawn is covered in "dilapidated furniture, a washing machine, and tires", you got a problem.)
But last Saturday night, Mr. McDormett watched through binoculars as the police raided the Stones’ home, tearing off plywood from the base of their two connected single-wide trailers to search under the floors. By Monday, the Stones were in green prison garb in a federal courthouse in Detroit, two of nine defendants facing sedition and weapons charges in connection with what Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. called an “insidious plan.”
In an indictment against the nine unsealed on Monday, the Justice Department said they were part of a group of apocalyptic Christian militants who were plotting to kill law enforcement officers in hopes of inciting an antigovernment uprising, the latest in a recent surge in right-wing militia activity.
The court filing said the group, which called itself the Hutaree, planned to kill an unidentified law enforcement officer and then bomb the funeral caravan using improvised explosive devices based on designs used against American troops by insurgents in Iraq.
“This is an example of radical and extremist fringe groups which can be found throughout our society,” Andrew Arena, the FBI special agent in charge in Detroit, said in a statement. “The FBI takes such extremist groups seriously, especially those who would target innocent citizens and the law enforcement officers who protect the citizens of the United States.”
The Hutaree— a word Mr. Stone apparently made up to mean Christian warriors— saw the local police as “foot soldiers” for the federal government, which the group viewed as its enemy, along with other participants in what the group’s members deemed to be a “New World Order” working on behalf of the Antichrist, the indictment said.
Eight defendants were arrested over the weekend in raids in Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana, the Justice Department said. The authorities arrested the Stones’ eldest son, Joshua M. Stone, 21, shortly before 9 p.m. Monday in Pittsford, Michigan, about twenty miles west of his family’s home, an FBI spokeswoman, Sandra Berchtold, said. A grand jury had secretly returned the indictments against the nine last Tuesday.
A law enforcement official said the plot appeared to be unconnected to recent threats against Democratic lawmakers who voted for legislation overhauling the nation’s health care system. According to the indictment, the group— apparently centered in Lenawee County, about 70 miles southwest of Detroit— has been meeting regularly since at least August of 2008.
The Hutaree website suggested that it was motivated by apocalyptic religious scenarios more than any secular political fears. A rare mention of earthly politics on the site is a page devoted to discussion of efforts to unite Europe, with a suggestion that one high-ranking European official, Javier Solana, might be the Antichrist.
Chip Berlet, a senior analyst at Political Research Associates, a liberal-leaning nonprofit group that tracks far-right networks, said the Hutaree’s philosophy was drawn from a populist strand that fuses fear of a conspiracy to create a one-world government with a belief that a war is imminent between Christians and the Antichrist, as described in the Bible’s Book of Revelation.
In April of 2009, the Department of Homeland Security produced a report warning of a rising threat of right-wing terrorism, citing factors like economic troubles, the election of a black president, and perceived threats to United States sovereignty.
Mark Potok, who leads a program that tracks right-wing groups for the Southern Poverty Law Center, said it first took note of the Hutaree last year amid a surge in new “Patriot” movement groups, race-based hate groups, extremist anti-immigrant groups, Christian militants and other variations. “We’e’re seeing all kinds of radical right-wing groups grow very rapidly, especially in the militia world,” Mr. Potok said.
The indictment said the Hutaree, in anticipation of a war against its enemies, had been engaging in “military-style training”, from weapons proficiency drills to “close quarter battle drills” and the use of “ambush kill zones”. The small group had acquired guns, ammunition, medical supplies, uniforms, communications equipment, and “explosives and other components for destructive devices”, it said. After attacking the police, the members planned to retreat to several planned “rally points” and wait for the authorities to come after them. They were preparing fighting positions as well as “trip-wired and command-detonated” bombs, it said.
“It is believed by the Hutaree that this engagement would then serve as a catalyst for a more widespread uprising against the government,” the indictment said. In addition, Mr. Stone had announced “a covert reconnaissance exercise” in April, during which “anyone who happened upon the exercise who did not acquiesce to Hutaree demands could be killed,” the indictment said.
The United States attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan, Barbara McQuade, said the government raided the group this past weekend because that exercise would have “had the potential of placing an unsuspecting member of the public at risk.”
The Hutaree website features the motto “Preparing for the end time battles to keep the testimony of Jesus Christ alive” and a video showing rifle-toting men in camouflage running through woods and firing weapons.
“Jesus wanted us to be ready to defend ourselves using the sword and stay alive using equipment,” the website says, adding, “The Hutaree will one day see its enemy and meet him on the battlefield if so God wills it.”
By Monday, the Stones’ house stood empty, its front door ajar and two dogs still tied up in the muddy yard, which was littered with dilapidated furniture, a washing machine, and tires. The Stones’ two sons were among those arrested. Joshua, the eldest, left the local school system after the fifth grade in 1999 to be home-schooled, and the younger son, David B. Stone Jr., 19, had never been enrolled, an official said. Also charged were Joshua J. Clough, 28, of Blissfield, Mich.; Michael D. Meeks, 40, of Manchester, Mich.; Thomas W. Piatek, 46, of Whiting, Ind.; Kristopher T. Sickles, 27, of Sandusky, Ohio; and Jacob Ward, 33, of Huron, Ohio. They could face a maximum penalty of life in prison if convicted of the most serious charge, attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction.
Rico says that he has a picture, just like the one on their website, of him and a bunch of his friends from Apple, but we were holding paint ball gubs, rather than real ones...
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