Remembering Brisenia & Raul Flores.....

I am very torn about all of this myself lil, I am 100% against the prison system and 100% against the death penalty....yet I don't know what I would do to these people given the circumstances of these murders, maybe I would hang them by their ankles for 5 years and give them a taste of what they did to that family turning their world completely upside down....

 

That was beautiful....thank you

 

Leak Reveals New Border Vigilante Group on Arizona Border
Posted in Anti-Immigrant, Nativist Extremist by Leah Nelson on June 29, 2011


A 2010 U.S. Department of Homeland Security memo warned that a new Minuteman-style border vigilante group had popped up in Arizona that posed “a possibility of violence between armed civilians and smugglers.”

The confidential memo — dated April 28, 2010, and leaked last Thursday by LulzSec, a group that hacked the Arizona Department of Public Safety — warned that an “unknown group” calling itself “A Concerned Citizen” was seeking recruits to help shut down a 30-mile section of Interstate 8. The idea was to create a roadblock, allegedly for the purpose of stopping any smugglers who might be traveling along the route.

“t is not surprising that another contingent of Minuteman types has come to life. The tone of this information is quite unlike that of the MCDC Locked and Loaded Operation,” the memo’s author wrote, referring to Chris Simcox’s nativist extremist group Minuteman Civil Defense Corps (MCDC) and appearing to suggest that the new group was even more militant. MCDC dissolved in March 2010 in part because it did not want to take legal responsibility for the potential actions of its fired-up volunteers after its leader announced a “locked and loaded” plan that encouraged volunteers to bring rifles with them to the border and “forcefully engage” the “criminals” who try to cross without documentation.

The memo continued: “If this new operation happens, there could be potential for human rights violations and a possibility of violence between armed civilians and smugglers or with law enforcement.”

Hatewatch found evidence today that suggests that the “new” group was real and was, in fact, a descendant of MCDC, some of whose chapters apparently continued to function after the national organization fell apart last spring.

On May 6, 2010, a website called U.S. Border Fire Report – a revolting anti-immigrant and anti-Mexican site that routinely publishes graphic images of the dismembered corpses of purported drug war victims – announced a new “citizen activist opportunity.” That opportunity, it said, was being offered by a group called “Concerned Citizens” that was seeking volunteers to camp out along Interstate 8 for a campaign of “deterrence by presence.”

The announcement told potential volunteers that the event was “NOT” sponsored by or related to MCDC or any other Minuteman group, but explained that several groups’ mailing lists had been used to “get the word out.” It said that the area was “very dangerous” and that volunteers should be prepared to “defend themselves” in encounters with “armed drug lords.”

The DHS memo also related a March 27, 2010, tip to the Border Patrol from a man calling himself Daniel Webster. Webster, it said, told authorities that he and “a group of concerned citizens” had seen a cluster of vehicles transporting undocumented immigrants along Interstate 8. The language Webster used suggested that he may have been a part of the Concerned Citizen group.

Webster told Border Patrol agents he was not affiliated with any civilian vigilante or Minuteman group. He said that he and a group of volunteers would be camping in the I-8 for the next few days to “observe and report criminal activity,” according to the DHS memo. Investigators who followed up on Webster’s tip were unable to locate the alleged vehicles, the memo says. “The possibility exists that [Webster] might be involved in the organizing of [A Concerned Citizen], or that he might be recruited by the organization,” the memo adds.

A May 19, 2010, posting on the U.S. Border Fire Report website seems to confirm this. Describing Concerned Citizens’ “low profile” campaign along Interstate 8 further, the article quotes a member named Daniel Webster saying, “This is not a Minuteman or extremist group-sponsored event, just a call to action by a group of Concerned Citizens.”

http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2011/06/2 ... r=HW063011

 

LulzSec Leaks .....Part II
Authorities Find Bomb Apparently Targeting Immigrants in Arizona



Roadside bomb found near Tucson, ArizonaA U.S. Border Patrol agent found a live pipe bomb while patrolling a known smuggling route west of Tucson on May 30, 2009, a classified memo released by a group that hacked the Pima County, Ariz., sheriff’s department reveals.

The device, described in an intelligence bulletin issued by the department’s bomb squad as “moderately complex,” exploded during the course of the squad’s investigation. The memo does not say whether anyone was hurt or speculate about who was responsible. It does caution agents working remote roads near the border to “be vigilant” and look out for “suspect items.”

The memo, released by the hacker group known as LulzSec, states that the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives investigated the incident but does not describe the results of the investigation.

Although its provenance apparently remains unknown, the bomb’s discovery is not entirely surprising in light of the anti-immigrant tensions that have plagued the region around Arizona’s border with Mexico for years.

In another part of Arizona on precisely the same day the pipe bomb went off, former Minuteman American Defense (MAD) leader Shawna Forde orchestrated a home invasion that culminated in the murder of a Latino man and his 9-year-old daughter in Arivaca, Ariz. Forde and one of her accomplices were sentenced to death earlier this year; a third accused accomplice is currently on trial.

On Jan. 14, 2011, a member of the neo-Nazi National Socialist Movement (NSM) named Jeffrey Harbin was arrested with three improvised explosive devices, explosive powders and other bomb-making materials that he allegedly intended to offer to anti-immigration groups patrolling the border. Harbin’s trial is set for August 2.

In June 2010, J.T. Ready — who now describes himself as a former member of the NSM — led a group of armed extremists into the Arizona desert to apprehend immigrants and drug smugglers. According to the Heat City website, Ready during the same month handed out fliers calling for a bombing campaign against immigrants. “We all should be actively advocating daily to mainstream America the most humane, non-racist, fair border security plan available,” the fliers reportedly read. “Namely, A MINEFIELD!”

In 2005, vigilantes wearing plastic “Undocumented Border Patrol Agent” badges converged on Cochise County’s aptly named Border Road to play army and listen to a rousing speech by immigrant-bashing former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.).

http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2011/06/2 ... ent-303870

 

Third Defendant in Nativist Home-Invasion Murders Convicted

Ending the trial phase of a sad and sordid tale that has haunted Arizona for two years, a Pima County jury Friday convicted a Latino man of first-degree murder for the slayings of Raul Flores and his 9-year-old daughter, Brisenia, in a home invasion committed by members of a border vigilante group.

Albert Gaxiola was the last of three defendants to be tried and convicted for the May 30, 2009, slayings. Preceding him were Shawna Forde, founder of Minuteman American Defense (MAD), and MAD member Jason “Gunny” Bush, both of whom have been sentenced to death.

Forde, Bush and Gaxiola went into the Flores home in Arivaca, about 50 miles southwest of Tucson, believing that because Flores was a drug dealer, he would have plenty of cash on hand. Prosecutors charged that Bush was the gunman who shot Flores dead before shooting his wife, Gina Gonzalez, in the leg. He then walked over to Brisenia, who was sleeping with her puppy on the couch, and shot her twice in the head at close range.

Testimony at Gaxiola’s trial suggested a two-pronged motive for the home invasion: Forde sought to steal money to fund her increasingly militant operation against immigrants on the border; Gaxiola was in it to take out Flores, who allegedly belonged to a rival drug gang. “If Gaxiola had not told Forde and Bush where to go, the crime would not have happened,” Deputy Prosecutor Kellie Johnson told the jury. Bush, a violent man charged with two other murders, was not said to have had a motive distinct from Forde’s.

Over the course of Gaxiola’s 11-day trial, it emerged that he and Flores had once been friends. According to Flores’ widow, the two often met socially in 2007 and 2008, before eventually having a falling-out. Gaxiola’s cousin is Gonzalez’s godmother.

Like Forde and Bush, Gaxiola was also found guilty of attempting to murder Gonzalez, as well as burglary, armed robbery, aggravated robbery and aggravated assault.

The jury’s next and final task will be to determine if Gaxiola should join Forde and Bush on death row.

http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2011/07/0 ... r=HW070711

 

Minuteman Leader Knew Killer-to-Be Yearned for Violence

In mid-2009, nativist leaders scrambled to distance themselves from Minuteman American Defense (MAD) founder Shawna Forde, after the immigrant-bashing former child prostitute was charged with two counts of first-degree murder in connection with the slaying of an Arizona man and his 9-year old daughter.

Few were as adamant in their repudiations of Forde – who now sits on death row for the murder of Raul and Brisenia Flores – as Minuteman Project (MMP) President Jim Gilchrist. Within hours of the announcement of her arrest, he stripped MMP’s website of its many laudatory references to Forde’s group, extended his “condolences” to the victims and “all those who have been affected by the alleged incident,” and wrote, “Jim Gilchrist’s Minuteman Project, Inc. is not affiliated with the Minuteman American Defense or Shawna Forde. The Minuteman American Defense is an independent patriot organization which participates in systematic border observation and reporting operations.”

However much Gilchrist might have wished that were true, it’s well established that he and Forde at the very least had a close working relationship. As the Southern Poverty Law Center reported in 2008, the two Minuteman leaders shared a podium at an Everett, Wash. “Illegal Immigration Summit.” And in 2009, Gilchrist defended Forde after other nativist leaders expressed doubts about her claims that she’s been raped, beaten and shot in a bizarre series of incidents in and near her Everett home. (Police eventually dropped the investigation of the reported rape, citing lack of evidence.)

In the wake of Forde’s convictions, Gilchrist has never recovered his former glory – but he has managed to distance himself somewhat from Forde and her gruesome, pointless crimes.

Or that’s the way it seemed.

In an article published this week on Alternet, veteran investigative reporter David Neiwert examines just how close the relationship between Gilchrist and Forde apparently was. The MMP founder at one point even discussed ways of funding Forde’s group, according to Neiwert’s story.

Forde formed a relationship with Gilchrist in 2007, shortly after breaking ties with Chris Simcox, head of a rival Minuteman group called the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps (MCDC), Neiwert reports. A witness who spoke with Neiwert said that Simcox “begged” Forde to stay with MCDC, but that she decided to start her own group and link up with Gilchrist instead.

In February 2008, Gilchrist made Forde his “border patrol coordinator.” That month, while riding together in a car to an appearance at Central Washington University, Gilchrist and Forde allegedly had what Neiwert describes as “a lively talk about ways they could make money — including robbing drug dealers.”

Mike Carlucci, a Seattle private investigator who drove Gilchrist and Forde to their CWU gig, described the conversation to Neiwert. “They were discussing in what I thought was a hyperbolic way, doing what she wound up doing — by taking on people who were selling drugs and taking the money from their organizations,” Neiwert quoted Carlucci as saying. “She was thinking about that shit in a role-playing way back then, and doing a gallows laugh. … It was almost like she was bouncing it off Gilchrist and seeing how he responded.”

Gilchrist, according to Neiwert, “played along and encouraged Forde’s fantasy. At no point did he ever suggest that the whole idea was completely nuts.” Relations between the two reportedly remained chummy right up to the day Forde was arrested.

Reached by Hatewatch yesterday, Gilchrist flatly denied that he had ever talked to Forde about robbing drug dealers and said she was not even in the car on the way to CWU. “This is bullshit,” Gilchrist said, adding that Forde “was just part of the audience” at the CWU talk. He also said he did not remember Carlucci driving to CWU.

But in an interview with Hatewatch today, Carlucci stood by his comments to Neiwert. “What Neiwert reported was consistent with my comments in the interview,” he said.

http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2012/07/2 ... ent-523742