Government’s Plan to Railroad Bundy Family Hits a Major Roadblock in Oregon
on Friday, October 28, 2016
Government Vendetta against Cliven Bundy Stopped by Oregon Jury.
The War on Bundy Hits a Little Snag in the Road… The Truth!
By Scott Michael Rohter – October 28, 2016
A government vendetta against the family of Nevada rancher, Cliven Bundy ran into a major roadblock in Oregon when a jury unanimously found two of his sons, Ammon and Ryan Bundy not guilty of conspiracy and Federal firearms charges. They were both acquitted on all thirteen counts. It wasn’t quite, “Free at last. Free at last. Thank God Almighty I am free at last”, but at least the government’s plan to incarcerate them along with five other defendants for up to six years received a major blow as a Portland, Oregon jury saw right through the government’s overreaching indictment and straight into the heart of the matter.
There was no conspiracy, the jury concluded… and they found no proof that the defendants ever intended to threaten any government employees who worked at the Refuge. There was no evidence of intimidation of any government employees because there were no government employees at the Refuge during the whole time that the defendants were there. The jury drew a distinction between the defendant’s actual intentions and the unintended consequences of their actions which the defendants had no control over. The occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge began as a spontaneous response to the government’s own unlawful actions against two Oregon ranchers, Dwight and Steven Hammond of Burns, Oregon. That is what happened, and that is exactly what the jury concluded.
Ammon and Ryan Bundy have spent the last nine months of their lives in jail because they dared to tell the United States government that it was wrong to incarcerate Dwight and Steven Hammond for arson under a federal anti-terrorism act.. The Bundy’s determination has been met with stubbornness by federal prosecutors. Their dedication and courage has cost them dearly. It has meant that they will remain jail at least until the end of their next trial in Nevada over a previous confrontation that their father, Cliven Bundy had with the BLM in 2014.
After the verdicts in Portland were read, the Judge told all seven defendants that they were free to go unless Federal Marshal’s had something different to say about it.” At that point David Fry was a free man after spending the last nine months of his life behind bars just in order to make it look like this wasn’t a government vendetta against the family of Cliven Bundy, but the Marshals had other plans for Ammon and Ryan. They are the only two defendants in the occupation trial of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge to still remain in federal custody more than a year later.
Marcus Mumford, the attorney for Ammon Bundy expected that his client was going to be released after the not guilty verdict. He promised the judge that Mr. Bundy would report for trial as ordered in Nevada. He argued with Judge Brown that his client should be free to go. Voices were allegedly raised and someone in the courtroom said that Judge Brown told Mr. Mumford to stop yelling at her. At some point the Marshals took control of the courtroom. They surrounded Mr. Mumford. When he asked to see their paperwork which allowed them to detain his client they grabbed him and attempted to restrain him. They obviously didn’t think they needed to prove anything to Mr. Mumford. A scuffle ensued when they grabbed him and at least five Federal marshals forced him to the ground.
As this scuffle went on a table got flipped over and computers and papers went flying. The judge ordered everyone to clear the courtroom while Mr. Mumford was tazed, handcuffed, and arrested. It is ironic that Mr. Mumford was arrested and booked for the same crime that his client Ammon Bundy had just been acquitted of. After obtaining a not guilty verdict for his client, Mr. Mumford was jailed and released on his own recognizance on charges of impeding federal officers.
The courtroom scuffle which occurred after the not guilty verdicts were rendered is further evidence that the courts and the executive branch of government are out of control. They don’t obey their own laws more less follow the Constitution they swore to uphold… They pick and chooses what laws they will obey and what laws they will not obey.. and now we have a government that assaults and arrests a defense attorney after he beats them in court.
“I don’t think such a thing has ever happened before in Federal Court where Marshals have attacked a defense attorney, and then tazed and arrested him”, attorney Mike Arnold said. Mr. Arnold was the first attorney who originally represented Ammon Bundy in Oregon, but he withdrew a month later. It shows just how bitter and hard fought this legal battle has been and just how angry the government is over losing. Loretta Lynch, Billy Williams and the Obama Un-Justice Department is absolutely furious. The DOUJ is like a wounded animal, even more dangerous than it was before the trial began..
After being booked in county jail Mr. Mumford was released and given a trial date in January.
Meanwhile what is going to happen to the next group of defendants who occupied the Refuge who are scheduled to go on trial sometime in February? Will the charges against them be dropped now that the leaders of the so called “conspiracy” have all been found not guilty… or will the government file new and different charges?
What about those who pled guilty to the charges in order to avoid the possibility of long jail sentences? Will they have to serve jail time even thought all the others were found not guilty? That would be rather unfair as their guilty pleas were obtained under duress and real intimidation… unlike the kind they were accused of. Ryan Payne is one of the defendants who pled guilty, but afterwards tried to retract his guilty plea when he realized that he felt he had been misled by Federal prosecutors. His attempt to withdraw his guilty plea was unsuccessful.
There are still a lot of unanswered questions, but none is more important then why Ammon and Ryan Bundy have to remain in Federal custody until their next trial is over. The truth is that there really is a government vendetta against the family of Cliven Bundy. Cliven and his four sons Ammon, Ryan, Mel, and David are all behind bars.
The not guilty verdicts in Oregon are not just a win for the defendants. They are a rebuke of the government’s heavy handed actions and tactics which they used against the people who occupied the Refuge as well as against the Hammond family which inspired the occupation in the first place. It is a rebuke of the FBI, the Oregon State Police, the Department of Justice, the Court system, and it is especially a rebuke of federal prosecutors. The government has been sent a clear message of disapproval by the Oregon jury who heard the case.
Federal prosecutors thought this was going to be a slam dunk case, but even with the deck heavily stacked in their favor… the government could still not convince the jury of a conspiracy. At the end of court proceedings every day, three federal prosecutors wheeled a large rolling file cabinet filled with notebooks containing evidence out of the courtroom and down the elevator to the fourth floor where their offices are located. Using all of the enormous resources of the federal government… tremendous financial and legal resources which the largest and most powerful country on the face of the earth can muster they still could not convince the jury when matched against the plain and simple, honest truth that was obvious in the courtroom testimony of Ammon Bundy and in the riveting closing arguments of his brother Ryan. All seven defendants were completely and fully exonerated on all thirteen counts in the federal indictment as well as on the Federal firearms charges as well.
The Department of Justice assigned three prosecutors to the case. They were twelve paid government informants who infiltrated the Refuge and were spying on the defendants throughout the entire time they were there. The prosecutors raised thousands of objections in the courtroom during the six week long trial nearly all of which were sustained by the judge. Much of the evidence that defense attorneys wanted to present to the jury was not even allowed to be seen by the jury and numerous defense witnesses were not permitted to testify in court.
The judge called the evidence and the testimony which she banned from the courtroom cumulative in nature. She said she didn’t want to waste the jury’s time with all of it, but what might be cumulative to one juror might be corroborative to another. Video evidence that managed to escape the judge’s gavel and actually did make it into the trial was strictly edited right down to the last nano-second in order to prevent the jurors from hearing too much from the inspiring man who is at the center of this trial… Ammon Bundy.
At this point I would like to mention the names of the other five defendants who were found not guilty of conspiracy and not guilty of violating federal firearms statutes… They are Shawna Cox, Ken Medenbach, David Fry, Jaff Banta, and Neil Wampler.
Even with the courtroom heavily stacked in their favor the government still lost the case… and they didn’t just barely lose. They lost on every single count, and on every single charge. Their case was tossed out on its ears by an impartial jury which they picked to act as the official arbiters of truth. Chalk one up for justice. John Qunicy Adams, America’s sixth President who was a lawyer himself once said, “The law is an artificial human construct. It is good for nothing outside of a court of law.” I was glad to see that at least it still works inside of a court of law, because after attending this trial I really had my doubts. Thank God for the jury.