Suspects in Whitmer Kidnapping Plot Claim FBI Set Them Up
One defendant filed a discovery motion after the lawyer found messages between an FBI agent and an informant proving entrapment.
![https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSB4z9Wfovo](https://c1.legalinsurrection.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Whitmer.jpg)
BuzzFeed News dropped a huge bombshell regarding the alleged plot by a militia to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
Only one of the 14 defendants pleaded guilty to the plot. The others claimed they never plotted to kidnap Whitmer.
The outlet reviewed the evidence and found some shocking details that back up their defense.
It turns out at least 12 of the FBI confidential informants had a larger role in the plot than outlets have reported:
An examination of the case by BuzzFeed News also reveals that some of those informants, acting under the direction of the FBI, played a far larger role than has previously been reported. Working in secret, they did more than just passively observe and report on the actions of the suspects. Instead, they had a hand in nearly every aspect of the alleged plot, starting with its inception. The extent of their involvement raises questions as to whether there would have even been a conspiracy without them.
A longtime government informant from Wisconsin, for example, helped organize a series of meetings around the country where many of the alleged plotters first met one another and the earliest notions of a plan took root, some of those people say. The Wisconsin informant even paid for some hotel rooms and food as an incentive to get people to come.
The Iraq War vet, for his part, became so deeply enmeshed in a Michigan militant group that he rose to become its second-in-command, encouraging members to collaborate with other potential suspects and paying for their transportation to meetings. He prodded the alleged mastermind of the kidnapping plot to advance his plan, then baited the trap that led to the arrest.
The prosecution insists their evidence, consisting of social media posts, text messages, and recordings, prove the defendants had anti-government feelings and wanted to kidnap or kill “law enforcement officers and elected officials.”
The defendants said, “their talk never rose beyond the level of fantasy and they never intended to harm anyone.” They accuse the government of targeting them due to their political views:
Although they have not denied participating in training events, attending meetings, and communicating with other defendants, they claim that no actual conspiracy to kidnap the governor ever existed.
Instead, they say, they were targeted because of their political views. Some describe the case as a premeditated campaign by the government to undermine the Patriot movement, an ideology based on fealty to the Second Amendment and the conviction that the government has violated the Constitution and is therefore illegitimate. They argue that the recordings and text messages that the government calls proof of a criminal conspiracy are in fact constitutionally protected speech — expressions of frustration at what they see as the government’s betrayal of its citizens.
Brandon Caserta’s lawyer filed a motion to compel discovery of one of the FBI informants, codenamed “Thor.” The motion includes text messages between the informant and an FBI agent. Caserta asserts the messages show the FBi agent directed the informant “to draw specific people into the conspiracy — potential evidence of entrapment that he said the government ‘inadvertently disclosed.'”
The motion identifies the FBI handlers as Impola and Chambers.
The lawyer requested “all texts sent and received by that informant.” Other lawyers have thought about taking similar actions.
The lawyer wrote: “The evidence is material to the preparation of the dense because the Defendant is likely to assert a defense of entrapment and being able to demonstrate the trajectory of the F.B.I.’s directives to CHS-2 over time and how the Defendant’s involvement was ‘instigated by overzealous law enforcement agents…'”
Also from the motion:
What is surprising, and was unknowable to the defense, is S.A. Impola’s encouragement to CHS-2 to bring Caserta into one of the two recons, recons that are overt acts in the government’s superseding indictment, and thus into the conspiracy. Further, to push the recon into a specific location, location 1. This active participation of the F.B.I supports the defense theory of entrapment in that the government, or someone acting for the government, induced or persuaded the defendant to commit a crime, or an act in furtherance of the crime.
The defense found the text messages “buried within hundreds of thousands of pdf reports, documents, text messages, audio recordings and photographs.”
“Ths type of evidence is material and critical to the defense that CHS-2 was actively attempting to pull together a conspiracy together, create overt acts and he was doing it as a paid informant at the behest and direction of his F.B.I. handlers,” wrote Castera’s lawyer.
Other attorneys noted the informant profited from his role despite claiming he did all this as a Good Samaritan:
[Lawyer Kareem] Johnson and the other defense lawyers have taken pains to note that despite his claims that he acted as a good Samaritan, Dan was rewarded financially for his work as an informant. In testimony, Dan described how his handlers eventually gave him envelopes of cash, covered his mortgage and car payment, and also bought him a phone, computer, and the new vehicle. When Dan sold his house in December because he was concerned people in the Patriot movement knew his address, the bureau even reimbursed him for what he testified was a $4,500 loss on the deal. The grand total for his seven months of work, including reimbursement for expenses, was $54,793.95, considerably more than most families in Dan’s part of Michigan bring home in a year.
“All of this evidence underscores the extremely active and coercive role the CHSs played in this matter,” wrote Scott Graham, Kaleb Franks’ attorney, in a motion filed last week.
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Entrapment
They plan the crime and then look for people with the target ideological proclivity who they can entice into their web.
Beware. This seems to be happening with increasing frequency.
Looks like this is now the American Stasi’s primary job function. Looks like doing this kind of thing are their marching orders from Comrades Biden and Garland.
Lets hope the judge isn’t a Democrat
Party no longer matters. See: Roberts, Kavanagh, and that new woman; I forgot her name.
“…and that new woman; I forgot her name.”
Awesome.
AOC? ACB? No M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E… which is how the Social Club of the United States is turning out to be,.
Way back in time, when the Kent State shooting went down, I was at San Diego State College. Lots of students in an uproar; even some of the blindlingly patriotic right-wingers, and quite a few Vietnam vets.
There was one person who stood out. He was making a lot of noise about doing something “that no one would forget”. He was advocting blowing the Coronado Bridge. He knew where to get the materials to do so blah blah.
Finally, one of our VN veterans “met with” this clown in one of the tiny study rooms in the student union. He knew how to ask questions but not leave any marks. Yes. The advocate for blowing up the bridge was… (yes, you in the back?) a Fibbie.
Now they don’t even use a Fibbie, they use a stoolie they have over a barrel for a meth charge or whatever, who is anxious to see you go down so he won’t. Makes it harder to verify ID.
Looks like the FBI had over twice as many actors in the plot as there were “plotters” and the FBI itself did the kidnapping layout.
Wray has merely continued Mueller and Comey’s tradition of corruption.
Glenn Reynolds over at Instapundit mentioned an incident in the 1990s where every member of a “militia” group was an informant for Federal authorities.
https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/462971/
Does anyone here know the case Reynolds is referring to?
I believe he might be discussing the Hutaree case from Hillsdale County (MI).
https://www.michiganradio.org/post/key-charges-dismissed-against-michigan-militia-members-federal-court
No, not possible. Not only was that not in the ’90s, people were charged, and they actually went to trial. Fed agents don’t get charged, and they certainly don’t get tried. It’s when a “plot” is busted, but mysteriously nobody is charged and you never hear of it again, that you know there was a bit of an oopsie, i.e. once all the agents were removed there was nobody left.
Thank you for the correction.
FBI—Agents provocateur.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the DoJ and FIB allow the wife-beating thug agent to testify. His behavior exemplifies the 99% of “good” agents.
At least he was not having sex with his daughter’s playmates like another recently indicted ‘Special Agent’.
Nasty. I wasn’t aware of that.
What basis is there for saying that he was not?
Subotai Bahadur
Looks almost exactly like the script from the (attempted) mass shooting at the “Draw Muhammad” event in Austin — created, funded, and catered entirely by the FBI.
The FBI agent even went to the scene to make sure that the crime was committed
Once the facts came out I asked if it was entrapment
Looks like the American Stasi concocted a plot to kidnap Whitmer and dangled it in front of some gullible low IQ fools who bit on the bait. The American Stasi then reeled them in by planning and advancing the fake plot, gathering evidence used to charge the fools.
This is Soviet-style ‘policing’. The FBI are now the Dem’s political orthodoxy enforcement police. It’s their job to intimidate political opposition into silence. And to discourage or prevent political opposition from organizing.
Considering that, let’s examine the Jan 6 ‘Insurrection’ more closely, too.
What did the FBI know and when did they know it? How many FBI agents and informants were involved? Participated? Entered the Capital building? Where are the video recordings showing what FBI agents and informants planted in the crowd did during those four hours? Why was Trump’s advice to bring the National Guard in well before Jan 6 turned down? Why would Trump make this recommendation if a ‘terrorist’ assault on the Capital building is what he wanted?
Too bad the Jan 6 political prisoners are stuck in the DC gulag and have DC as their venue. Too bad they are too poor to pay for their own attorneys. Attorneys who would defend them as the Whitmer plot defendants are being defended.
BTW, imagine what Jan 6 would have been like if Trump had been declared the winner by the same margins as Comrade Biden. Think there would have been any rioting in DC? How about rioting across the nation starting Nov 4? I’ve read that the Dems’ paramilitary wing — Antifa/BLM — were ready to make the summer of 2020 look like a warmup for the main event.
it’s all about feeding the narrative.
Anyone not on board with the Marxist agenda = white supremacist.
They want to give the impression that armed white supremacists are everywhere.
Problem is reality keeps getting in the way – see link below about recent event.
https://www.theroot.com/members-of-heavily-armed-black-militia-shut-down-traffi-1847227996
Yes, and shortly after “foiling the Michigan kidnapping plot,” wasn’t the agent who ran the operations in Detroit was transferred to the D.C. Field Office and place in charge of overseeing “domestic terror” investigations? Really makes you wonder about January 6 and entrapment, doesn’t it?
yes
The old KKK inside joke was that any new member yelling to bomb something was an FBI agent. Randy Weaver was entrapped and when a court screw-up made a raid possible… they literally pulled the trigger.
Lon Horiuchi is still out there collecting his pension while trespassers sit in solitary 23 hrs a day.
Its this what Patrick Byrnes was claiming about his Russian babe that got busted.
Byrne’s claim is that he reported the babe as a honey trap to the FBI immediately, and got told by the FBI to string her along. I don’t think he suspected the FBI was honey-trapping him with a Russian agent.
The “if-but” run down from our favorite 2A lawyer comes to mind.
“If -but for the FBI’s actions to create a plot, no plot would have existed.”
Shouldn’t Kathy Griffin be charged with plotting to assassinate a President? If members of the Michigan “militia” can be charged for a kidnapping plot actually planned by the FBI, then what about indisputable visual evidence of her plan to behead Donald Trump (holding up a fake severed head on national TV)?
The case against Griffin is far stronger than the one against the “militia”.
No, she should not. There’s not a shred of evidence even suggesting that she did such a thing, (And even if she had done that, plotting is not a crime; conspiracy requires at least two people, and an overt act.)
In this case there is evidence of an actual conspiracy. It’s in the charging documents. It’s just that we now have evidence contradicting the first evidence and putting it in a new light; if that turns out as the defense alleges, then the charges will have to be dropped. If it doesn’t then the charges can proceed. Right now we’re only at the stage of the defense asking for the information it would need to try to prove its case; neither we nor the defense know what that information will show. The defense is hoping it will show that there was no conspiracy.
Do you really think this will be dropped if the defense attorney is right? The Dems run the show now and the rule of law is rather strained.
Yes, I think if the defense attorney is right the judge will drop the case.
Yes, I think if the defense attorney is right the judge will drop the case.
Tell that to Speaker of the House Tom DeLay, or Senator Stevens, RIP. They each got sentenced by your honorable Judges.
My sarcasm flopped badly. OTOH I saw Griffin on TV holding up the fake severed head. That is more evidence in favor of prosecution than what I have seen in the Michigan case so far. Sorry, but given the events of the past five years the FBI doesn’t get the benefit of the doubt from me anymore. Everything we know about the Michigan case stinks to high Heaven.
And as for conspiracy: someone was behind the camera to record Griffin’s mug, and someone else broadcast it (were any of them FBI informants, like in the Michigan case?). Sure that “conspiracy to assassinate” is the weakest of weak tea – but so is the “insurrection” twaddle the Feds are pushing about the J6 protestors. If the Feds can make the process the punishment in the J6 protestors’ cases, I don’t see why Griffin should be spared the similar “benefit” of facing massive legal fees and the prospect of a long sentence to a room without a view at Club Fed.
The only conspiracy here is the one the FBI and their informants created, planned, led and funded.
That’s what the defense claims. It hasn’t yet got the evidence to prove it, but it’s now demanding that evidence. Once it has it, we will see whether it backs the claim up.
12 undercover Special Agents plus an unknown number of paid Confidential Human Sources. The lead FBI agent was second in command of the plot. Directed surveillance, and recruited named conspirators into the group.
Continue to ignore the evidence in front of you. Ignorance is truly bliss
@iowan2 I thought they were FBI informants not Special Agents – and that lack of certainty between the pair of us is precisely why the defence is collating evidence.
They need to be able to show the judge actual verifiable evidence that demonstrates the FBI acting in a manner that prevents prosecution of their client. They can’t just go “ah, they were all FBI.”
Even though basically they were.
Federal Bureau of Intimidation
Federal Burea of Instigation.
Reminds me of the old jokes about the IRA in the UK.
That every IRA 3 man cell was 2 MI6 agents pushing plans to blow things up and one wanker that just wanted to get drunk and talk shit.
That may have been what the IRA wanted us to believe, but the fact is a lot of things got blown up and a lot of people were killed, and it wasn’t by MI-6.
It was a joke, as Olinser pointed out.
I’ve read that she is a thoroughly unpleasant person. I wonder.
I wonder, Had the act been successful, how long before the kidnappers would have begged to pay Michiganders a large sum, please to come take her back?
24 hours? That would beat Red Chief’s incarceration record of 48.
Plus, the conspirators could have saved time and money developing an unnecessarily sophisticated plot.
“Here’s some candy, little girl, you want to go for a ride?We vote Democrat.” would likely have been sufficient.
Buzzfeed surprised me a great deal with this act of journalism but I am glad they did it and our agenda towards the FBI should reflect the entrapment they did for political reasons.
I suspected this from the get-go.
According to Jack Prosobiec:
“We now know the FBI used 12 informants to plan, entrap, and arrest 13 members of the Michigan militia group ‘Wolverine Watchmen’.”
Good thing they were careful to limit themselves to 12, or the Wolverine Watchmen could have arrested the FBI.
Being from MI I have been following this case pretty closely. I think the FBI may have “screwed the pooch” on this one by leading a group of ill-educated, hostile and poorly funded guys to “talk” and then “research” (or recon) doing some truly ignorant and illegal chit. Thing is when you step back and look at those arrested you find that none of them had either the resources (finances) or opportunity to turn the talk into action but for the FBI funding “Dan” to pay for meals, travel, resources. Hell . . . on the day they were supposed to purchase the C4 (from an FBI agent) for 4,000.00 the group had just over 350.00 between them!
Understand, I believe anyone who went inside the MI State Capital in April 2020 with a weapon or who illegally entered the US Capital on 6 Jan 2021 ought to face criminal charges. However it seems we’re seeing a disparated outcome with regard to who is being charged and what charges are being filed. My opinion is that there is a clear bias from the DOJ and many State Prosecutors.
Here’s an interesting article from the Detroit News a few days about about the FBI agent arrested in MI who was involved with the investigation. Seems like a reach “peach” of a guy.
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2021/07/19/fbi-agent-whitmer-kidnap-case-arrested-following-domestic-incident-richard-trask/8013618002/
They were apparently allowed in. They knocked on the door…. I guess this is the “attempt”… lol
“Understand, I believe anyone who went inside the MI State Capital in April 2020 with a weapon … ought to face criminal charges.”
Why? Is the People’s House a rights-free zone?
I’ve gone into several state capitals with weapons. All perfectly legal.
Including, believe it or not, the People’s Republic of Massachusetts.
What better way to make this bitch look like she was in danger than for the FBI to cook up a plot to kidnap her, entrap people who hate her ( not that they’re hard to find), and transport, feed, and house the supposed “conspirators”. We had a case here in GA about 25 years ago, where a “militia” group was targeted by the FBI in exactly the same fashion. The “informant” was someone the ATF and FBI had the goods on for trafficking explosives. He initiated the plan to send a pipe bomb to a judge, supplied the explosives, set up the meeting place, everything. These federal coppers think they are fucking Rambo, and as evidenced by James Comey, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, et al, they believe they are above the law. And when they get away with it, as they will here, they ARE above the law.
They look for gullible losers who will latch on and follow them. Somehow the “leaders” are all FBI or informants. Definitely entrapment.
I may be mistaken, but I’m pretty sure the legal test for entrapment isn’t a “but for’ test of whether the crime would have occurred without the cops’ involvement. Police are allowed to provide opportunities to commit a crime, even fairly attractive ones, provided they don’t go so far it would induce a person with no criminal inclination to commit it. The FBI has been doing this a long time, a lot more since 9/11, and they’re typically very good at staying just this side of the line.
Especially when they get to erase the line and redraw it wherever they need it to be.
The FBI is looking really bad. The 99% are not good guys. Their reputation is crap.
If eyes are a window to the soul, looking into Witmer’s eyes must be akin to gazing into the abyss.
The ransom note read, “We are holding Governor Whitmer. Give us $10 billion or we will release her.”