Vol.

5 - 1

1 IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

2 FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEVADA

3 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, )

) Case No. 2:16-cr-00046-GMN-PAL
4 Plaintiff, )
) Las Vegas, Nevada
5 vs. ) November 7, 2017
) 8:51 a.m.
6 CLIVEN D. BUNDY (1), RYAN )
C. BUNDY (2), AMMON E. BUNDY)
7 (3), and RYAN W. PAYNE (4), )
) Day 5
8 Defendants. ) Government's Opening Statement
____________________________)
9
TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS
10 BEFORE THE HONORABLE GLORIA M. NAVARRO
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT CHIEF JUDGE, AND A JURY
11

12 APPEARANCES:

13 For the Government:

14 STEVEN W. MYHRE, USA

DANIEL SCHIESS, AUSA
15 NADIA JANJUA AHMED, AUSA
United States Attorney's Office
16 District of Nevada
501 Las Vegas Boulevard South, Suite 1100
17 Las Vegas, Nevada 89101
steven.myhre@usdoj.gov
18 daniel.schiess@usdoj.gov
nadia.ahmed@usdoj.gov
19

20 Appearances continued on page 2.

21

22

23 Court Reporter: Katherine Eismann, CSR, CRR, RDR

(702)431-1919 ke@nvd.uscourts.gov
24
Proceedings reported by machine shorthand, transcript produced
25 by computer-aided transcription.
 Vol. 5 - 2

1 APPEARANCES CONTINUED:

2 For the Defendant Cliven D. Bundy (1):

3 BRET O. WHIPPLE, ESQ.

Justice Law Center
4 1100 South 10th Street
Las Vegas, NV 89104
5 admin@justice-law-center.com

6 For the Defendant Ryan C. Bundy (2):

7 RYAN C. BUNDY, PRO SE

79400065
8 Nevada Southern Detention Center
2190 East Mesquite Avenue
9 Pahrump, NV 89060

10 MAYSOUN FLETCHER, ESQ.

The Fletcher Firm, P.C.
11 5510 South Fort Apache, Suite 5
Las Vegas, NV 89148
12 maf@fletcherfirmlaw.com

13 For the Defendant Ammon E. Bundy (3):

14 DANIEL HILL, ESQ.

Hill Firm
15 228 South 4th Street, 3rd Floor
Las Vegas, NV 89101
16 dan@hillfirmlawyers.com

17 JAY MORGAN PHILPOT, ESQ.

1063 East Alpine Drive
18 Alpine, UT 84004
jmorganphilpot@gmail.com
19
For the Defendant Ryan W. Payne (4):
20
BRENDA WEKSLER, AFPD
21 RYAN NORWOOD, AFPD
Federal Public Defender
22 411 East Bonneville, Suite 250
Las Vegas, NV 89101
23 brenda_weksler@fd.org
ryan_norwood@fd.org
24

25
 Vol. 5 - 3

1 (Tuesday, November 7, 2017, 8:51 a.m.)

2 --oOo--

3 P R O C E E D I N G S

4 (Jury in, 10:04 a.m.)

5 GOVERNMENT'S OPENING STATEMENT

6 MR. MYHRE: Thank you, Your Honor. May it please the

7 Court, counsel, ladies and gentlemen of the jury. Good

8 morning.

9 We are in a courtroom. And in courtrooms like this

10 here in this building, in the building across the street, and

11 countless courthouses throughout the country, matters and

12 disputes get decided. This is a place where people bring their

13 complaints, their grievances, their requests for relief of one

14 sort or another.

15 You may have -- as you walked in the building or down

16 the lobby in the last couple weeks or today, you may have

17 noticed inscribed on the wall of this courthouse, that the

18 cornerstone of the American judicial system is the trial

19 courts, where witnesses testify, jurors deliberate, and justice

20 is done.

21 And that's very true. Our American judicial system

22 is comprised of the courts and matters are decided and justice

23 is done, not just in criminal cases, and in civil cases as

24 well.

25 We all are aware, in our own common experience, where

 Vol. 5 - 4

1 we've read or heard where someone -- you know, someone goes to

2 court, and they have a claim, and their side gets heard. The

3 other side gets heard. They present evidence. They present

4 argument standing in front of a judge or a jury like I am

5 today, and the Court decides the matter.

6 And when they render that decision, when the Court

7 renders that decision, that results in an order of the Court.

8 And that order from the Court is, in fact, the law of that

9 case. It decides the dispute and tells the parties what to do.

10 So, we all have heard of, you know, A sues B, because

11 B owes money to A. The Court says, B pay A. That's an order.

12 And it's expected that that order be followed. That's how we

13 maintain peace. That's how we maintain order in our

14 communities. That's how our system of government is set up.

15 The orders are not advisory. They are not there to suggest

16 things. They are there to be followed.

17 And if the order is not followed, you can expect that

18 a law enforcement officer of one type or another will get

19 involved to enforce the order. Because if there was no

20 enforcement of an order, the orders would not be worth the

21 paper they are written on. Again, that's how we maintain the

22 peace. That's how we maintain order in our communities.

23 So, we have all read or heard of someone who hasn't

24 followed an order, and maybe a sheriff's officer or a police

25 officer has to go in and seize property to sell to pay a debt,

 Vol. 5 - 5

1 or evict a tenant who hasn't paid rent, or tear down a fence

2 that the Court has ordered it should be torn down because of

3 some violation of one thing or another.

4 So, when that law enforcement officer executes that

5 order, the law protects that officer. Protects that officer so

6 that that officer can conduct his or her duties without

7 interference, without impediment. And it is a crime to

8 obstruct the execution of a Court order.

9 It is a crime to interfere, impede, or intimidate a

10 law enforcement officer from executing the order that has been

11 issued from the Court. And it is a crime to use force and

12 violence in order to impede, intimidate, or interfere with that

13 officer as they execute the orders of the Court.

14 The defendant -- one of the defendants in this case,

15 Cliven Bundy, was subject to a Court order. The evidence will

16 show that Mr. Cliven Bundy was a Nevada rancher, during the

17 times alleged in this indictment, who ranched about 90 miles

18 northeast of here along I-15 near a little town called

19 Bunkerville, Nevada.

20 He had a 160-acre plot of private land that he used

21 to ranch from, but he grazed cattle on federal public lands.

22 His private property was surrounded by hundreds of thousands of

23 acres of federal public lands. That is lands owned and managed

24 by the United States. Those lands, in this case, were managed

25 by an agency called the Bureau of Land Management or we'll

 Vol. 5 - 6

1 refer to it shorthand as the BLM.

2 Now, in order to graze cattle, as Mr. Bundy was

3 doing, on the federal public lands, Mr. Bundy or any rancher

4 would have to obtain permits from the BLM to do so. Those

5 lands belong to everybody. And in addition to getting permits,

6 you also -- the rancher is required to pay fees to pay for the

7 amount of forage or the vegetation that the cattle graze in the

8 arid and sparse vegetation that exists out in these -- in that

9 area of the county.

10 And the evidence in this case will show that

11 Mr. Bundy indeed did pay fees and obtain permits until about

12 1993. Thereafter, he refused to do so. He refused to pay the

13 money for the foraging. He refused to get the permits. And

14 the BLM said, "You need to -- you need to pay. You need to get

15 the permits." He said, "No." He had his reasons.

16 The BLM and the -- Mr. Bundy went to court. And

17 Mr. Bundy told his side of the story, the BLM told their side

18 of the story, and the judge decided. And the judge decided,

19 "Mr. Bundy, you are in trespass. You are not paying your fees.

20 You are not getting your grazing permits. You need to remove

21 your cattle from the land."

22 Mr. Bundy refused. He refused to follow the Court

23 order. And for years, for years, he continued to graze his

24 cattle without obtaining permits or without paying fees.

25 Ultimately, the BLM came to enforce the Court orders.

 Vol. 5 - 7

1 And when they did, they brought law enforcement officers to

2 enforce those orders. The BLM went back to court and the Court

3 said, "Mr. Bundy, if you do not remove those cattle, the BLM

4 will remove them for you."

5 Again, he refused. When the BLM showed up, with law

6 enforcement officers, to remove the cattle from the public

7 lands, Mr. Bundy interfered. At first, the interference was to

8 block a few convoys or to block a convoy. To make threats that

9 he would do whatever it takes. And over time, as the BLM was

10 removing the cattle, the level of interferences escalated.

11 And eventually, Mr. Bundy began to reach out. He

12 realized quickly he wasn't going to stop the BLM from gathering

13 his cattle on his own, so he reached out to others to help him.

14 He reached out to individuals who referred to themselves as

15 militia. People who were willing to take up arms and, quote,

16 unquote "defend against tyranny."

17 And over the course of time, he raised essentially a

18 small army of militia to come help him to stop the BLM. His

19 mission became to stop the BLM and to drive them out of the

20 area of Bunkerville where this impoundment was taking place.

21 And then at a time and place of his choosing, he

22 unleashed the forces he had gathered. And he directed those

23 forces to get his cattle. And those forces were not only

24 people who were his supporters but there were people on horses,

25 and there were guns.

 Vol. 5 - 8

1 COURTROOM ADMINISTRATOR: Are you on HDMI or VGA?

2 MR. MYHRE: Oh, I don't know.

3 COURTROOM ADMINISTRATOR: It's on VGA, so you may

4 need to -- is it on?

5 MR. MYHRE: Yes.

6 COURTROOM ADMINISTRATOR: You may need to unplug it

7 and plug it back in.

8 MR. MYHRE: Nicole. This won't be the first

9 technical difficulty we have during the course of this trial,

10 or I should say it won't be the last one.

11 (Pause in the proceedings.)

12 MR. MYHRE: There we go.

13 THE COURT: You may continue. I think -- raise your

14 hand if your screen is not working.

15 All right. Thank you.

16 MR. MYHRE: Okay. Sorry for the brief technical

17 interruption.

18 But Mr. Bundy, with the help of his sons and

19 codefendants, Ammon and Ryan Bundy, and codefendant Ryan Payne

20 and others reached out to militia, brought guns to Nevada, and

21 at the time that he unleashed these forces, they led them

22 against the BLM officers who were engaged in the impoundment

23 operation. And they threatened. They intimidated. They

24 interfered. They threatened them to the point that they

25 thought that they would lose their lives, and those with them
 Vol. 5 - 9

1 with lose their lives.

2 The gunmen had come from all over the United States

3 in response to the call to arms that Mr. Bundy and the

4 codefendants had issued. And when they amassed against the

5 BLM, the BLM was put into a position that they had no

6 alternative but to back down, to surrender their position and

7 leave the site in order to avoid any bloodshed or any violence.

8 No shots were fired that day. No one received

9 injuries from shots that day. But the evidence will show

10 that's not the issue in this case. The issue is the BLM

11 officers being threatened, intimidated, and interfered with.

12 Now, the Court has already indicated that the

13 government bears the burden of proof in this case. And I've

14 just described for you briefly in a nutshell what this case is

15 about. And that's all this case is about. It's about the

16 interference through the use of force and violence in this

17 impoundment operation.

18 Our job, as the prosecutors in this case, is to

19 present the evidence to you. Our burden in this case is to

20 prove the charges by proof beyond a reasonable doubt. It is a

21 burden that is fair, it is a burden that is just, and it is a

22 burden that we will meet in this case.

23 Now, the charges in this case are contained in

24 something that's called the indictment, and that's just a fancy

25 word for a charging document. And I've listed for you here the
 Vol. 5 - 10

1 charges that have been brought in that indictment. But they

2 all spring from the basic set of facts I have just described

3 for you. The facts of bringing people, bringing guns, bringing

4 militia, bringing violence to the BLM, to the BLM officers.

5 I want you briefly -- you see the charges before you.

6 I'm going to circle back to those in a few minutes and kind of

7 walk through with you what the charges are, what we anticipate

8 the proof will be as to each of these charges.

9 At the close of the evidence in this case, you will

10 get detailed instructions from the Court as to each of the

11 elements of these offenses, and I don't intend to go through

12 that with you now. I just want to make you aware of what the

13 charges are. And what I'd like to do going forward is outline

14 for you the evidence we intend to present over the course of

15 the trial.

16 We are going to be together a long time. We are

17 going to be together for a number of weeks. And the evidence

18 is going to -- we are going to do our level best to bring in

19 the evidence chronologically covering the time frame over which

20 the BLM was gathering cattle and during the time frame in which

21 the buildup militia occurred and the assault.

22 Essentially, that would be between approximately the

23 end of March of 2014 to April 12th of 2014. That's when the

24 great bulk of these events occurred, but the story actually

25 begins much earlier than that. So, what I'd like to do is sort
 Vol. 5 - 11

1 of cover the evidence that we anticipate we'll be presenting in

2 sort of a number of different -- sort of a -- a grouping, if

3 you will, as how we anticipate the evidence will come in.

4 We will cover the sequence of events for you, the

5 Court orders, and the plan to gather the cattle. Then I'd like

6 to cover the threats that were leveled, the interference, and

7 the false messaging that occurred in order to bring militia

8 into Nevada.

9 And then I would like to delve a little bit more in

10 detail into the actual -- the assault itself and the

11 obstruction of the Court orders on April 12th, 2014.

12 So, first of all, the Court orders. Now, we started

13 off talking about the cornerstone of the American judicial

14 system and the importance of Court orders. The Court orders

15 that were involved here arise from Mr. Bundy's trespass of

16 cattle on the federal public lands. And I alluded to that at

17 the very outset.

18 Before you is a map of the area that we are talking

19 about, and this is the area that I described as northeast from

20 this spot, about 90 miles -- in Clark County, just south of

21 Mesquite, in a little town called Bunkerville.

22 So, Mr. Bundy had a ranch. It's right around this

23 area here. And you can see by this map the vastness of the

24 territory of federal public lands that surrounded his ranch.

25 That little square is where his ranch is located, and all

 Vol. 5 - 12

1 around it are public lands. The little dots, I think here,

2 represent where his cattle were roaming.

3 Now, I spoke earlier about BLM's role, the Bureau of

4 Land Management's role. And one of their roles is to -- in

5 managing this land is to try to balance the various uses that

6 everybody has for this land. You can imagine, with the size of

7 this land, with the amount of this land, there are a number of

8 people and entities that have different demands for the use of

9 this land, whether it be mining, recreationists,

10 conservationists, environmentalists, ranchers.

11 As many as different types of people are walking

12 around are about as many different types of use these people

13 would like to make of these lands. As I mentioned earlier,

14 these lands belong to everybody. Hence the requirement for the

15 BLM to require permits, so that they can manage this land so

16 that it's put to its highest and best use and is not -- it

17 remains available for everybody.

18 So, in 1993, Mr. Bundy decided that he was going to,

19 quote, "fire the BLM." And you'll hear testimony about his

20 motivations for doing that. He believed that the BLM was

21 restricting his rights to graze cattle; and, therefore, he was

22 not going to follow their rules anymore. So, he decided he

23 wasn't going to do so.

24 And he had earlier -- he had had permits before 1993

25 to graze on what was called the Bunkerville Allotment, which is

 Vol. 5 - 13

1 around the area around his ranch. Well, after he "fired" the

2 BLM, his cattle -- his herd continued to grow and spread out

3 from not only the Bunkerville Allotment but well beyond that.

4 In 1998, the BLM had sued Mr. Bundy, and the Court

5 had issued the order, the first order for him to remove his

6 cattle from the land. And we discussed that earlier. But as I

7 mentioned, the evidence will show that he refused to remove his

8 cattle from the land.

9 And as the cattle began to expand, the herd began to

10 expand, they began to spread out. The BLM, you will hear

11 evidence, did not take enforcement action in 1998 to remove the

12 cattle, even though they had every right to because of the

13 Court order. They were concerned of violence.

14 Mr. Bundy had made statements such as "I will do

15 whatever it takes to prevent anybody from removing my cattle

16 from the land."

17 He made references to -- to Waco and things of that

18 nature. References that caused concern for the BLM to try to

19 take any action for fear of any sort of confrontation. They

20 wanted to avoid confrontation.

21 And over the years, you will hear evidence they tried

22 to find a way to resolve this, even to the point where they

23 offered to remove the cattle for Mr. Bundy, and sell them, and

24 give him the money. But nothing worked. He continued to

25 refuse to follow the Court order.

 Vol. 5 - 14

1 So, by the time 2012 had rolled around, the cattle

2 had spread out from the Bunkerville Allotment and wandered all

3 the way down into the Lake Mead Recreational Area, down in this

4 year, down in through here, all around in through here, where

5 they got stuck in the mud.

6 There were issues concerning whether, you know,

7 the -- whether they -- there was a risk of potential injury to

8 others, because these cattle, you will hear, were referred to

9 or are referred to as feral. They -- they wandered through the

10 desert seeking forage and water wherever they can, but with

11 they have very little human action -- human interaction.

12 Excuse me. So, they became -- they are cattle that can be

13 dangerous around human beings.

14 So, the decision was made to do another -- to impound

15 the cattle around 2012. But because of the concern for

16 violence, because of the concern for confrontation, the

17 decision was made that BLM would go back to court and get new

18 court orders and relitigate this issue about the grazing fees

19 and the permits.

20 So, we have Court orders from 1998 and 1999 that

21 required Mr. Bundy to remove his cattle. And in 2012, there

22 were new Court orders -- or, excuse me -- BLM went back to

23 court in 2012, and in 2013, new Court orders issued.

24 And the order said that, as with the first one,

25 remove your cattle from the public lands. This time one of the
 Vol. 5 - 15

1 orders pertained to what was called the New Trespass Lands or

2 the lands around Lake Mead where these cattle had wandered, and

3 then as well as the Old Trespass Lands or the old Bunkerville

4 Allotment.

5 And the order specified that Mr. Bundy not physically

6 interfere with any seizure of the impoundment. Because during

7 the course of the litigation in 2012, Mr. Bundy had said that

8 he again would do whatever it takes to prevent anyone from

9 removing his cattle from the public lands. He would not define

10 what that meant. He refused to define what that meant other

11 than leave it to one's imagination what he meant by that.

12 So, with new Court orders in hand, BLM then proceeded

13 to plan to gather the cattle. This was a very large

14 undertaking, as you can imagine. There are approximately --

15 these cattle were scattered throughout approximately

16 587,000 acres of land. It was going to require the use of

17 contractors to gather the cattle, use of helicopters to find

18 them, to help round them up, use of trucks to move the cattle

19 to where they were gathered to an area where they would be

20 held.

21 So, the plan was that the BLM would contract with

22 various contractors to gather the cattle. They would be held

23 in an area which we will refer to as the ICP, and I will

24 explain what that is in a little bit. But they would be held

25 there, and then the BLM would contract with an auction barn in
 Vol. 5 - 16

1 Utah where the cattle would then be transported and sold. So,

2 they would gather, held at the ICP, and then transferred to

3 Utah.

4 Now, the assault that we are going to talk about

5 occurred at the ICP. And you have a visual of that on your

6 screen before you. It was located on the Interstate 15, about

7 7 miles from the Bundy Ranch property, the private property of

8 the Bundy Ranch, and it was located on public lands.

9 It was near the Interstate 15 in an area call the

10 Toquop Wash. And Toquop Wash will be referenced quite a bit

11 throughout these proceedings. And the Toquop Wash was just an

12 old -- dried-up old ditch that had been used previously,

13 perhaps, as a place to hold gravel or to get gravel. But it

14 was -- had -- it provided easy access to and from the

15 interstate so that BLM could use that as a gathering spot.

16 It also was far enough away, the BLM believed, from

17 the Bundy property so as not to create a chance for

18 confrontation, to avoid any confrontation, but yet be able to

19 effectively gather the cattle.

20 And you see in this image before you now that the ICP

21 was up here in the Interstate 15 area. The Bundy Ranch

22 property, as I said, was about seven miles away here. And

23 running in sort of a loop off of the 15 -- and this is the 15.

24 To your right is northbound towards Salt Lake City. To your

25 left would be southbound towards Las Vegas. It actually runs

 Vol. 5 - 17

1 east/west at this particular corridor.

2 And so right along here is State Route 170 that would

3 run around and loop down from the Interstate 15 and loop back

4 up into the Mesquite area. And State Route 170 was a surface

5 road that BLM would use in order to convoy or to move cattle

6 from the gathering, to the state -- to the ICP. That was not

7 the only route they would use, but it was a route that they

8 would use from time to time.

9 In the image we have before you now is a picture of

10 the ICP itself. And all the equipment that you see there would

11 have to be trucked in. There were no -- there was no

12 infrastructure there. There was no running water or power, so

13 everything had to be carted in. Everything from water, to

14 portable generators and so forth.

15 And you see here are the pens where the cattle were

16 held after they were gathered and brought to the ICP, and there

17 they would be wait -- they would wait until they would be

18 trucked or shipped off to the auction barn for sale.

19 Now, with the Court orders in hand, the BLM

20 established that they would -- planned that they would begin

21 this operation around the April 2014 time period because of the

22 weather and so forth. It was conducive to this.

23 But before they went out there, they tried to

24 ascertain what the intent of Mr. Bundy would be when he got

25 there. So, in February of 2014, then Sheriff Gillespie went to

 Vol. 5 - 18

1 the Bundy Ranch to speak with Mr. Bundy and tell him, "Look.

2 The BLM has new Court orders. I have reviewed them. They have

3 full authority to come out here and gather your cattle. What

4 are you going to do?"

5 He was nonresponsive. But his -- one of his sons,

6 Ryan, said, "We are going to do whatever it takes to protect

7 our property." The sheriff will testify that he heard, for

8 example, "Sheriff, do your job. Your job is to kick BLM out of

9 here." And the sheriff left concerned that there was a

10 potential for violence, a potential for confrontation, because

11 despite the sheriff's admonition that, hey, this is all fully

12 authorized and everything is in order, Mr. Bundy still said he

13 would take -- he would do whatever it takes.

14 In March 2014, agents from the BLM spoke with Ryan

15 Bundy, Mr. Cliven Bundy's son, and said, "Look. We are

16 reaching out to let you know that we are coming. We are coming

17 to gather the cattle. We have Court orders. What is your

18 intent?"

19 And you will hear the recording of that interchange

20 between the agent from the BLM and Mr. Bundy. And the gist of

21 it was, "If you want to avoid violence, don't come. And if you

22 do come, we will have hundreds in support of us to keep you

23 from doing your job, to prevent you from gathering the cattle."

24 So in March 28th, the BLM started to move equipment

25 into the ICP in order to begin their impoundment operation.

 Vol. 5 - 19

1 And right from the get-go, Mr. Bundy interfered. And you will

2 see evidence of how, as the -- as the contractors are

3 attempting to move equipment into the ICP, Mr. Bundy and his

4 sons blocked them. Tried to block them. Tried to interfere

5 with them setting up. Some -- one of his sons making his

6 gesture. Reaching into his -- into his front coat as if to

7 reach for something. But a very early indicator that the --

8 very early indicator of the intent to stop them and intent to

9 interfere. So, that was at the early outset.

10 On April 2nd, the BLM actually began. They had set

11 up and they were beginning their impoundment operation, the

12 actually physically gathering the cattle. And Ryan Bundy

13 attempted to interfere by going to the auction barn in Utah

14 that I described for you earlier as the place where the cattle

15 would be shipped and sold. And he showed up there with his

16 supporters, and he threatened to disrupt the business there.

17 Now, the owner of the auction barn is just a private

18 individual who entered into a contract with BLM to sell these

19 cattle. He had done some renovations to his auction barn in

20 order to handle these cattle, which were wild, and he was

21 attempting to carry out his contract with the BLM.

22 Mr. Cliven Bundy had called him and basically

23 threatened to shut him down if you cooperate with the BLM. He

24 said, "You're dealing in stolen cattle."

25 So, March 28th, when the block first began, at the

 Vol. 5 - 20

1 same time that that occurred, Mr. Bundy began messaging. He

2 went on social media, and he said words to the effect of the

3 BLM is stealing our cattle. The BLM is closing off the land

4 for anybody to use, and we are standing up for you. You hear

5 music referencing we have got the varmints on the run and guns.

6 So, by the time April 2nd rolls around, these threats

7 begin to take new form. After blocking, on March 28th,

8 Mr. Bundy had called and threatened to shut the business down.

9 Again, this notion that BLM was stealing cattle. False. A

10 false message. But that's the message that he was conveying on

11 social media calling for people for his support -- to support

12 him. Excuse me.

13 This is an image of the auction barn where the cattle

14 were to be sold and Photoshopped along the top of this are the

15 words "Stolen cattle for sale."

16 Bundy family members were putting things like this

17 out on social media in order to hurt the business of this

18 auctioneer. And you will hear evidence that in this line of

19 business for selling cattle, to say that someone is dealing in

20 stolen cattle goes to the very core of their being.

21 It goes to the very core of what they are about,

22 because much of their business as an auctioneer depends solely

23 on their reputation. And someone who is accused of stealing

24 cattle or dealing in stolen cattle loses that reputation. The

25 Bundy family attacked that individual's reputation.

 Vol. 5 - 21

1 And on April 2nd, Ryan Bundy showed up at the auction

2 barn to physically confront the auctioneer and to physically

3 interfere with that business, so much so that the county

4 sheriff was called to respond. And when the sheriff confronted

5 Mr. Ryan Bundy, he said that he was there to get his cattle

6 back, that they were stolen, and that he would use force if

7 necessary.

8 The sheriff of Richfield, where this event took place

9 in Utah, was so concerned that he wrote a letter to the

10 governor expressing concern about the potential for force and

11 violence as a result of Mr. Bundy's actions, Mr. Ryan Bundy's

12 actions.

13 So, notwithstanding all of these threats, all of this

14 level of interference, all the false messaging that was going

15 on, Mr. Bundy still was not getting the support necessary to

16 stop the BLM. They had come out there, and they had, you know,

17 continued with their operation.

18 By the time April 6th rolls around, there's another

19 attempt at interference. This time Ryan Bundy and his brother

20 Dave Bundy had staged -- and others working with them staged an

21 area on State Route 170, that loop that I described to you

22 earlier, in order to block a convoy.

23 And just a little word about these convoys and the

24 blocking of them, why it's important. You'll hear evidence

25 that, you know, these convoys move -- it's very large

 Vol. 5 - 22

1 equipment. They are moving cattle. It's very difficult. If

2 they get stopped, if they get blocked, it's not like they can

3 just turn around and move in another direction. It's very

4 difficult to do. And when they are stopped, and when they are

5 blocked, they are vulnerable. They are vulnerable to anyone

6 who wants to do harm, or wants to do violence, or wants to

7 disrupt their operation.

8 So, when law enforcement officers saw that Ryan Bundy

9 and Dave Bundy were set up to block a convoy that was just

10 coming out onto State Route 170, the BLM officers confronted

11 them. Asked them to leave. They refused. They asked them to

12 leave multiple times. They refused. Ultimately, law

13 enforcement officers responded and arrested Dave Bundy.

14 Right down there is the arrest of Dave Bundy, and

15 over here in this white van is Mr. Ryan Bundy. Mr. Ryan Bundy

16 ultimately left. Mr. Dave Bundy was arrested for refusing to

17 leave the closed area.

18 Now, I want to speak just briefly on how -- why law

19 enforcement officers were there to respond to this and how law

20 enforcement was going to provide security during the course of

21 this impoundment operation.

22 I described for you how this gather operation would

23 take place over vast areas of land and involve helicopters and

24 convoys. BLM's plan for security was to provide concentric

25 rings of security. And you will hear more about that as we go

 Vol. 5 - 23

1 on.

2 Suffice to say here that the security, the officers

3 would move to where the gather operation took place. So, if

4 they moved to a particular area, that area would be closed to

5 the public. Would not be open for everyone to use. They would

6 close it, do their gather, gather up the cattle, and then move

7 to the ICP. Law enforcement officers moved with them and

8 provided a ring of security to avoid anybody getting in there

9 to -- to interfere with the impoundment.

10 Now, during the impoundment operation, there are

11 about somewhere between, anywhere between about 84 to 100 law

12 enforcement officers. These law enforcement officers were from

13 the park service and from the Bureau of Land Management. They

14 are duly sworn law enforcement officers, sworn to uphold the

15 law and have authority to make arrests and so forth.

16 So, as this convoy on the 6th was moving out, the law

17 enforcement officers were with it. And when they spotted and

18 when they saw the attempt to block, that caused them to

19 respond. That caused them to make an arrest, a lawful arrest,

20 a lawful arrest for failing to -- to remove themselves from

21 that closed area.

22 So, after the arrest of Dave Bundy on April 6, the

23 messaging began to escalate. So, where before, as I described

24 for you it was a -- you know, the BLM is stealing my cattle,

25 and an attempt to block the convoy. Now messaging changed from

 Vol. 5 - 24

1 they got my cattle to now they've got one of my boys. And

2 that's -- and that snipers are in fact pointed at us.

3 And the image you have that you see here is the type

4 of messaging that was going out over social media to gather as

5 many people that they could possibly bring attention to this to

6 try to inflame the emotions and try to persuade people that

7 somehow Mr. Bundy and his family was being abused.

8 Now, during the arrest of Dave Bundy, up here on the

9 top of this hill were two officers who were in overwatch

10 position. In other words, they were providing security for the

11 officers down here who were making the arrest. Perfectly

12 legitimate law enforcement operation. Nothing unlawful about

13 it at all.

14 Someone of the Bundy supporters took a photo of that

15 and transformed that these were now snipers pointed at us just

16 for taking pictures. Another photo of the officers who were

17 there to protect the convoy, to provide security for the

18 convoy, that now they are making the plans to attack us.

19 Now, as you hear the evidence, ladies and gentlemen,

20 come in, you will see that the confrontations that occur

21 between, you know, March until ultimately April 12th were all

22 the results -- all the result of these defendants going to the

23 BLM, of interfering with the BLM. The BLM was just there doing

24 its job gathering the cattle.

25 If Mr. Bundy, the evidence will show, had taken his

 Vol. 5 - 25

1 cattle off the land, as the orders required, there would be no

2 need for the BLM to be there to take them off. If he would

3 have followed the Court orders, the Bureau of Land Management

4 would have no further issue with Mr. Bundy. But because he

5 refused, it required the BLM to go out there and do it. It

6 required law enforcement officers to accompany them to provide

7 security.

8 And the messaging that was put out by the Bundys, by

9 the Bundys and their supporters, was that this was BLM being a

10 large Army that was coming to attack them, was coming to

11 interfere with them, was coming to abuse them. And you will

12 hear how the messaging transformed from stealing cattle to now

13 they've got snipers aimed at us. Now they've got our house

14 surrounded. Now we can't move. We've got to shelter in place.

15 We can't do anything because the BLM has got us surrounded.

16 And that was false, and that was the type of

17 messaging that attracted a certain type of individual, and it

18 attracted the attention of Ryan Payne, one of the defendants in

19 this case.

20 Now, you'll hear testified and evidence about --

21 about Mr. Payne. He was -- he lived in Montana before April of

22 2014. Never heard of the Bundys. Never met them. Didn't know

23 anything about cattle ranching. Wasn't a rancher himself, but

24 he was the head of an organization that he referred to as

25 Operation Mutual Aid. And you will hear him, and you will see
 Vol. 5 - 26

1 evidence of how he described this organization.

2 It was essentially a network of militia, of people

3 who are -- are militia like-minded people who believed that if

4 the government is acting tyrannically, is acting outside the

5 constitution, citizens then have the right to confront them, to

6 arrest them, to threaten violence, to use force in order to,

7 quote, unquote "get the government to comply with the

8 constitution," or as he describes it, put them in a box, back

9 in their box constitutionally.

10 So this -- the messaging now that was put out by the

11 Bundys and the Bundy supporters attracted -- caught the

12 attention of Ryan Payne. You will hear evidence that Ryan

13 Payne and his network of like-minded militia were actually

14 looking for something where they could respond to.

15 And the concept of OMA was to essentially provide

16 what they describe as a quick reaction force or a QRF that

17 would be -- the militia groups around the country would be

18 networked through social media, and -- and the Internet, and

19 they would be alerted as to a constitutional violation going

20 on, and then alerted to respond with guns to that situation to

21 prevent the government from acting tyrannically.

22 By April 7th, Ryan Payne had heard of these

23 confrontations through social media. He had heard of the

24 arrest of Dave Bundy. He had heard the message that the Bundy

25 residence was being surrounded, and so he reached out in his

 Vol. 5 - 27

1 network to call in the militia.

2 And this is just an image of the website. You will

3 hear evidence that, you know, Payne and his co-founder of OMA,

4 Jerry Bruckhart, put up a website which described their

5 mission, and you will hear about their mission and their

6 mission statement and so forth during the course of this trial.

7 But suffice to say, in summary form, what I just

8 described for you was their mission, was to respond to the call

9 and to come and act as a quick reaction force, if you will.

10 So, around the 7th of April, Payne and Jerry

11 Bruckhart, his co-founder of the OMA, put out an action alert,

12 based on the information they heard that, hey, you know, the

13 government is now abusing the Bundy family.

14 And they used messages like this that you have before

15 you and other messages much like this as well, but this was the

16 type of messaging that was going out that, as you see there,

17 "His son was arrested for taking pictures. There are snipers

18 on surrounding hilltops. They have isolated his family

19 completely. Nobody is allowed outside the established

20 perimeter." And this was the early alert for militia to come

21 to Nevada.

22 And by April the 8th, Payne and his -- another one of

23 his fellow militia members traveled down to Nevada from

24 Montana. Got here sometime early on the April 8th, 2014. This

25 image is of Jim Lardy, one of the individuals he brought with

 Vol. 5 - 28

1 him. This is a member of OMA. This is a member of a militia

2 group that accompanied Payne.

3 When he got here, him being Mr. Lardy, he was

4 interviewed by Channel 8 News. And at the time, as these

5 things began to expand, it was drawing more and more media

6 attention as more militia were coming to Nevada. And one of

7 the reporters asked Mr. Lardy, "Why do you have your gun?" And

8 he said, "Because they," referring to the BLM law enforcement

9 officers, "they have guns." He said, "We provide an armed

10 response, an armed response."

11 Mr. Payne was interviewed shortly after he got to

12 Nevada and to Bundy Ranch. And he said, "I am here as the head

13 of or the leader of Operation Mutual Aid. We are a group of

14 militia who respond to these situations." He indicated that

15 militia units from all over the country were responding to

16 OMA's alert, and they were responding by coming to Bundy Ranch

17 to, quote, unquote "protect against tyranny."

18 Now, while all this was going on, the BLM continued

19 with their impoundment operation. And the last confrontation

20 was on April the 6th I would describe. By April the 9th,

21 things ratcheted up considerably. Also by April 9th, another

22 individual, who was drawn to the social media of messaging that

23 was going on, also entered the picture, an individual by the

24 name of Pete Santilli.

25 And you will hear evidence about Pete Santilli during

 Vol. 5 - 29

1 the course of the trial. That he was a blog/talk radio host.

2 And he had a certain following of like-minded individuals. And

3 he would broad -- he broadcasted that the Bundys were being

4 abused. That the BLM was surrounding their house. That they

5 were sheltered in place and so forth.

6 On April the 8th, Pete Santilli actually interviewed

7 Cliven Bundy on his radio show. And during the course of that

8 interview -- and you will hear that interview -- they talked

9 about militia. And Mr. Bundy said, "Well, I haven't decided

10 yet whether to call in the militia, but maybe it's time for

11 that." And Mr. Bundy, on -- Cliven Bundy, on this talk slow,

12 described how he was being, quote, unquote "abused."

13 At the end of that broadcast, Pete Santilli said,

14 "It's time we all gather together and we respond to this." He

15 says, "If you can legally carry, you got a gun, get to Nevada.

16 This will not stand. We need to back down the BLM."

17 So, Pete Santilli then joined forces with Ryan Payne

18 and Ammon and Ryan and Cliven Bundy to continue the call to

19 arms. And Pete Santilli began his messaging that if we show

20 enough force, if we get enough people out here, if we have the

21 militia here, they will back down, they being the BLM.

22 By April 9th, both Santilli and Payne are on the

23 ground at Bundy Ranch. Santilli coming from California to

24 Bundy Ranch. On April 9th, Santilli leads a group of people to

25 block a convoy coming out onto State Route 170, as I described.

 Vol. 5 - 30

1 This was a confrontation that grew very quickly, very

2 violent, and really marks, if you will, the demarcation point

3 where before we had, you know, little increases of violence and

4 confrontation. On April 9th, things really take a jump.

5 As the BLM was coming out of the public lands onto

6 State Route 70, Santilli blocks the convoy and is leading a

7 group of people to block the convoy as well. Pete Santilli and

8 other Bundy supporters attempt to get in front of the vehicles

9 and stop them.

10 And as I mentioned before, when these convoys get

11 stopped, the evidence will show that's when things become

12 really vulnerable for the members of the convoy and for the law

13 enforcement officers as well.

14 Now, during the course of this blocking of the

15 convoy, you will see evidence that -- of people being tased, of

16 K9 units being used, of people being thrown to the ground, a

17 violent confrontation. Again, this was initiated by the Bundy

18 supporters led by Pete Santilli.

19 Here you see an image of an individual, a relative of

20 Mr. Cliven Bundy named Margaret Houston. As she attempted to

21 jump in front of a vehicle, a law enforcement officer, in order

22 to keep the convoy moving and for her own security, threw her

23 to the ground.

24 At the same time or shortly after that was happening,

25 Mr. Ammon Bundy approached from the opposite direction in an

 Vol. 5 - 31

1 ATV and rammed his ATV into the truck to stop the truck. This

2 was the last truck in that convoy.

3 And as officers responded to the block by Ammon

4 Bundy, Ammon Bundy took a swing at them and became very violent

5 and very confrontational. He refused to move the ATV. And

6 when an officer told him to back away, Ammon Bundy became

7 violent and aggressive and moved toward the officer. That

8 caused another officer, who had a K9 officer with him -- and

9 you'll hear the description and hear the training of the K9

10 that was used that day.

11 The K9 was deployed on Mr. Ammon Bundy, and he, in

12 turn, attempted to kick the dog. As he attempted to kick the

13 dog, he was tased in order to move him back away from the

14 officer who was attempting to remove the ATV. And

15 unfortunately, during the course of this, the dog as well got

16 tased because of an electrode that was -- that hit him and

17 caused him to back down.

18 The confrontation continued. People got -- were very

19 agitated and were getting close up to the officers. And

20 officers, ladies and gentlemen, have every right to protect

21 themselves and to protect those that they are guarding. And in

22 that convoy were civilian contractors, and in that

23 particular -- and in that particular truck especially, there

24 were civilian contractors in there as well.

25 And the officers are continually telling this crowd

 Vol. 5 - 32

1 to back -- back away, back up, create space, let us move. And

2 the crowd continued to surge forward on them, continuing to

3 confront them. Here you see an individual, some -- one of the

4 supporters picked up a rock as if to throw it at the officers.

5 A BLM officer responded and brought the rock down. Could have

6 used much greater force, but just used -- tried to calm the

7 situation, a very violent situation, by lowering the rock.

8 As the officers again attempted to remove the ATV to

9 free the convoy, Ammon Bundy lunged at an officer again, this

10 time grabbing the officer by the arm as he attempted to remove

11 the ATV. That caused him to be tased again, and he backed --

12 he backed away ultimately, and the officers were able to remove

13 the ATV and get the convoy moving again.

14 Now, those are the events as they occurred. And you

15 will hear a lot of testimony about April the 9th, and how the

16 assault by Ammon Bundy evolved, and how it -- how this

17 encounter quickly escalated to violence, and how the officers

18 responded to that violence.

19 Now, in this image you see up in the right-hand

20 corner an image of Pete Santilli who led the assault that day.

21 And so the messaging went out from Santilli from this was a

22 couple of things. In essence, one was, "Hey, we saw the BLM

23 back down. We had enough forces there. Nobody got arrested.

24 They didn't touch us. They didn't do anything to us. They

25 backed away."
 Vol. 5 - 33

1 They, quote, unquote "surrendered and left with their

2 tail between their legs." That was the messaging there. And

3 his messaging continued as "We need more people out here. We

4 need the militia. This has the potential for another Waco or a

5 Ruby Ridge. You need get out here. The BLM will back down.

6 If we show force, the BLM will back down." He also was saying

7 the Bundys were being abused. That protesters were being --

8 were being abused.

9 Now, just a word about protests. You heard during

10 the course of voir dire references to protests, the First

11 Amendment, free speech. These events, ladies and gentlemen, of

12 April the 9th and April the 12th that we will be going into,

13 that was not a protest. Those were not protests.

14 A protest is where you attempt to send a message and

15 you do it peacefully. This case is not about protesting. This

16 case is about use of violence, instilling fear in people

17 through use of violence, and that crosses a line way over a

18 protest, and that gets into actually breaking the law.

19 So, it's not about the message. And you will -- you

20 will hear, throughout the trial, and you will hear through the

21 government's evidence the messaging that was attempting to go

22 out. What they claimed were the grievances or the issues here.

23 But it wasn't about -- this case is not about the message.

24 The First Amendment is something we all value very

25 much, and we all -- it's one of the hallmarks. It's one of the
 Vol. 5 - 34

1 defining characteristics of our nation to be able to stand up,

2 and state your mind, and say what you believe in. It's not

3 about the message. It's about the means that they used, the

4 use of guns and the use of violence.

5 Your Honor, should we take a short break? We can

6 break here for a few minutes.

7 THE COURT: All right. We will go ahead and take

8 a -- about a 15-minute break.

9 And during this time, I do remind the jury that you

10 are not to discuss this case with anyone or permit anyone to

11 discuss it with you. You may speak to your fellow jurors about

12 other things but not about the case.

13 Please do not listen to or review or read anything

14 that touches upon this case nor attempt to perform any research

15 or any independent investigation. Remember, write down your

16 questions if you have any. And now, please do not form any

17 opinion until we are all done with the case.

18 So, we will go ahead and take, like, a 15-minute

19 stretch and restroom break, and then we'll meet back up in

20 here.

21 MR. MYHRE: Thank you, Your Honor.

22 THE COURT: Please stand for the jury.

23 (Jury out.)

24 THE COURT: We will be in recess.

25 (Recess, 11:04 a.m. Resumed, 11:27 a.m. Jury in.)

 Vol. 5 - 35

1 THE COURT: All right. Everyone else may be seated.

2 We are going to resume with the government's opening statement.

3 Mr. Myhre, whenever you ready, sir.

4 MR. MYHRE: Thank you, Your Honor. Welcome back,

5 ladies and gentlemen. So, when we broke, we were discussing

6 the events of April 9th, and I spoke about Pete Santilli.

7 And what I didn't mention to you as well was that he

8 had selectively videotaped this event on April the 9th, this

9 confrontation, this assault that occurred on April the 9th.

10 And we already described for you the messaging that went out

11 with this.

12 But you will see evidence that this videotape

13 actually went viral. There was over a million hits. It was

14 just -- it's something that captured fire in the Internet

15 community, in the social media community. By now already

16 conventional media, conventional press were already showing up

17 at Bundy Ranch over this controversy, as it was described, that

18 was growing.

19 And with this, after April the 9th, as I had

20 mentioned, this was sort of the demarcation point, and events

21 began to accelerate very rapidly after April the 9th. By this

22 time, Ryan Payne, as I mentioned had been -- was on the ground

23 at Bundy Ranch. Militia members through the OMA networking

24 were responding. They were coming to Nevada with guns.

25 Ryan Payne had established a militia camp around the

 Vol. 5 - 36

1 Bundy Ranch area. Along with Ammon Bundy and his brothers,

2 they established a place where people who identified themselves

3 as militia when they arrived would be sent to this camp.

4 That's where the guns were. That's where they were kept

5 separate and apart from those who showed up merely to lend

6 support, or to wave a sign, or to yell and scream and so forth.

7 By April the 9th, Ryan Payne is interviewed, and he

8 mentions -- he tells the interviewer that who he is, and that

9 militia units are responding to Bundy Ranch. And he's asked

10 the question, you know -- you know, "Is there a potential for

11 violence?" And he says, "We all want peace. We want peace,

12 but only way for this to end peacefully is for BLM to move --

13 to remove themselves."

14 And you will hear reference to objectives that Ryan

15 Payne had issued to his OMA members, what their objectives were

16 when they arrived at Bundy Ranch.

17 Now, you'll hear throughout the course of the trial

18 references to what I'll call double speak, which is saying one

19 thing but meaning quite another. So, you will hear references,

20 for example, that we want this to end peacefully, but we are

21 prepared to die to do it. We want this to end peacefully, but

22 for that to happen, you need leave. We will show force, but we

23 will do it peacefully, as if to suggest that this is lawful

24 activity when it's not. There is nothing lawful about using

25 force and violence against law enforcement officers.

 Vol. 5 - 37

1 And so you will hear references to that throughout

2 the course of this trial. The thing that we ask that you bear

3 in mind as you hear those references is bear them in mind as to

4 what the objectives were that were published by OMA and what

5 these defendants all agreed to.

6 So, the evidence will show that after Payne arrived

7 at Bundy Ranch, he met with Cliven Bundy. And Payne and Bundy

8 discuss what the objectives were for all the militia who were

9 coming here. And they published -- they published these

10 objectives in an email that went out among all the militia

11 members who belonged to this network.

12 And they are described there as "Protect the Bundys."

13 And again, this notion of protect, when, in fact, they are

14 engaged in unlawful activity. "Open the lands," and lastly,

15 "Return the cattle to Mr. Bundy." So, the objectives were

16 included to return the cattle that had been impounded back to

17 Cliven Bundy.

18 So, as more and more militia, as more and more guns

19 began to flock to Bundy Ranch, to the Bundy Ranch area, the BLM

20 became so concerned, the BLM law enforcement officers became so

21 concerned of the potential for violence, that they decided to

22 end the impoundment operation. They sent out a public

23 statement saying that they were stopping the gather, and they

24 were going to remove their assets from the area.

25 And this is the image I have here of the ICP, which I

 Vol. 5 - 38

1 should explain a little further. The ICP stands for incident

2 command post. This is just a fancy word for this is

3 essentially the makeshift police station, if you will. This is

4 where the head of the impoundment operation, the Supervisory

5 Special Agent by the name of Dan Love, was the incident -- he

6 will be referred to as the incident commander. He was the one

7 who had overall charge of the gather operation, and it was from

8 this area that communications would go out from the incident --

9 or, excuse me -- from the command post.

10 Officers would be dispatched from this area. This

11 was the area, as I mentioned before, where the cattle would be

12 kept. So, that's -- that was the function, if you will, of the

13 ICP.

14 Now, about 5 miles away from the ICP, the Bundy

15 supporters and Cliven Bundy and the codefendants here

16 established a little staging area. They put up a makeshift

17 stage, an area where their supporters would gather, and it's

18 from this point that they held rallies. And they would hold

19 rallies and talk about their ideology and what their beliefs

20 were and so forth, and they would use this area as a place

21 where everybody could gather and discuss these things.

22 And as I mentioned, the militia camp was located not

23 far from this staging area, as we will refer to it, right down

24 here around old Gold Butte Road or Gold Butte Road off of Route

25 170 just across the river from the stage area. And this is
 Vol. 5 - 39

1 where the militia would gather, and this is where the militia

2 were -- essentially, where they would be camping.

3 Now, April the 9th was a Wednesday. By Friday, April

4 the 11th, I mentioned the potential -- because of all the guns

5 that were now in the area from the militia, the BLM said they

6 were going to remove their -- their assets from the area.

7 So now I want to bring you to Saturday, April 12th.

8 Now, things had grown -- had grown to such a potential for

9 violence that the sheriff of Clark County, Sheriff Doug

10 Gillespie, at the time, went out to this staging area to speak

11 with Cliven Bundy.

12 And his purpose of going there was to deescalate the

13 tensions, because he saw the emotions were running high. His

14 purpose was to communicate that BLM was removing their assets

15 and their resources and had stopped the gather and hoped to

16 ratchet things down.

17 His goal was to meet with Cliven Bundy privately.

18 Cliven Bundy refused to meet with him. Instead, Cliven Bundy

19 and the codefendants in this case held a rally, and hundreds,

20 and hundreds, and hundreds of people there. Hundreds of people

21 angry, upset by the BLM and the BLM gather operation.

22 So, Cliven Bundy said, "Sheriff, if you want to meet

23 with me, you will meet with me on stage." So, the sheriff took

24 the stage, and from the hundreds of these -- of the people that

25 were there yelling and screaming, the sheriff communicated to

 Vol. 5 - 40

1 Cliven Bundy. He told Cliven Bundy, "The BLM is ending its

2 operation. The BLM is removing its assets. The BLM is opening

3 up the land for everybody to use." And this was met with

4 everybody cheering. Everybody happy.

5 And then someone from the crowd yelled, "What about

6 the cattle?" And the sheriff paused for a moment and said,

7 "Well" -- in speaking to Cliven Bundy, he said, "Well, the

8 cattle are where they have always been," meaning the ICP.

9 "That's something you and I are going to have to talk about,"

10 and then he handed the mike to Cliven Bundy.

11 And Cliven Bundy responded. And he said, in front of

12 the crowd, that he was not here to negotiate with the sheriff.

13 He said instead, "I'm here to put legs under him." And then he

14 made a series of demands of the sheriff. And among those

15 demands, he said, "Disarm the park service," meaning the park

16 service police, the BLM officers there at the ICP. He said,

17 "Disarm them and bring the guns back here to this stage and

18 stack them." He said, "And you do this in one hour."

19 And he made other demands as well. Knock down the

20 toll both -- toll booth entrances to the national parks and so

21 forth. But his primary message was disarm, return here in an

22 hour, stack arms. And this was met with great cheers as well.

23 So, where the sheriff had tried to deescalate and

24 ratchet, Cliven Bundy reratcheted everything back up and

25 everybody was worked up. So, with that the sheriff left. He
 Vol. 5 - 41

1 went back to the ICP.

2 They had a discussion among the command group there,

3 and the sheriff left for Las Vegas, and left in charge of

4 security for the ICP his then assistant sheriff, now current

5 sheriff, Joseph Lombardo. And Lombard was with Sheriff

6 Gillespie at the time that he was on the stage.

7 And Sheriff Lombardo as well as everybody could see

8 on the stage the militia members that were there. They now had

9 formed details as if to be personal security for Cliven Bundy,

10 and they accompanied him wherever he went. And here they are

11 in front of the stage as the -- as Bundy addresses the crowd.

12 So, the sheriff left, and the hour came and went.

13 And obviously, the sheriff wasn't going to disarm the BLM.

14 There was nothing to disarm. They are law enforcement

15 officers. They are authorized to carry weapons. They are

16 authorized to enforce the law. The demands were ridiculous.

17 So, after the hour came and went and the sheriff

18 hadn't returned, the crowd again was worked up. And they said,

19 "Cliven, what are we going to do? What are we going to do?"

20 So, Cliven took the stage again. Cliven Bundy took the stage

21 again. And in addressing the crowd, he gave them directions.

22 He worked them up a little bit talking about freedom, and

23 opening up the lands, and being a free people, et cetera. And

24 then he said, "I want you to go up and release the cattle."

25 Now, at the time that the sheriff made the speech,

 Vol. 5 - 42

1 not only were there people there that were there to support

2 him, we had the militia in uniform, there were people with

3 guns, there were guns all over the place you'll hear testimony.

4 But also there were a group of about 40 people on horseback.

5 And when the sheriff left, the people on horseback sort of

6 magically appeared and took the high ground overlooking the

7 stage area. And there they remained for the hour that -- that

8 came and went.

9 And so when Cliven Bundy took the stage again an hour

10 later, he said, "I want you to release my cattle. I want you

11 to go up the freeway, and I want you to block the freeway."

12 And he said, "These people on horses, they are going to go up

13 the Powerline Road," which is not along the freeway, "and they

14 are going to meet you up at the Toquop Wash."

15 Remember, I mentioned the Toquop Wash was where the

16 ICP was located. He said, "When you get up there, you meet

17 with the horse people or the people on horses," and off they

18 went. And that's when everybody got in their trucks, their

19 cars, their vehicles, the people on horseback took off, and

20 most importantly, the militia took off. The people with guns

21 took off, and they went to the ICP to release the cattle as

22 Cliven Bundy had instructed them.

23 And here is an image of Ryan Payne who was on the

24 stage with Cliven Bundy. And when Cliven Bundy gave the

25 direction, the demand, if you will, to release the cattle, Ryan

 Vol. 5 - 43

1 Bundy -- or, excuse me -- Ryan Payne began speaking with his

2 militia members who were there, and began talking to them, and

3 they began to move as well. And in this image you see Ryan

4 Bundy right behind them off to your right.

5 And so the militia moved out. People with guns moved

6 out. The horses moved out, and all the other supporters moved

7 out including men, women, and children who were not carrying

8 arms.

9 Now here is an image of the horses moving. And

10 throughout the course of the trial, ladies and gentlemen, you

11 will see a lot of video on this. And I'm not going to spend a

12 lot of time on it now other than to help show how the sequence

13 of events began to unfold on the 12th.

14 So, here's an image I showed earlier of the different

15 locations. We have the ICP up here, the Toquop Wash. We have

16 Bundy Ranch down here. This is the stage area just on the

17 other side -- or, excuse me -- just off of State Route 170.

18 It's about 5 miles by road from there to the ICP.

19 So, it took a while for people to get there, but the

20 ones who drove in vehicles took a route something along this up

21 the State Route 170, and then hit the interstate going

22 northbound toward the Interstate 15. And they began to

23 assemble just at the -- across from the entrance to the ICP,

24 which is called Post 1, and we'll talk a little bit about that

25 in just a second.
 Vol. 5 - 44

1 So, Cliven Bundy gave the directions for everybody to

2 go release his cattle about 11:00 in the morning. By 11:20,

3 people had made their way, some began to make their way, and by

4 11:20 were starting to arrive at the front entrance to the ICP.

5 And here you see an aerial shot of the area directly across or

6 just south of the ICP, in this case, right here.

7 This is an area that we'll refer to throughout trial

8 as the assembly area. This is where the militia and other

9 Bundy -- and the people who are now following Bundy's commands,

10 the followers would gather, and that's where they essentially

11 would all assemble.

12 So, by 11:20, people are moving up to the -- up to

13 the ICP. And this image helps to orient you as to the

14 different geographical locations of where the assault occurred.

15 So, we have the main entrance, which we've demarcated here as

16 Post 1. Just to the east of it is what's called Post 2.

17 Post 2 is in the Toquop Wash. It was basically a

18 makeshift gate that had been erected between the pillars of the

19 southbound lane of the I-15. This is -- this topmost lane here

20 is southbound going towards Las Vegas. Under that -- under

21 that bridge was a makeshift gate to block entrance from anyone

22 coming up from the Toquop Wash.

23 Post 2 is where BLM would post security. During the

24 night and during the day, they had 24-hour security around the

25 ICP, to guard the cattle, guard the equipment, and most

 Vol. 5 - 45

1 importantly guard the civilian workers who were working in the

2 ICP. And I mentioned the assembly area.

3 Now, as people began -- once the followers and the

4 militia began to gather in the assembly area, you'll see how

5 the Las Vegas metropolitan police began to respond. They have

6 a saturation team, as they will call it. They had Metro

7 officers, about 20 of them, staged just along the southbound

8 area so that they could quickly respond.

9 But as you'll hear testimony, it would be

10 difficult -- it was extremely difficult to call more backup or

11 more officers to this area because they were so far. This is

12 about 80, 90 miles away from Las Vegas, and it takes a while to

13 get there.

14 So, as people are assembling here, Metro hears -- has

15 information, from one of the officers who is at the stage, at

16 the staging area, saying that Cliven Bundy has launched people

17 to get his cattle. So, Las Vegas Metro responds.

18 And here is an image of Metro coming onto the scene.

19 And they take the -- they eventually take up security of Post

20 1, as we described earlier.

21 Now, as Metro is responding, as more people begin

22 pouring into the area, Ammon Bundy in the assembly area. He's

23 one of the first people up there. And as he's traveling up

24 there, he talks about the BLM as being thugs and taking care of

25 the thugs.
 Vol. 5 - 46

1 And when he gets there, he takes a leadership role.

2 He begins directing -- he begins directing people to where they

3 should go. And he tells people, "You know, we need to go down

4 to the Toquop Wash, down to the wash to meet with the horses

5 just like my dad said." And so he leads people from the

6 assembly area down to the wash.

7 And while that's occurring, more and more militia

8 begin filing into the area, people with guns. And there are

9 people with guns wearing civilian clothes. There are people

10 with guns wearing tac vests, and people with guns wearing

11 camouflage uniforms as well. And you will hear testimony from

12 the officers who witnessed this that there were guns all over

13 the place.

14 And you will hear testimony that whenever you have

15 people who are angry, and mixed with guns, and mixed with

16 demands, that that's a very volatile, very dangerous, very

17 violent situation.

18 Ryan Bundy made his way to the assembly area as well

19 from the stage, and he was directing traffic to direct people

20 into that assembly area as they were arriving.

21 And by 11:30, people began moving down from the

22 assembly area down to the wash. Metro was responding at Post

23 1. Post 2 was only lightly guarded by a couple of BLM law

24 enforcement officers. As more and more militia began to arrive

25 to the area, Metro became obviously more and more concerned,

 Vol. 5 - 47

1 and they quickly determined that they could not hold or

2 maintain security of that area because of the numbers of people

3 and the numbers of guns. And you will hear a constant

4 reference to "we were outgunned and we were outnumbered. We

5 were outnumbered, and we were outgunned."

6 And you will hear this from the officers, and you

7 will hear that that was one of the objectives of Pete Santilli.

8 That if we outnumber them, they will back down. The sheriff

9 become being concerned. I will refer to him now as the

10 Sheriff, since he is the sheriff now, but he was then the

11 assistant sheriff.

12 He grew concerned as he saw the assembled masses. He

13 made his way across from Post 1 over to the assembly area to

14 try to find someone in charge. And he speaks with Dave Bundy,

15 another son of Cliven Bundy. And he says, "What -- what's

16 going on?" And he says, "We're here to get the cattle." And

17 he tells the Sheriff, "You've got an hour." And the Sheriff

18 says, "I can't do anything in an hour." And he goes, "You got

19 to maintain the peace here. I can't -- I can't work -- do

20 anything in an hour. I need more time."

21 People continued to flock -- move into the assembly

22 area, move up to the ICP area. NHP tries to respond. They

23 have got a huge traffic jam. And remember that Cliven Bundy on

24 the stage said, "Shut down the freeway." Well, they were

25 successful in shutting down the freeway. And it was very

 Vol. 5 - 48

1 difficult for NHP to respond, and they had only a few officers

2 to respond in any event, but they responded as well attempting

3 to try to keep traffic moving, attempting to be some sort of

4 force to keep the peace.

5 By about noon, the forces had essentially gathered at

6 the assembly area, and the horses began to arrive. The horses,

7 having made their way up to the Powerline Road, essentially an

8 unimproved dirt road, were now arriving at the ICP. And --

9 about 11:55, and were making their way along this dirt road

10 here south of the Interstate Northbound 15 toward the Toquop

11 Wash.

12 And with the people on horseback were people with

13 guns moving with them. And the horse -- the people on horses,

14 the horses made their way down to the Toquop Wash. And right

15 around noon, they get to the area underneath the -- the

16 northbound overpass.

17 There they met with Ammon Bundy, who had gathered

18 with a group of the people and were under the northbound

19 bridge. Across from them now the BLM, having seen people build

20 up in the Toquop Wash, their officers responded. Their

21 officers responded to that makeshift gate that I described for

22 you in order to prevent entry underneath that southbound lane.

23 So, when the horses arrived and gathered up with the

24 followers that Ammon Bundy had gathered underneath the

25 northbound, they all pushed out in between the northbound and

 Vol. 5 - 49

1 the southbound bridge. They pushed out and formed a line

2 across the bottom of that wash, about 270 people. 270 people,

3 including 40 people on horseback, lined up about 60 yards

4 across from that makeshift gate opposite the law enforcement

5 officers. And they began to shout, "Release the cattle.

6 Release the cattle. BLM go home. BLM go home. Release the

7 cattle."

8 And BLM -- the BLM officers on a loudspeaker saying,

9 "Disburse. You are in a closed area." Essentially, you are

10 not supposed to be here. Leave. Disburse. You are violating

11 a Court order by being here. You are violating a Court order.

12 And when the horses pushed through, and when the --

13 when the people pushed through and formed that line, guns began

14 to move into the wash as well. Guns moved onto the bridges in

15 a superior position over the BLM. Guns moving into the wash,

16 people with long guns, people on the bridges. This is a --

17 this is an image of gunmen on the northbound bridge overlooking

18 the position of the BLM under the southbound bridge. That's

19 some distance of about 125, 150 yards. Well within the range

20 of an AR-15.

21 And you will hear testimony to the types of weapons

22 the gunmen were carrying, and they were principally AR-15s,

23 some other AR-15 variant, but they were rifles. There were

24 handguns there, but the most concerning thing for the officers

25 were the long guns.

 Vol. 5 - 50

1 And as I mentioned, they overlooked the position

2 where the BLM had responded. And you see in this image the

3 makeshift gate that I described underneath the southbound

4 bridge. The BLM position was about 30 to 40 yards behind that

5 gate.

6 Approximately, during the course of the next 30

7 minutes that we are going to describe for you, the BLM officers

8 at most numbered between 27 to 30 officers. Opposite them were

9 over 270 in the whole area, on the bridges above them, and in

10 the area surrounding, about 400 people, and guns everywhere.

11 So, the guns had moved, and they began to intermingle

12 with the crowd that was on -- had lined up in the bottom of the

13 wash. But it wasn't just guns. There were unarmed people

14 there as well. There were women. There were children,

15 children in that group, along with unarmed men as well and the

16 horses and the guns.

17 And the officers will describe how the guns moved.

18 How the gunmen moved. They moved in and out of the crowd.

19 They were raising their rifles, as if to raise them. They were

20 pointing rifles and putting them down. And they were showing

21 their rifles. And they were moving in and out of the crowd as

22 if to use the crowd to shield their movements.

23 And then, of course, there were the gunmen on the

24 bridge, on the bridge above them, under the bridge in sniper

25 positions aimed at the BLM position. This is BLM's position

 Vol. 5 - 51

1 here, and here is the group in the wash about 12:06.

2 Meanwhile, while this was occurring down in the wash,

3 Ryan Bundy was moving up. Was up at Post 1. And he was

4 demanding the release of the cattle as well. And he made the

5 comment that the blood will be on your hands.

6 By about 12:15, the Incident Commander Dan Love had

7 seen the incident in the wash. Began to move down to the wash.

8 And you will hear testimony from Sheriff Lombardo, who had

9 taken over the overall command of the security of the ICP,

10 because Metro was in charge of providing the security. They

11 had the most -- they had the officers there to do that.

12 And Sheriff Lombardo, seeing the situation, seeing

13 the people moving into the wash, seeing the guns, seeing the

14 numbers, knew that the situation was so violent it could spark

15 gunfire at any moment. And he knew, from talking to Dave

16 Bundy, and he knew from what Cliven Bundy had said on the

17 stage, that the key here to deescalating, to ratcheting this

18 down was to release the cattle.

19 BLM had no authorization to release the cattle. BLM

20 never intended to release the cattle. The BLM officers' goal

21 was to move the cattle from the ICP and move them out of state

22 to the auction house where they would be sold.

23 But because of the situation, because of the guns

24 that were brought, because of the numbers, Lombard made the

25 decision, "We are going to release the cattle." Dan Love made
 Vol. 5 - 52

1 his way down to the gate at Post 2, and there he was --

2 attempted to negotiate.

3 So, about 12:15, Special Agent Love walks past his

4 line of security and walks alone across that space to get to

5 the gate. And when he gets to the gate, he says, "I need to

6 talk to somebody in charge. I need to talk to somebody in

7 charge down here."

8 By this point, law enforcement officers had -- had

9 engaged the crowd. They saw the guns on the bridge. They had

10 their weapons raised. They were waiting in the event shots

11 were fired to respond. And Special Agent Love wanted to

12 deescalate. He wanted -- you will hear his -- you will see

13 his -- or you will see his image. You will hear his voice

14 where he says, "I need you guys to back off, to break away. I

15 can't deescalate as long as you are here."

16 So, when he asked for someone in charge down here,

17 the people immediately began to call for Ammon Bundy. And

18 Ammon Bundy, as I stated before, the evidence will show, was in

19 the lead of this group. And when Ammon Bundy moves toward the

20 gate, the group moves with him.

21 And once Love gets down there, he says, "No gun

22 pointing. No gun pointing. No gun pointing." Meanwhile, as

23 that group moves up, the guns move with the group. And they

24 take high ground underneath or on the skirt on the

25 northbound -- on the east skirt of the northbound bridge.

 Vol. 5 - 53

1 And you hear testimony about militia members on the

2 high ground on that slope, on that slope on the east side and

3 the slope on the west side. And Ammon Bundy and Special Agent

4 Love meet, and Love says, "I need you to back them off. I need

5 you to back them off."

6 And Ammon Bundy says, "We are not leaving. We are

7 not leaving." And he goes, "Look. I get that. I get that."

8 This is Dan Love speaking. "I get that. We are trying to

9 negotiate the release of the cattle up at Post 1. I need space

10 down here so that we don't have any violence." And again,

11 Bundy says, "We're not leaving."

12 Meanwhile, the officers are pleading that nobody

13 raises guns, that nobody starts anything. And you will hear

14 testimony from a number of officers that during this --

15 especially during this critical period, from about 12:15 to

16 12:30, things were so violent that something as simple as a

17 backfire, or a firecracker, or an accidental discharge would

18 have set off a huge firefight. That there would have been

19 people dead because of that.

20 And the concern of the officers, they were concerned

21 for their own safety, but they were concerned for the safety of

22 the men and women and children, the unarmed men, women, and

23 children on the other side of that gate as well. They were

24 there to guard that post, but the only way they could guard it

25 and stay there would just continue to increase the violence and
 Vol. 5 - 54

1 the potential for gunfire.

2 And as the crowd in that lower part of the wash moved

3 forward toward the gate, the gunmen on the bridges went down to

4 concealed sniper positions and aimed their weapons at the BLM

5 officers at that gate.

6 In this shot you see an individual named Scott

7 Drexler in a prone position at 12:30. Up here on the left are

8 members of the militia that had moved down to the wash. This

9 is the east side of the southbound bridge above the BLM

10 position.

11 You will hear testimony about the Arizona State

12 Militia as the -- as the unit that responded in greatest

13 numbers out to -- to the -- in response to the call to arms

14 from OMA, and those are members of the Arizona State Militia in

15 the wash.

16 By 12:30, Love negotiates with Ammon Bundy. He

17 has -- he says, "I need time. I need time." And they -- and

18 Dave Bundy says, "How much time do you need?" Dave Bundy, by

19 this time, had worked his way from Post 1 down to Post 2. He

20 says, "30 minutes." He says, "You got 30 minutes." He yells

21 to the crowd, "He's got 30 minutes." The crowd backs away

22 after the -- they are told they got 30 minutes.

23 Love and Dave Bundy make their way from Post 2 up to

24 Post 1. They meet with Ryan Bundy, and there they -- and there

25 they talk. And Sheriff Lombardo is there as well. And you

 Vol. 5 - 55

1 will hear and you will see the recording of their discussion.

2 And the discussion is, "We are going to release the cattle," or

3 "we're going to abandon the post. We are going leave." And

4 Ryan Bundy insists that they leave quickly. And the -- but

5 Special Agent Love, in speaking to Ryan Bundy, says, "If you

6 release these cattle, that's on you, because I'm not authorized

7 to release these cattle." And Ryan Bundy says, "I understand."

8 And while negotiations are going on up at Post 1,

9 more militia again piling into the wash across from Post 2.

10 And this is an image from the officers' perspective of what

11 they were seeing. And they were seeing the bridges above them,

12 gunmen on the bridges, gunmen on the sides of the wash, people

13 up at the gate interspersed with gunmen there as well. They

14 will testify they were in an impossible situation.

15 By 12:40, the word is passed that the BLM is going to

16 be leaving. So, the Bundys insisted that the BLM leave

17 entirely from this area. So, 12:40, the word is given that

18 they are going to be leaving, and BLM begins to break off from

19 Post 2. Nevertheless, militia continue to flood into the wash

20 area.

21 And as they are -- during the -- as I described for

22 you before, during the height of this thing, the BLM officers

23 were engaged with the gunmen on the bridges above them. And

24 this is an image of BLM officers with their weapons raised.

25 And you will hear testimony, as we've described

 Vol. 5 - 56

1 before, that law enforcement officers have the right to protect

2 themselves including the right to raise a weapon when weapons

3 are raised at them or when someone presents a threat of deadly

4 force against them. This is the deadly force that they faced.

5 By about 1:40, a quarter of 2:00, somewhere in that

6 general area, BLM had lined up their vehicles, threw whatever

7 they could into the back of their vehicles, and began to take

8 off out of the ICP to leave the post. They had to surrender

9 their position.

10 In the United States of America, a law enforcement

11 officer forced to surrender a position that they are duty bound

12 and oath bound to protect, because of the deadly force and the

13 threat of death and violence that faced them, that was

14 organized, mustered, and led by these defendants.

15 After the BLM withdrew, Ammon Bundy was asked, you

16 know, "What did we accomplish here?" He said, "We accomplished

17 what we set out to do. We drove them off. They are leaving.

18 They are gone. They are gone from this area." This is public

19 land that he's on at this point, federal public land. He says,

20 "They are gone." And they said, "Well, what happens if they

21 come back?" And he said, "We'll do it again."

22 By 3:00, the Bundys and their followers had released

23 the cattle from the ICP. The cattle were then allowed to --

24 they were driven out of the ICP back out onto the public lands,

25 and everybody rallied back at the stage where this whole thing
 Vol. 5 - 57

1 began. And Cliven Bundy stood before the crowd and said, "You

2 got the job done. I thought for a while there I'd have to do

3 it, but you got the job done." And he was holding a sign that

4 said "closed area" that was cut down during the course of this

5 assault.

6 Later that same evening, Ammon Bundy was interviewed.

7 And during the course of the interview, he said, "You know, our

8 whole goal there was to make a big investigative stink, if you

9 will, so that the Sheriff would come in and intervene and take

10 over. Of course the militia were there with us, and the BLM

11 didn't know whether they would shoot or not."

12 And that was the goal, ladies and gentlemen. The

13 goal, the plan, the mission was to make BLM wonder whether they

14 would shoot. And when they got to the point where they made

15 BLM wonder whether they would shoot, that's an assault. That's

16 a threat. That's intimidation. That's instilling fear using

17 force and violence, using guns to instill that fear.

18 Now, I have covered, in the last hour, what is

19 probably going to take us quite a few days to cover in detail,

20 but I wanted you to have the overall, the bigger picture, if

21 you will, the outline of how the events of April 12th unfolded.

22 Now I'd like to circle back and little bit and talk

23 about the specific charges. I talked about the goal here, the

24 goal being to instill fear and to intimidate, to make them

25 think they were going to shoot. And that's --

 Vol. 5 - 58

1 (Pause in the proceedings.)

2 MR. MYHRE: That the militia was with them, and that

3 the militia was going to shoot. That was one of the goals or

4 that was the goal was to -- in order to force BLM to leave.

5 That is -- and we will -- and we will prove to you that that's

6 assault on a federal officer.

7 As I mentioned before, there was -- no one was shot,

8 and no one was shot because the law enforcement officers

9 exercised good judgment to break away from this violent

10 confrontation. Nobody, nobody wanted to die or have a drop of

11 blood spilled over cattle.

12 Law enforcement officers knew that, and Bundy knew

13 that, which is why they confronted them with guns knowing that

14 they would back them down.

15 Now, I talked about instilling fear in officers, and

16 you will hear testimony from the officers about their fear.

17 Now, you are not going to see any video or officers running out

18 of the wash going, "Oh, help me. I am going to die," or

19 anything of that nature.

20 Officers are trained to deal with their fear.

21 Officers are trained to respond to a situation despite their

22 fear, but that doesn't mean they don't feel the fear. And you

23 will hear testimony of the officers as to the fear that they

24 felt that day.

25 And you will be asked to look at the circumstances to

 Vol. 5 - 59

1 whether a reasonable officer, in those circumstances, would

2 fear for their life. And we will prove to you that these

3 officers were outgunned, that they were outnumbered, that they

4 were in a tactically inferior position. That they were on low

5 ground while the people -- the militia were taking the high

6 ground, while the militia and the militia minded, like-minded

7 people were on the bridges while they were moving in and out of

8 the crowd.

9 And it was the combination of these factors, the

10 people with the guns, the militia, the people on horseback, the

11 horses. And you will hear testimony about the horses was a big

12 factor for the law enforcement officers as well, because it's

13 difficult to deal with a horse when you are on foot, and all

14 you have to deal with is what you have with you. And if the

15 horse -- the horses presented a huge issue for the officers in

16 terms of how they were going to deal with this situation.

17 Threat to a federal officer, we will prove to you

18 that these were threats that were intended to be threats. That

19 any reasonable person, looking at these circumstances, what was

20 said, what was done, was a threat to the officers' lives.

21 Extortion. Extortion is just a fancy legal term that

22 says taking property from another by force. And we will prove

23 to you that the property was in the possession, lawful

24 possession of the BLM. That they had gathered the cattle over

25 the course of the days between April the 2nd and April the
 Vol. 5 - 60

1 12th. That they were in their possession. They were guarding

2 those.

3 That the force that was assembled against them, the

4 force that was leveled against them caused them to leave the

5 area, to back down, and to move -- and to leave and abandon the

6 cattle. And that was the goal of the defendants was to obtain

7 the cattle by use of force.

8 Use and carry of a firearm during and in relation to

9 a crime of violence. It is unlawful. It is a crime to use a

10 firearm in the commission of a crime of violence. The crimes

11 of violence in this case are the assault on a federal officer,

12 the threatening a federal officer, and extortion.

13 And use and carry of a firearm doesn't mean that the

14 firearm has to be fired. It can be used in any fashion. It

15 could be carried, displayed, brandished, pointed, any of

16 those -- any of those uses of a firearm is a violation of the

17 use and carry statute.

18 And just to -- just a word about that. What we will

19 prove to you is not that -- necessarily that the weapons were

20 there. Certainly they were there. But we will prove to you

21 the mindset behind those weapons. That those weapons were used

22 for the purpose of instilling fear. That they were there, they

23 were used, they were shown, they were displayed, they were

24 pointed, they were brandished in order to intimidate law

25 enforcement officers.
 Vol. 5 - 61

1 Obstruction of the due administration of justice. I

2 started this presentation with it's a crime to violate or to

3 impede the execution of a Court other. Here there were no less

4 than four Court orders in place. 1998, the 1999, and two

5 orders in 2013. Four Court orders requiring Bundy to remove

6 his cattle. Authorizing the BLM to take them off the land.

7 The Bundys were not going to allow that. That's

8 obstruction of justice. And it's obstruction of justice using

9 force and violence. The militia that they had assembled, the

10 horses that they had assembled is the force and violence they

11 used.

12 Interstate travel in aid of extortion. Again, just a

13 fancy term of bringing the militia to Nevada. They brought

14 people with guns across state lines from far away as Montana,

15 Arizona. You'll hear evidence they came from as far as New

16 Hampshire. Came from all over the United States for the

17 purposes of backing the BLM down. And remember the objective,

18 to get the cattle back. That's the extortion.

19 Conspiracy to commit all of the above and conspiracy

20 to injure -- impede or injure a federal officer. Conspiracy is

21 again just a fancy legal term saying there's an agreement to

22 perform an unlawful act. The government will prove here the

23 unlawful act is to get the cattle back.

24 And the conspiracy is between Ryan Bundy, Ammon

25 Bundy, Cliven Bundy, Ryan Payne, and Pete Santilli, who you
 Vol. 5 - 62

1 will see in the evidence as well. They all agreed to the

2 common objective to get the cattle back.

3 And while in a conspiracy case you will hear the

4 Court explain and instruct that the government's not required

5 to prove an agreement. You know, you think of conspiracy as

6 sometimes you conjure up in your mind the image of the iconic

7 film The Godfather, where it starts out with the Godfather in

8 the study telling this person to do that and this person to do

9 that.

10 You are not going to see or hear any evidence of

11 people meeting together and talking about what -- what's going

12 to happen or writing it down. There's not going to be any

13 recording of what was said. But the way we will demonstrate

14 the conspiracy is through the actions of the people on that day

15 on the April 12th.

16 We will show the conspiracy by the actions of Ammon

17 Bundy leading in the wash, Ryan Bundy leading at Post 1, Cliven

18 Bundy saying, "Get my cattle," Ryan Payne launching the

19 militia, and them all moving together. If you think of it as a

20 basketball game, a pickup basketball game, there's a common

21 goal, scoring that basket.

22 All the players on the team may not know precisely

23 where everybody is going to be standing, may not know precisely

24 when they are going to make a move to the basket, but they are

25 all watching each other, and they are all watching each other
 Vol. 5 - 63

1 move to the basket. And so when someone is driving, and they

2 see this person on the left, they flip the ball over to him,

3 and they make a layup. They all know what the goal is.

4 On April the 12th, we will show that they all knew

5 what the goal was, that they all worked together, that they

6 could all see each other and what they were doing, and that

7 will be the conspiracy.

8 Aiding and abetting is again just a fancy legal term.

9 It's unlawful, it's a crime to help someone commit a crime.

10 So, help in any way, incite, counsel, advise in any way is

11 aiding and abetting. And we will show evidence that all these

12 defendants aided and abetted each other, helped each other

13 commit this crime.

14 You will hear testimony from -- excuse me -- you will

15 hear evidence of Ryan Payne talking about what the plan was

16 here, what the goal was, and you will hear evidence that he

17 will say that the goal here was to, quote, unquote "protect the

18 Bundys." The Bundys were going to do whatever they were going

19 to do, and the militia would be there to protect them.

20 So, when they went down to the wash, when Cliven

21 said, "Go get my cattle," the militia went with them. You will

22 hear him describe how the militia were going to be there. Some

23 were going to be -- they had talked about it earlier that day.

24 Some would be in civilian clothing carrying guns, so as not to

25 draw too much attention to them. Others would come in later,

 Vol. 5 - 64

1 be phased in later to act in support of the -- of the Bundy

2 followers in the wash. And that's what the evidence will show.

3 Gunmen, civilian clothes intermixed with the unarmed men and

4 women. Militia phasing in later.

5 (Pause in the proceedings.)

6 MR. MYHRE: So, you will hear that testimony about

7 Ryan Payne. So, you will hear evidence of Ryan Payne and what

8 the agreement was, what the plan was, how it unfolded.

9 So, with respect to all of these offenses, the

10 assault, the extortion, the carrying of a firearm, you will not

11 see evidence that Cliven Bundy carried a firearm. You will not

12 see evidence that Ammon Bundy carried a firearm. You will not

13 see evidence that Ryan Bundy carried a firearm, other than a

14 sidearm holstered.

15 But because they are coconspirators, because they are

16 all working together, because they are aiding and abetting each

17 other, they are as equally responsible as those who are raising

18 and pointing their guns.

19 The evidence will show that when Cliven Bundy said,

20 "Get my cattle," he could see the militia in front of him. He

21 could see the gunmen in front of him. He could see the gunmen

22 leaving toward the wash. He knew they were there. He knew

23 where why they were there. He saw the horses going. It was

24 foreseeable and a natural consequence of his command that all

25 this was set in motion making him responsible as a

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1 coconspirator as well.

2 Same thing in the wash. Ammon Bundy, Ryan Bundy

3 didn't carry -- even though they didn't carry a weapon, they

4 were there leading. They were assisting. They were aiding and

5 abetting and inciting each other and aiding and helping each

6 other.

7 And Ryan Payne, Ryan Payne was not in the wash. Ryan

8 Payne was back at the stage during the course of these events.

9 But because he helped put in place all the pieces that came

10 together on April 12th, because he was in agreement with Cliven

11 Bundy as to the objective to get the cattle, because he knew --

12 had knowledge of the militia, because he had called them,

13 because he incited them, because he encouraged them to come, he

14 is part of the conspiracy, and he is equally responsible as

15 those who actually pointed guns or raised guns.

16 As I said, at the end of -- at the close of this

17 case -- and we'll be together for quite a while -- we will

18 again stand in front of you and walk through these charges and

19 the elements and how -- how we have proved up the case. And I

20 talked to you about what the case was, what the case is, about

21 force and violence against law enforcement officers.

22 Now, let me just take a few minutes of your time to

23 tell what you this case is not about. This case, as I

24 explained before, is not about a protest. This was way over

25 the line from a protest. This was breaking the law. This was
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1 using force and violence. Force and violence are not

2 consistent with a protest. And it doesn't have to be a shot

3 fired in anger to amount to force and violence because of the

4 fear and intimidation that was instilled.

5 This also is not about the Second Amendment or the

6 right to carry weapons. The Second Amendment again is one of

7 our most dearly held rights in the country, and this is not

8 about carrying a weapon or owning a weapon or possessing a

9 weapon. It's about use of a weapon. It's about the

10 brandishing, the raising, the pointing, all for the purpose of

11 intimidating and instilling fear.

12 This is not a case about one's beliefs. And you will

13 hear evidence, during the course of the -- this case, about

14 beliefs about grazing rights. This isn't a case about cattle

15 grazing. This isn't a case about should the BLM manage public

16 lands, or should they not manage public lands.

17 Whatever one's beliefs with regard to that, they are

18 entitled to. It's not about whether you believe you have a

19 right. It's about or not you are going to use force and

20 violence to enforce your beliefs. And force and violence is

21 against the law. It's a crime. And because someone has a

22 belief in something doesn't make it less of a crime.

23 At the end of this trial, the Court will instruct you

24 as to the law in this case. What is the law to be applied.

25 You may hear, through the course of the testimony or the

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1 evidence presented during the course of this trial, other

2 persons' beliefs of what the law is or what the law should be.

3 The only law that governs in this case, ladies and gentlemen,

4 the only law is the law that's given to you by the Court at the

5 end of this case.

6 So, at the end of the day, ladies and gentlemen, what

7 this case is about, it's about the rule of law. It's about

8 that cornerstone that I talked about very early on about the

9 Court orders. About are we going to be governed by law and

10 order or by the end of a gun.

11 The evidence will show that Cliven Bundy and his

12 coconspirators and codefendants got what they wanted that day.

13 They got it at the end of a gun. They got it through force and

14 violence, and they broke the law doing it.

15 I want to thank you in advance for your time and

16 attention. On behalf of Ms. Ahmed and Mr. Schiess and myself

17 and our entire trial team, we appreciate your service very

18 much. We know it's a tremendous duty that you have, and we

19 greatly appreciate your attention and your time now and

20 throughout the course of this trial.

21 As I mentioned earlier, we are going to be together

22 for quite a while. We will try to present the evidence in

23 chronological fashion as I walked through the evidence today.

24 We will do our level best. But with -- as with all trials, it

25 doesn't always occur. So, I would encourage you to take good

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1 notes during the course of trial, because we may during the

2 course of the trial bounce back and forth in time when

3 addressing certain events. And because of the length of this

4 trial, you will want your notes to refer back to testimony and

5 evidence that -- that you viewed as well.

6 And at the close of the case, we will stand before

7 you again, and we will ask that you return a verdict of guilty

8 as to all counts in the indictment. Thank you so much.

9 (12:24 p.m. End of requested transcript.)

10 --oOo--

11 COURT REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE

12

13 I, KATHERINE EISMANN, Official Court Reporter, United

14 States District Court, District of Nevada, Las Vegas, Nevada,

15 certify that the foregoing is a correct transcript from the

16 record of proceedings in the above-entitled matter.

17

18 Date: January 11, 2017.

19 /s/ Katherine Eismann

20 Katherine Eismann, CSR CRR RDR

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