Radical Islamist paramilitary training camp in Buena Vista?

"National news report" (4.00 / 1)

As soon as I saw that, I read "dodgy online militia website," and lo:

http://www.canadafre...

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by: Stygius @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 10:27:52 AM CDT

oh yeah (4.00 / 1)

They also like to publish articles that deny climate change.

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by: johne @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 10:36:00 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Surprisingly, not all smoke and mirrors. (4.00 / 1)

There apparently was a Pueblo/Buena Vista "Sufi-militant Islamic sect" doing bad things in Colorado in the late 1980s and early 1990s. 

The Attorney General's press release on the subject is found here.  The trouble is, for conservative political purposes anyway, that the case was closed for everyone but the lawyers about fifteen years ago, that this was achieved using ordinary police procedures subject to the rule of law, and that the leaders are in prison for long terms now.

The press release states:

As a result of the two-year investigation, five FUQRA members were indicted by the statewide grand jury in September 1992 on racketeering charges involving theft, mail fraud, and forgery. Six months after the indictments, further racketeering charges, including theft of rental property, conspiracy to commit murder and arson (the Denver Hare Krishna Temple), were also filed against the five individuals and a sixth person -- all FUQRA members. Some of the fraudulently obtained workers' compensation funds were traced directly to payments for a parcel of land near Buena Vista used by the group as a residence compound and training site.

One of the FUQRA defendants convicted is James D. Williams. After his conviction in 1993 for conspiracy to commit first degree murder, racketeering, and forgery, Williams fled and remained a fugitive until being apprehended in Virginia in August 2000. He was returned to Colorado and sentenced this past March to 69 years in prison. From at least the middle 1980's through 1990, Williams was a leader of a Colorado FUQRA.

The conviction for conspiracy to commit first degree murder referred to a comprehensive written plan for the murder of a Tucson, Arizona Muslim cleric, Rashad Khalifa. Khalifa was murdered in January 1990 in a manner that was remarkably similar to the written plan.

The other notable thing about this group from a public safety perspective, is that there weren't an anti-American group.  They were going after Hari Krishnas and American Muslims of Islamic sects that they disagreed with, rather than having the kind of priorities of Al-Queda.

Good riddance to them, but this is old news and proves that the system works.  This incident was probably a factor in the amendment of the law in Colorado banning terrorist training camps (CRS 18-9-120) in 1995.  (The law was originally enacted in 1984 and was amended again post 9-11 in 2003, to broaden the law enforcement exception).

While the Colorado attorney general implies that the group is Pakistani in origin, the Anti-Defamation League's report on the group describes it as a "Black Muslim" group, which would suggest deeper historical ties to Malcom X than Osama bin Laden, and explain its activities outside of historically immigrant heavy areas.

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by: ohwilleke @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 11:22:04 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

great work, gang! (0.00 / 0)

so there may be a kernal of truth that Andrews made sound like it happened yesterday?

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by: Zappatero @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 11:41:32 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Excellent (0.00 / 0)

Thank you.

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by: Stygius @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 11:46:14 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

The Honorable John Andrews (4.00 / 1)

just responded to my email query. Per him:

"National news report" = Michael Savage (who probably quoted the link you have there).

If he would have told the congressional panel that Savage was his source they would've laughed him out of the hearing.

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by: Zappatero @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 14:11:11 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

He did (0.00 / 0)

Savage is the one who got that article moving around the blogs.

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by: Stygius @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 15:08:20 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Yeah, but just as with the 2004 property tax rate freeze... (0.00 / 0)

...he didn't know what he was testifying about. So, it's OK.

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by: bmenezes @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 11:04:43 AM CDT

You mean the property tax increase, right Bill? (0.00 / 0)

n/t

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by: rdandrea @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 12:40:19 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

What was Andrews thinking? (4.00 / 1)

If I were going to tell the House of Representatives about an Islamist paramilitary training camp, I'd: (a) make sure that I could cite the source of the report and (b) memorize the outfit's address and phone number so that the police could keep an eye on them. I hate to use the phrase "common sense," but (a) and (b) are just common sense. So let's assume that Andrews actually believed his own words. Why didn't it occur to him to provide the simple information needed to solve the supposed problem? I think it's becuse Andrews, like most of today's GOP, believe that words have magical properties: they don't just state what's so, instead, saying something with conviction makes it so. By claiming that there was a terrorist training camp in Buena Vista, Andrews hoped to foster a climate of fear and intimadation that would itself confirm the need for tighter controls on the boarder. The social fact of public fear (rational or irrational) would then itself confirm the need for the very policies Andrews was pushing. This kind of thing happens all the time. We noticed it in this case because Andrews isn't a paarticularly intelligent practitioner of the technque.

There is no elite, so take your place in the driver's seat.

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by: Stagarite @ Tue May 22, 2007 at 12:45:11 PM CDT

Andrews is as screwy as they come. Put him on par with David Duke (0.00 / 0)

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by: UveGotMail @ Sat May 26, 2007 at 16:58:08 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Memories (0.00 / 0)

I was a cub reporter in Buena Vista when the Fuqra compound was raided in 1992. The members were all native-born Americans (I met several of them in a grocery store a month before the raid).

The group was roughly analogous to a white supremacist survivalist group/Koreshian cult. They were pissed off at society and hiding in the mountains, engaging in petty theft and insurance fraud to keep afloat. And they had some tenuous contacts with other groups, which is great fodder for the conspiracy minded.

Buena Vista seems to attract all kinds of kooky cults and assorted felons. I once met Oliver North at these goofballs' compound, for instance.

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by: gnarlytrombone @ Wed May 23, 2007 at 19:18:48 PM CDT