Arizona killings rock anti-illegal immigration movement, highlights risk of frin

[TruthBrigade]

Arizona killings rock anti-illegal immigration movement, highlights risk of fringe activists

JONATHAN J. COOPER | Associated Press Writer
    2:04 PM EDT, June 19, 2009
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-us-immigration-activist-killings,0,1310992.story


Shawna Forde

This undated photo released by the Pima County Sheriff's Office in Arizona shows Shawna Forde, 41. Forde was charged with two counts of first-degree murder and other charges stemming from a southern Arizona home invasion on May 30 that left a little girl and her father dead. Forde is well known in the anti-illegal immigration community, said Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University-San Bernardino. (AP Photo/Pima County Sheriff's Office) (Pima County Sheriff's Office, AP / June 17, 2009)

PHOENIX (AP) — The tagline on Shawna Forde's anti-illegal immigration Web site says her group was "doing the job our government won't do." They wanted to patrol the border, but her small band of activists needed money to do it.

So, authorities say, Forde and two men dressed up as Border Patrol agents and broke into the southern Arizona home of a man they thought was a drug dealer, hunting for money or drugs to sell. They found neither, but killed the man and his 9-year-old daughter.

The May 30 killings rocked an anti-illegal immigration movement that prides itself on being vocal but not violent, and added to a growing list of activists unafraid of using violence to advance their aims.

In recent weeks, a white supremacist was accused of killing a black guard at the U.S. Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., and an ardent abortion foe allegedly shot and killed a prominent Kansas abortion doctor.

The possibility that activists in the anti-illegal immigration movement would use violence did not surprise Heidi Beirich, research director at the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups.

"We figured for a long time that we were going to get violence out of this movement," she said.

Her organization says the number of hate groups nationwide has risen 54 percent since 2000, fueled by opposition to Hispanic immigration and, more recently, by the election of the nation's first black president and the economic downturn.

Several groups focusing on stopping illegal immigration formed in the past half-dozen years, and many were drawn to southern Arizona, the busiest corridor in the nation for illegal border crossings.

While the movement has been largely peaceful, it seemed a matter of time before someone would be accused of resorting to violence.

"Some are using the movement to promote their own bigoted, racist ideology," said Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University-San Bernardino. "But I want to be clear: That's not everyone in the movement, and it poses a real problem."

He said the movement's message attracts people with ulterior motives. Larger groups try to patrol their ranks for potentially troublesome people but have no power to stop exiles like Forde from starting splinter groups, and even from using the Minuteman name.

After the killings, some of the movement's leaders quickly distanced themselves from Forde and her Minutemen American Defense group, saying they warned for months that she was potentially dangerous.

"We knew that Shawna Forde was not just an unsavory character but pretty unbalanced as well," said Chris Simcox, the founder of one of the original border watch groups, the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps.

Forde, charged along with the other men with murder and other counts, declined interview requests, but she had denied involvement in the killings when she was led away after her arrest.

Before coming to Arizona, Forde, 41, lived in Everett, Wash., where she ran for the city council in 2007 promising to allow police to check the immigration status of suspects, according to local news accounts.

She became a lighting rod in the community of 100,000 north of Seattle and famous in anti-illegal immigration circles when she alleged that her ex-husband was shot and that she was raped, beaten and shot in retaliation for her immigration activities.

The allegations caught fire and Forde drew a following among online border security advocates. Everett police are investigating her claims but have not made any arrests, police said. Some leaders of the anti-illegal immigration movement said her story didn't add up and that Forde was lying.

In October, Forde showed up at a border-watch event organized by Simcox's group, he said. She bragged about her own group and said it would be going after drug cartels, which made Simcox worry about the safety of other Minutemen, he said.

"You don't go pissing off the drug cartels," Simcox said. "That was something we were not really happy about."

Simcox said the fact that his group kicked Forde out in 2007 amid allegations of lying and pretending to be a senior leader proves that the anti-illegal immigration movement is effectively policing itself.

Her group was small and unorganized, with about 14 members and no formal meetings or activities, said Chuck Stonex, a former group member from Alamagordo, N.M., who severed his ties to the organization following Forde's arrest.

Forde claimed to have reconnaissance and covert mission teams that she called "Delta One Operations" but she refused to identify their members or activities, Stonex said.

She often talked about buying 40 acres of land for staging border surveillance activities in southern Arizona, but she would get angry when Stonex asked her how she planned to pay for it, he said.

Stonex and Forde once talked about what they would do if they encountered a truck full of drugs in the desert, according to Stonex. Forde said she knew a guy who would sell the drugs and give them 60 percent of the proceeds.

"She had her own private agenda," Stonex said. "She was doing her own thing, and she wasn't concerned about who she hurt."

[TruthBrigade]

What was Shawna Forde thinking?

By Pete Jackson
June 16, 2009.
http://crosscut.com/2009/06/16/everett/19062/

Shawna Forde, a lost soul in Everett and the world of anti-immigrant terrorism, is now accused of murder. It adds another dark chapter to Everett's history and to the stories of mayhem caused by 'true believers.'

There are times when the arc of Greek tragedy morphs into horror. On Friday the saga of Shawna Forde, 41, birddogged and recounted by the Everett Herald, abruptly turned into a perverted cross between Euripides and the Coen brothers. On May 30, authorities allege, Forde, along with fellow Everett-ite and Minuteman American Defense honcho Jason "Gunny" Bush, and another man, Albert Gaxiola, committed a home invasion in rural Arizona that left a nine-year old child and her father dead.

It was a ferocious crime with an overlay of hate (the family was Mexican), but an apparent motive as old as Eve: the cardinal sin of greed. One more "God no!" layer was added Monday when the Herald's Scott North reported that Forde's compatriot, Jason Bush, has also now been charged with the murder of an Hispanic man in Eastern Washington a dozen years ago.

For months the Herald has ably tracked Forde's cascading bad luck, legerdemain, and conspiracy. Her ex-husband was mysteriously shot in December of 2008, and Forde herself was allegedly raped and beaten the subsequent week. In January of this year, Forde suffered a bullet wound to her arm. Was she the target of pro-immigrant forces incensed by her border-watch activism? What emerged instead was a clouded picture that appeared part X Files and part paranoid drivel.

Forde's straight line from the banality of a lost soul to the evil of American terrorist now seems preordained. She was the unstable leader of an Everett-based nativist fringe group, Minutemen American Defense. A classic misfit and troubled kid searching for a higher calling, she became a hate cliche, emblematic of the mass-movement absolutists described by Eric Hoffer in his 1951 masterpiece, The True Believer.

Hoffer observed how nationalists, Communists, and extremists of all stripes are curiously interchangeable. True believers feel oppressed and gravitate to movements that portend a new day in the stark clarity of pure beliefs.

Shawna Forde and her American Minutemen Defense aren't an historic blip to be dismissed as outliers that evolved in a vacuum. Time "streams," as Richard Neustadt and Ernest May have argued. Tease up the thread of Shawna Forde and the long seam of nativist bigotry begins to unravel, much of it here in the Northwest. There were the Aryan Nations, the Militia movement of the 1990s, the anti-Indian-fishing forces, the John Birch Society, executive order 9066 to intern Japanese Americans during WWII, the Fascist Silver Shirts active on Whidbey Island, the KKK, the American Protective Association, and anti-Chinese pogroms to name a few. They all stood on the shoulders of the Know Nothing movement of the 1840s and those perennial forces that scapegoat and deal in xenophobia.

The leaders of these groups wrote a kind of lesser-angels' catechism that indoctrinated the credulous and the vulnerable. As Hoffer wrote years ago, "It is by its promise of a sense of power that evil often attracts the weak."

One of the best books written about any community, Norman H. Clark's Mill Town, documents some of the history of Everett's nativist elements. John W. Frame, a progressive news editor and politico in the 1890s, tried to fight the bigoted American Protective Association (APA) which extended its tendrils into both political parties and the populist movement. Clark writes:

    When Frame first settled in Everett, the APA had already applied pressures to have the federal government close a Catholic school which had for years served Indian families at Tulalip. The APA controlled the city school board and was making the most of the confusion in county and municipal politics..."Apaism," as Frame called it, easily infected every dispute or debate. Frame was infuriated by the political behavior of many recent immigrants from Norway, Sweden, Germany, and England — some of them unable to speak English — who had swallowed "Apaism" and were incanting "American for Americans" against the local Catholics, most of whom were native born.

It all sadly rings true. My own Norse grandparents bolted from Everett's First Lutheran Church in the early 1900's because they feared it had grown "too damn much like the Catholics." (Someone at church must have brought in a poinsettia or, worse, smiled at them.)

Everett, like most Western towns, is chiaroscuro, weaving together the forces of light and dark. The 1916 Everett Massacre marked the culmination of the city's radicalism and class conflict as the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) battled a sadistic county Sheriff, Donald McRae.

On Friday the PBS program NOW cited a Department of Homeland Security report predicting an uptick of right-wing domestic violence. The Forde story now falls together with the shooting of abortion doctor George Tiller and the murder of security guard Stephen Johns by white supremacist James von Brunn at the Holocaust Memorial Museum.

It's easy to bemoan Shawna Forde's self-styled end. It would be better, however, to conjure something remedial and creative to anticipate the Northwest's future Fordes. Everett-ites, for example, might use the peace-park conversion of the Aryan Nations compound in Hayden Lake, Idaho, as a template. We could pool our money, purchase Forde's house, and turn it into a center for tolerance training or dispute resolution. Perhaps it could house the Snohomish County Human Rights Commission — presupposing that the county council passes the enabling human rights ordinance.

The facility's name would be the one decision not requiring debate: The Brisenia Flores Center, in memory of a very innocent nine-year-old girl.

Pete Jackson, a former gubernatorial speechwriter, lives in Everett, Wash. You can reach him in care of editor@crosscut.com.
View this story online at: http://crosscut.com/2009/06/16/everett/19062/
© 2009 Crosscut Public Media. All rights reserved.
Printed on June 19, 2009

[TruthBrigade]

Murder suspect Shawna Forde feared for border security

By Scott North
Herald Writer
Published: Sunday, June 14, 2009
http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20090614/NEWS01/706149860

EVERETT -- Shawna Forde believed organized criminals operating at the border between the U.S. and Mexico posed one of the greatest threats to the nation's security.

Drug traffickers. Human smugglers.

The Everett woman was convinced they were helping terrorists sneak radioactive "dirty bomb" materials into the U.S. She feared the federal government was in league with the United Nations and allowing what amounted to an illegal-immigrant invasion.

In a May 20 "border report" posted on the Web site of her Minutemen American Defense group, Forde warned readers that soon "you will walk out your door and think you were just transplanted into Mexico."

Forde spent much of the past three years scouring the Arizona desert for signs of criminals.

Now, she finds herself behind bars, the focus of a double murder investigation in Arizona with potential connections to a home invasion robbery in California and other crimes in Washington.

Pima County, Ariz., detectives on Friday described Forde leading a plot to finance her Minutemen activities by robbing suspected drug traffickers. She and two others are charged with a fatal May 30 home invasion at a suspected drug trafficker's home in Arivaca, Ariz.

Raul Flores, 29, and his daughter, Brisenia, 9, were killed when a group of armed people, including a woman, forced their way into the home. The child's mother traded gunfire with the attackers. She survived but remains hospitalized with gunshot wounds.

The Arivaca robbery was meant to raise money to fuel Forde's group, investigators said.

Detectives believe there are additional suspects and are aggressively continuing their investigation.

On Saturday, Arizona detectives were pursuing tips that members of Forde's group may have staged a home invasion robbery in Shasta Lake, Calif., on Monday.

The victims, friends of Forde's mother, reported being robbed at gunpoint of nearly $12,000 by two men who showed up at the door and presented badges claiming they were U.S. Marshals.

Truck driver Peter Myers, 48, said he recognized one of men who robbed him after he saw news reports about Forde's arrest and photographs of her co-defendants.

He said the man who directed the robbery in his home was Jason Eugene Bush, 34. The ex-convict from Eastern Washington is a Forde associate now accused of being the gunman in the Arivaca killings.

"That is the guy. He pointed a gun right at us," Myers said.

***

Arizona officials have said Bush is recovering from a gunshot wound received during the home invasion there. Myers said that description fits the tall man who bound him with zip ties and then took cash from the family's lock box.

"He was moving real slow," Meyers said.

Forde's mother, Rena Caudle, said her daughter recently visited the area. After Friday's arrest, Caudle said she made certain that Arizona officials knew about the suspected link to the California robbery.

She also told them about a frantic May 30 phone call from Forde, who said she was in hiding and mentioned the Arivaca killings. Forde had previously discussed robbing drug traffickers linked to Mexican organized crime, her mother said.

Detectives arranged an interview.

After her arrest, Caudle said, Forde apparently tried to use her as a reference in hope of securing release on $1 million bail. She declined.

Caudle said she's deeply saddened over what happened in Arizona. If her daughter was involved in the killings, she expects her to be held accountable.

"I can only sympathize with the woman who lost her 9-year-old daughter," Caudle said. "You can quote me on this. I want people to know I do not approve of anyone killing anybody else for any reason. But I still love the Shawna that would come down and do haircuts, and girly girl things with her mother. I love the kind side of her and the laughter we shared."

Forde has a long and troubled history in Snohomish County, including juvenile convictions for felonies, prostitution and other street crime. She's been married and divorced four times, has been fired from numerous jobs and managed to alienate many in Minutemen circles, in part because of her inability to follow rules.

In 2007, Forde ran for Everett City Council, campaigning on a platform that emphasized immigration issues. Her bid for office came up short after she was convicted of shoplifting a container of chocolate milk.

More recently, Forde has been at the center of a bizarre string of violence that began Dec. 22 when her ex-husband was shot in an ambush attack at his Everett home. A week later, Forde called the newspaper to report being beaten and raped by strangers at the same house.

Forde claimed that the violence was retaliation for her activities targeting criminal groups operating on both sides of the border between Mexico and the U.S. She suggested that the street gang MS-13 was somehow involved, and for a time she posted photographs on her Web page showing herself partially dressed, displaying what she said were injuries to her thighs and upper buttocks.

Forde's handling of the rape report triggered a blogosphere backlash accusing her of staging a hoax.

Just weeks later, on Jan. 15, Forde was found in a north Everett alley with apparent gunshot wounds to an arm.

Before her arrest, Everett police were contacted by Pima County detectives and they shared information about Forde, Everett police Sgt. Robert Goetz said.

Everett's investigation into violence here continues, Goetz said.

Bush, the suspected gunman in the Arivaca killings, has extensive adult and juvenile criminal history in Eastern Washington. He's served prison time for auto theft and being a felon in possession of firearms, court papers show.

***

Dave Neiwert is a Seattle journalist and author who has written extensively about political violence, including the 1999 book "In God's Country: The Patriot Movement and the Pacific Northwest."

He and others on Saturday said Forde's case echoes earlier criminal activity that involved people with far-right leanings who took up weapons.

The most notorious group was "The Order," a white supremacists group led by Robert Jay Mathews, who in the early 1980s engaged in a campaign of robbery and murder in Idaho, Washington and other western states. Mathews died in December 1984 in a fiery gun battle with FBI agents on Whidbey Island.

There are common themes among those attracted to groups that engage in crime to further right-wing causes, Neiwert said.

Those involved often see the world simply. They often have difficulty maintaining stable relationships. They frequently are broke, and looking to blame others, he said.

"A lot of these people are losers with a capitol 'L,'" Neiwert said.

Eric Ward was a community organizer in the Northwest during the 1990s, when militia groups were forming. He's now national field director for the Center for New Community, a national civil rights organization based in Chicago. Much of his work now revolves around immigration.

Forde's case appears to highlight what has happened repeatedly during U.S. history when people begin to dehumanize and scapegoat others, and then find space in their political movement for those who threaten violence, he said.

It is time for people to take a stand against bigotry and violence surrounding immigration issues, Ward said.

"I think Arizona has become a much more dangerous place," he said.

Devin Burghart is associate director of the Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights. He also worked as a community organizer in the Northwest during the 1990s.

Human rights activists have been warning since 2005 that Minutemen activism could lead to violent acts, Burghart said. Supporters bear some responsibility, he said.

"All of them should be held to answer for these murders, which include the brutal killing of a 9 year-old girl," he said.

***

Minutemen groups on Saturday seemed most interested in putting as much distance as possible between themselves and Forde.

The Web site for Forde's group posted a statement purporting to come from its leaders. The statement offered the group's "deepest regrets" to the family of those killed in Arizona, and vowed to "cooperate totally and fully with any and all Law Enforcement agencies and the appropriate judicial system to bring this most terrifying event to a close."

Chuck Stonex of Alamagordo, N.M., was a staunch supporter of Forde. Earlier this year he was among those who wrote The Herald, angry about how Forde's travails were being covered.

Stonex on Saturday responded to an e-mail from the Associated Press sent through the group's Web site. "This is not what Minutemen do," he wrote. "Minutemen observe, document and report. This is nothing more than a cold-hearted criminal act, and that is all we want to say."

Forde called him on May 30 while he was visiting Arizona and asked him to bring bandages to an Arivaca home because Bush had been wounded, Stonex told the AP.

According to the story, Stonex said it appeared Bush had a relatively minor gunshot wound, which he treated. Forde and Bush told him Bush been wounded by a smuggler who shot at him while the group were patrolling the desert. He didn't suspect that might not be the case until was contacted by a deputy on Saturday about their alleged involvement in the crime.

Jim Gilchrist, president of the California-based Minuteman Project and a longtime Forde ally, made it clear Saturday that his earlier support of Forde should in no way be construed as approving the actions now attributed to her.

"Am I going to come to her support at this time? Of course not. How can I?" Gilchrist said.

Forde ran her own organization, Gilchrist said.

"Unfortunately, some people in this Minutemen movement have used this movement to carry out sinister agendas," he said.

Scott North: 425-339-3431, north@heraldnet.com.

[TruthBrigade]

Records show suspect in Arizona, Washington murders not who he claimed to be

By Scott North and Elaine Helm
Herald Writers
http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20090617/NEWS01/706179571/0/BIZ


He called himself "Gunny" and reportedly told his pals in the Minutemen American Defense border-watch group that he was a decorated Special Forces veteran who'd survived combat in Somalia, Bosnia, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Instead, there is no record that Jason Eugene Bush served in the military as he claims, spokesmen at the Pentagon said Wednesday.

Court records reveal Bush, 34, to be a sometimes-violent ex convict who spent much of his teens and early 20s behind bars, and once told the court he had long-standing problems with debilitating mental illness.

Until his arrest last week on multiple murder charges, Bush was "operations director" for the anti-immigration group directed by Shawna Forde, 41, of Everett.

On the now defunct Web page for the group Forde ran, Bush -- or "Gunny" as former members say he was known -- was introduced as someone who had served six overseas tours and had received the Purple Heart and the Silver Star.

In a January 1998 declaration in Chelan County Superior Court, Bush said he'd been treated for bi-polar disorder and schizophrenia since the mid-1980s, when he was 12. At the time, Bush said he worried that mental problems would hinder his ability to assist in his own defense in a stolen property case.

"For most of my life since the age of eleven or twelve, I have had an experience of being outside myself, of watching another person take over my body," Bush said in a 1998 court declaration. "I start going haywire and I don't know what I'm doing or why. It's like being in a daze. I don't know why it happens and it scares me. It's like someone else crawls under my skin. It is very frustrating."

Bush was examined by mental health experts 11 years ago, and found competent to stand trial. He wound up serving nearly five years in prison for a variety of charges, including auto theft and being a felon in possession of a firearm.

Bush now finds himself jailed in Arizona along with Forde and another man, all charged with first-degree murder in connection with a May 30 home invasion.

The trio are accused of having passed themselves off as law enforcement officers to force their way into the home of an Arivaca, Ariz., man they suspected of drug trafficking.

The intruders, all dressed in camouflage, and one of them with his face painted black, fatally shot Raul Flores, 29, wounded Flores' wife, and killed the couple's 9-year-old daughter, Brisenia.

Bush also is charged with second-degree murder for a 1997 stabbing death of a Wenatchee man. He allegedly was connected to the killing earlier this year based on genetic tests on evidence collected nearly a dozen years ago.

Wenatchee police say they've found Bush has "long-standing" connections to white supremacists, including people associated with Aryan Nations, according to court papers.

The nickname "Gunny" often is applied to people who have earned the rank of gunnery sergeant in the Marine Corps.

There are no service records matching Bush's name and date of birth, Marine Corps spokesman 1st Lt. Brian Block said at the Pentagon on Wednesday.

Army spokesman Richard McNorton also said he found no matches for Bush in Army personnel records.

Chuck Stonex of Alamagordo, N.M., a Minuteman who earlier supported Forde but has since broken ties, said he only met the man who called himself "Gunny" a couple of times.

Once was May 30, Stonex said, when Forde asked him to provide first aid to a minor gunshot wound on Bush's calf. Forde and Bush misled him about how the wound was received, he said.

Stonex said he met Bush not long after at a Tucson, Ariz., restaurant. He said Bush showed him what appeared to be military paperwork documenting Special Forces training as well as medals from combat operations.

"He claimed that he got hit twice; once in Iraq and once in Somalia," Stonex said.

Stonex described himself as a veteran of combat in Vietnam.

Bush's deception about prior military service "makes a mockery of us veterans, I think," Stonex said Monday. "It is really, really poor taste. It is like impersonating a priest."

Court papers show that Bush has been in trouble with the law since 15, when he was prosecuted for felony property crimes in northern Idaho. He was convicted in Kansas in 1994 for burglary as well as assault on a female corrections officer and attempted escape, documents show.

His Washington state criminal history includes juvenile and adult convictions for property crimes and assault, including a March 1998 beating of another inmate at the Chelan County jail. The victim in that case suffered broken bones in the face. The victim believed the attack occurred because of his sexual orientation, but Bush denied that motive, court papers show.

Before he went to prison in the late 1990s, Bush had worked as a welder, according to court papers.

It is unclear when Bush met Forde. Arizona police allege that he participated in a plan orchestrated by Forde to raise money for their group through crime. In addition to the Arizona killings, police in Arizona, California and Washington are investigating the pair for potential connections to robberies and other violent acts.

When he was introduced on Forde's Web page not long ago, Bush promised to have an impact on border-area crime, eschewing "beer, binoculars and lawn chairs" for "boots on the ground, recon, surveillance and ACTION."

He was quoted at the time: "My goal is to bring the full force of our collective abilities down on the bad guys. This will make waves."

Reporter Scott North: 425-339-3431; north@heraldnet.com

[TruthBrigade]

Immigration Groups Issued Advisory on Shawna Forde before Killings
 
Americans for Legal Immigration PACImmigration Groups Issued Advisory on Shawna Forde before Killings

CONTACT: Americans for Legal Immigration PAC (ALIPAC)
www.alipac.us, (866) 703-0864
http://www.mmdnewswire.com/shawna-forde-5255.html

(MMD Newswire) June 16, 2009 -- Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, one of American largest grassroots immigration enforcement groups, issued national warnings about Shawna Forde and her key ally Jim Gilchrist of Minuteman Project months prior to her charges of double homicide in Arizona.

"We knew there was something very wrong with Shawna Forde and did all in our power to forewarn groups and leaders ,as well as press and law enforcement, regarding our concerns," said William Gheen of ALIPAC. "Shawna Forde does not reflect the immigration enforcement movement or the millions of Americans concerned about illegal immigration and border security."

ALIPAC issued national advisories and conducted a two hour radio broadcast warning about Shawna Forde and Jim Gilchrist, when the two tried to circulate photos and a story that Forde had been attacked and raped by a Latino gang in retaliation for her involvement in the immigration enforcement movement. Gilchrist was also an active endorser and campaigner for the Mike Huckabee for President campaign in 2008. He has been rapidly removing supportive materials and comments by Shawna Forde from his website over the last few days (Screen shots available upon request).

ALIPAC leads the largest coalition effort among immigration enforcement groups in America and had only recently heard of Shawna Forde.

"Forde came on our radar earlier this year when she started working with Jim Gilchrist and then shortly after when she started circulating suspect photos of alleged injuries from an attack," said William Gheen. "We manage the largest archive of information in existence on these topics and our researchers red flagged Shawna and Gilchrist's story for many reasons which led to our national advisory."

Shawna Forde was shunned by the vast majority of groups she encountered in the immigration enforcement movement. She founded her own group and unfortunately found an ally in Jim Gilchrist Co-Founder of the Minutemen. Gilchrist has fervently supported Forde over the last six months, despite the outcry and opposition of many groups and leaders.

Several groups and leaders that are part of the NIIBC (National Illegal Immigration Boycott Coalition) found at www.illegalimmigrationboycott.com fought Gilchrist over his support and elevation of Shawna Forde, including Jeff Schwilk of San Diego Minutemen, Chelene Nightingale of Save Our State, and many others who were aware of the situation. Minuteman Civil Defense Corps also threw Shawna Forde out several years back.

"At this point, we want police to fully investigate Mr. Gilchrist's involvement with Shawna Forde and we want him to fully resign from all activities within our movement.", said William Gheen the director of the largest coalition of such groups in America. "We are preparing a letter calling for his departure and we expect it to be signed by many groups and leaders."

ALIPAC extends their condolences to the many victims of Shawna Forde and reminds the press and the nation that all efforts were made to keep people like Shawna out of immigration politics. Shawna Forde is an unstable person who is not reflective of others who want illegal immigration stopped. Shawna Forde and the tragedy she caused should not diminish concerns for the thousands of Americans killed by illegal aliens each year, which is where public policy attentions should be focused.

ALIPAC is releasing the following documentation of prior advisories on Gilchrist and Forde.

Announcement: Jan. 5th 2009
LEADERS: Shawna Forde Story Advisory
http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-142143-forde.html

Announcement: Feb 24, 2009
ALIPAC: Jim Gilchrist Minuteman Project Damages Escalate
http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-147383-forde.html

March 8, 2009 Radio Show warning the nation about Gilchrist and Shawna
Forde (Audio Files)
http://www.lastamericans.us/index.php/2009/03/09/archives-of-the-march-08-show-of-last-am


###

Paid for by Americans for Legal Immigration AMERICANS FOR LEGAL IMMIGRATION PAC
Post Office Box 30966, Raleigh, NC 27622-0966
Tel: (919) 787-6009 Toll Free: (866) 703-0864
FEC ID: C00405878

[TruthBrigade]

2 Accused In Ariz. Killings Had Anti-Immigrant Ties

by Ted Robbins
All Things Considered, June 17, 2009 ·
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105526083

Two of the three people charged with killing a Hispanic man and his daughter in Arizona had ties to a group that strongly opposes illegal immigration.

Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik says the motive behind the killings was robbery — and he believes the money was to fund the suspects' anti-immigration activity.

Raul Flores, 29, and his 9-year-old daughter were shot in the head May 30 after a group of people dressed in camouflage entered their home in the small southern Arizona town of Arivaca. The girl was apparently shot because she was a witness. Her mother, whose name is not being released, was shot in the leg.

The woman was on the phone with a 911 operator when the attackers returned. She had a pistol and fired at the attackers. She wounded one man, but the group got away. Then late last week, Dupnik announced the three arrests and discussed the motive.

"The husband who was murdered has a history of being involved in narcotics and there was an anticipation that there would be a considerable amount of cash at this location, as well as the possibility of drugs," Dupnik said.

One of the three suspects lived in the area. But the other two, Shawna Forde and Jason Bush, are leaders of an anti-illegal-immigrant group in Washington state called Minutemen American Defense. Its Web site says it secures the U.S. border from human and drug trafficking.

Three years ago, Forde appeared on a local PBS TV program in Yakima, Wash. "I know the Minutemen and many other organizations will not stop," Forde said. "We will start at a local level and work our way up. We will not stop until we get the results that we need to have."

The two largest Minuteman organizations — the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps and the Minuteman Project — said Forde and Bush are not associated with them.

However, Stephen Eichler, executive director of the Southern California-based Minuteman Project, said that Forde wrote articles that were posted on the Minuteman Project Web site. They've been removed. Eichler said he and Minuteman founder Jim Gilchrist are horrified by the Arizona killings and by some of the people their movement has attracted.

"There's a lot of racists getting into movements because there are a lot of groups that feel threatened today which are very right wing, very conservative. And they feel threatened that our nation is moving in a different direction than it has in, say, the past 30 or 40 years," Eichler said. "So, instead of being reasonable about that, they become hostile."

Late Tuesday, a sheriff's captain said more arrests may be made in the Arizona case.

In addition, Bush has been charged with killing a homeless Hispanic man in Washington state 12 years ago and is a suspect in at least one other home invasion.

[TruthBrigade]

Ex-Everett woman charged in Arizona slayings now suspected of two crimes in California

By Christine Clarridge
Seattle Times staff reporter
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2009352137_webforde17m.html

An Everett woman and a cohort charged in connection with the slaying of a 9-year-old Arizona girl and her father are suspected of burglary and robbery in California where they stayed at a motel under their own names and bragged about the wound one of them received the night of the murders.

Six days after they allegedly killed a 9-year-old girl and her father in a home-invasion robbery in Arizona, Shawna Forde and Jason Eugene Bush checked into a motel in Cottonwood, Calif., under their own names.

During the three days they were in the Northern California town, Forde, 41, and Bush, 34, are suspected of orchestrating at least two crimes that preyed on family members and friends who lived in the area, according to Sgt. John Hubbard of the Shasta County Sheriff's Department.

According to Hubbard, a safe containing several hundred dollars was stolen from Forde's half-brother and nearly $12,000 was stolen in a home-invasion robbery that targeted a Shasta Lake couple who are friends of Forde's mother. Forde's mother lives in nearby Redding, Calif.

Charges have not yet been filed in connection with the California robbery and theft, but Hubbard said the information will be forwarded to Shasta County prosecutors.

"We just made the connections today," said Hubbard on Wednesday.

Forde, Bush and a third person, Albert Robert Gaxiola, 42, were arrested and charged last week in connection with the May 30 slayings of 9-year-old Brisenia Flores and her 29-year-old father Raul Flores in a small town near the Mexican border.

Investigators with the Pima County Sheriff's Department in Arizona have said that Forde, of Everett, believed there were drugs and cash in the home and was hoping to use proceeds from the crime to fund her freelance campaign to keep illegal immigrants out of the country.

According to Pima County sheriff's deputies, Forde, Bush and Gaxiola forced their way into the Flores home, and shot the girl, her father and her mother.

The mother survived, however, and shot Bush in the leg, police said.

According to Hubbard, Forde and Bush "were running back and forth between Everett and Arizona" when they checked into the Alamo Motel and RV Park in Cottonwood on June 6.

They told the hotel managers that Forde was an agent with the U.S. Border Patrol and that Bush was in the military.

"He said he was on leave because he had been injured and he even showed them his wound," said Hubbard.

According to the motel manager, who asked not to be named, Bush showed him "a hole in the side of his leg" that had been bandaged.

The motel manager said he and his girlfriend called police Wednesday after they recognized Forde and Bush on a television-news program.

Copyright © 2009 The Seattle Times Company

[TruthBrigade]

http://www.americanpatrol.com/ABP/NEWS/2008-UP/090622-FORDE/FordeShawna090622.html

Full Disclosure about Shawna Forde

By Glenn Spencer -- American Border Patrol
June 22, 2009

About ten o’clock on the morning of June 12, I was at my computer working on the Operation B.E.E.F. final report when suddenly someone appeared behind me.  It was Shawn Forde, the “Minuteman activist.”  She had not called for an appointment but merely showed up at American Border Patrol’s front door (and my home) and was let in.

 Being a polite person, I spoke with her, even though last summer I told American Border Patrol employees that, due to her strange behavior, she was no longer welcome at the ranch. 

Sitting down at my desk, Forde told me she was setting up an organization to put unemployed veterans to work protecting the border.  Knowing that this was ridiculous, I quickly ended the conversation and excused myself.  Forde asked if she could use our family room to do some work on her laptop.  She stayed about twenty minutes and left.

I still don’t know why Shawna Forde suddenly appeared at my front door, but I am sorry she did.

As she left she asked if she could return the next day and retrieve something she left in the RV. I said OK.  (Last summer I let Forde and her daughter use ABP’s RV for about a week.)

With the exception of allowing her to use our RV, I have never had any dealings with Shawna Forde.  She has never participated in any of ABP’s border work and none of our people have participated in any Minuteman border operation, including those involving Shawna Forde.

Shortly after Forde left, Waste Management called and said they couldn’t pick up our trash as the FBI the road leading to my house blocked.  I jumped on an ATV and drove to the end of the road where I saw a number of vehicles and people who appeared to be law enforcement.  I asked if their activities had anything to do with the border and they said no.  I returned home and called the Sierra Vista Herald to report the activity.  I spoke with reporter Bill Hess, whom I have known for years, and explained the situation.  He said he would look into it. That was about 11:30 a.m.

About 12:30 p.m. I left to go into Sierra Vista to do some shopping.  I drove my Hummer and waived as I passed the “FBI” people who were still at the north end of my road - they waived back.

On the way home I was just pulling onto my road where the “FBI” people were when I encountered Melissa Jaramillo, my office manager ,who was just leaving.  It was a little after 3 p.m., the end of Melissa’s workday.  She pointed out that one of the cars on the road looked like it belonged to Shawna Forde.  I confirmed this and took a picture of the vehicle ( the brown SUV).

Upon arriving home I called Bill Hess of the Herald and told him what had happened.  He asked about Shawna.  I told him she was a very strange.  He said there were a lot of strange people in Sierra Vista.  I amplified by saying she was a braggadocio and had claimed that she had visited drug hideouts north of the border.  He said it was unlikely drug smugglers would be hanging out with Minutemen and that they would know who she was.  I agreed.  He said he would pass the information along.

About 5:30 p.m. I was in my yard, playing ball with my German Shepherds when two sheriff deputies arrived.  They said that others would be arriving and that they had a warrant to search my home.  They said that Shawna Forde had been arrested for murder.  I was handed a copy of the warrant. 

Shortly thereafter more officers arrived and then came an armored vehicle loaded with a SWAT team.  As I was kept to one side the SWAT team entered my home and a search began.  I was approached by a Sheriff deputy who said Forde had murdered two people.  I corrected him, saying “you mean she is suspected of murdering two people.” He said, no, she murdered them.

I was then interviewed by a female detective from Pima County.  We talked for about twenty minutes and I told her all I knew about Shawna Forde. I told her I had very little to do with Forde and that I had told my associates that we should have little to do with her.  I told the detective I had heard from others that Forde had bragged about visiting a drug smugglers hide out inside the U.S. I also said I was concerned because of the way Shawna dealt with her daughter, then under eighteen years old, or so I was told.

I told the detective that the deputy who said she had committed the murders was not very professional.  She said he was only human.

They finished the search of my home and apparently found nothing that bothered them as  they took nothing.  After a quick search of ABP’s RV, they all left.

American Border Patrol stopped using volunteers for border work five years ago. We now concentrate on the use of high technology and aerial surveillance.

This is an object lesson about understanding with whom you are dealing in the border volunteer effort.  This is why I urged the Minutemen to do background checks on everyone they signed on.  They did, which is one of the reasons I allowed Forde and her daughter to use the RV – I thought they had done a background check on her.

Glenn Spencer

PS – Earlier today I learned from a reporter based in Washington State that the FBI was tracking Shawna as she used her laptop to send e-mails over her cell phone Internet link.  She sent an email from ABP’s headquarters and this may explain why they arrested her as she left our headquarters.

[TruthBrigade]

Minuteman says he warned authorites of robbery plot

The man says he tipped authorities to Shawna Forde's alleged robbery plans

By Scott North
Herald Writer
© 2009 The Daily Herald Co.
Published: Tuesday, June 23, 2009
http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20090623/NEWS01/706239918%26news01ad=1#Minuteman.says.he.warned.authorites.of.robbery.plot

EVERETT ­-- People within the Minutemen movement warned authorities weeks ago that border-watch activist Shawna Forde was talking about robbing suspected drug traffickers, but law enforcement officials did not seem interested in the tip, says a source who claims he later helped detectives connect the Everett woman to a deadly home-invasion robbery in Arivaca, Ariz.

"I think this whole thing could have been avoided," said the man, a leader in the Colorado Minutemen group, which opposes illegal immigration from Mexico.

He spoke on the condition that his name not be published at this time. He expects his identity and his role in the case eventually will become public once first-degree murder charges against Forde work through the courts in Pima County, Ariz.

Deputy Dawn Barkman, public information officer for the Pima County Sheriff's Department, on Monday declined comment on the man's story.

The department's refusal to comment makes it impossible to verify all of the Minuteman's claims. Some details of his story, however, including previously unpublished information about Forde's arrest, have been substantiated.

The man also supplied e-mails that appear to have been sent to him by Forde, 41, in the days after the May 30 robbery and double killing in Arivaca.

"I'm in deep and now have targets on my head including big brother," reads a June 3 message sent from Forde's e-mail address. "I don't know who will take me out or set me up."

In a June 5 e-mail, Forde apparently writes about getting a tip that sheriff's detectives in Tucson were looking for her.

"So just for your eyes now the po po (police department) is inquiring," the message reads. "Let them."

Forde had run the Minutemen American Defense border-watch group. She and two others are charged with the shooting deaths of Raul Flores, 29, and his daughter, Brisenia, 9. The pair died May 30 and the girl's mother was wounded when intruders opened fire after forcing their way into the home by pretending to be law officers.

The Minuteman from Colorado said he and others were told by Forde that she was planning a home-invasion robbery in Arizona.

The man said he was contacted early this spring by Forde, who knew of him from his Minutemen activities. Although they had not met, he claims she asked if he would be interested in helping her rob people suspected of involvement in smuggling near the border.

The man said he didn't turn Forde down, but in April told law enforcement officials about her request. They showed little interest, he said, declining to identify the officials or their agency.

The man said he offered to assist in helping an undercover investigator infiltrate Forde's group to make arrests before a crime was committed. The man said his offer was declined.

Meanwhile, he said, Forde pressed to set up a meeting to discuss staging robberies. After consulting with others in his group, four of the team decided to attend. They planned to later secretly share what they learned with law officers, he said.

"She had no idea," he said of Forde.

Recounting a May 15 meeting with Forde near Denver, the man said the conversation initially was hypothetical, and there was an agreement that there would be no action for months.

But then, he said, "She starts bringing up Arivaca."

Forde allegedly told the group she "had a guy" in Arivaca who could not only identify drug traffickers for home invasions but also help sell any drugs seized, the man said.

Forde, who was open about needing cash, allegedly pressed for immediate action. She began contacting members of his Minutemen group directly, trying to recruit them, he said. She got no takers.

Within hours of the Arivaca killings, Forde contacted an Arizona-based associate of the man and asked him to bring sutures to patch up one of her crew who had been wounded. The Colorado Minuteman's contact did not go. Instead, Chuck Stonex, a New Mexico man who was a former member of Forde's group, has acknowledged binding a wound on the leg of Jason Eugene Bush, 34. Bush has since been charged along with Forde.

The Colorado Minuteman said he learned of the Arivaca killings when an associate sent him a newspaper article a few hours after the shootings. He said the article was sent by another Colorado Minuteman who said of Forde "she did it."

The man said he called the law enforcement officials who earlier had passed on focusing on Forde.

"They became very interested when I made a phone call and said 'Well, it happened,' '' he said.

In the days that followed, the man said he was interviewed by Pima County detectives and worked with investigators to try to get Forde on the phone or to send e-mail messages. Detectives were seeking Forde's whereabouts in part by tracking her cell phone use, he said.

"Minutemen are the people who put the kink in her tail," he said.

Forde was arrested near Sierra Vista, Ariz., by an FBI team that tracked her to the home of Glenn Spencer, president of American Border Patrol, a group that monitors border security using airplane surveillance, the man said.

Forde was arrested a short distance from Spencer's home.

Barkman from Pima County confirmed that FBI agents were involved in Forde's case because she was a fugitive.

Spencer on Monday said Forde had no affiliation with his group, although last year he had allowed Forde and her teenage daughter to live in an unused recreational vehicle on his property. Spencer broke ties with Forde over concerns about her behavior and judgment, he said.

"She was actually going to leave her daughter here," he said. "I ... was not happy with this person, and I did not want to affiliate with her any more."

On June 12, almost two weeks after the Arivaca killings, Spencer said Forde simply showed up at his house and was admitted by the woman who runs his office.

"I was on my computer working on our report and she showed up right behind me," he said.

Forde asked to use one of Spencer's rooms to send an e-mail from her laptop computer. He let her, and then she left.

"That's where I want to leave it," Spencer said.

Forde was arrested about a mile from Spencer's home when she drove up to an FBI road block.

She remained jailed in Tucson on Monday, held in lieu of $1 million bail.

Reporter Scott North: 425-339-3431; north@heraldnet.com.

[TruthBrigade]

Woman held in 2 slayings an outcast, activists say

But Shawna Forde had high-level contacts in Minuteman movement despite extreme view

By Tim Steller
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 06.28.2009
http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/newsletter/298890.php

Shawna Forde was a rogue, many border-security activists say, or an impostor or a criminal.
They say the woman now charged in connection with the home invasion and shooting deaths of an Arivaca marijuana-trafficking suspect and his 9-year-old daughter was not really one of them.
But interviews with so-called Minutemen and their critics, as well as reviews of recently scrubbed Web sites, suggest Forde was well-placed in the border-security movement and represented a persistent radical wing.
"Shawna Forde was very much a known entity in this movement and, to some degree and to different folks, tolerated for quite some time," said Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University-San Bernardino.
Forde has been charged with two counts of murder in the May 30 home-invasion killings, and with aggravated assault in the shooting of the pot-trafficking suspect's wife. Pima County sheriff's investigators allege Forde conceived of the killings and carried them out with co-defendants Jason E. Bush and Albert R. Gaxiola, in order to raise money for her small anti-illegal-immigration group, Minutemen American Defense, and other activities.
Forde and Bush were white supremacists, according to police reports in Washington state and Pima County and one of Forde's brothers. Since her arrest on June 12, Minuteman groups and their allies have distanced themselves from her.
Jim Gilchrist, founder of the Minuteman Project and an early leader of the movement, said last week that he donated $200 to a member of Forde's group, that he called Forde a few days after the murders as investigators closed in, and that his group removed postings by and about Forde from its Web site after the arrests. But he called Forde and her associates "rogues," and denied that he or his group had a formal relationship with her.
"They happened to use the Minuteman movement as a guise, as a mask," he said.
Glenn Spencer, founder of the American Border Patrol and another prominent figure in the anti-illegal-immigration movement, posted an Internet account of Forde's arrest titled "Full Disclosure About Shawna Forde." She was arrested minutes after leaving Spencer's house near Sierra Vista.
He said Forde had dropped in uninvited on June 12 and asked to use a room in the house, which doubles as American Border Patrol's offices, to write an e-mail, then left.
"Being a polite person, I spoke with her, even though last summer I told American Border Patrol employees that, due to her strange behavior, she was no longer welcome at the ranch," Spencer wrote. "This is an object lesson about understanding with whom you are dealing in the border volunteer effort."
But former American Border Patrol employee Michael Christie, who left the group in February, said radicals such as Forde were a persistent part of the movement.
"This movement attracts people who are desperate to be a part of something big," Christie said. "These are people who are discontented with their lives for one reason or another, who have probably tried to make a difference in other aspects of their lives and failed." Looking back
Today's Minuteman movement was forming as early as last decade, when Roger Barnett began patrolling Cochise County ranch lands, looking for illegal immigrants.
But the movement took off in 2002 when then-Tombstone resident Chris Simcox printed a call to form a border-security militia in the Tumbleweed newspaper, which he owned.
Even while calling for armed citizen patrols of the border, Simcox warned of the danger of radicals joining up. "We want local people," he said in 2002. "We don't want the Rambos, the mercenaries and soldiers of fortune that some of these groups seem to be made up of."
When Simcox and Gilchrist organized an April 2005 patrol along the border in Cochise County, hundreds of everyday people came from around the country to join them. White supremacists also showed up, said Heidi Beirich, director of research for the Southern Poverty Law Center. "From the get-go, from 2005, that movement has been shot through by extremists," she said. "She was so assertive"
In 2007, Forde applied to join Simcox's group, Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, and was allowed in on a probationary basis, said group Vice President Al Garza and founder Simcox, who left the group this year to run for the U.S. Senate. The group vetted her through interviews and a background check, members said.
"Within a few weeks, she was so assertive, wanting to take charge and wanting to be a spokesperson," Simcox said.
"She lasted less than six months. After that, she went and tried other groups," he said. "She thrust herself into the movement where no one else wanted her." "It's a hodgepodge of folks"
The world she entered is a set of individuals and groups, many using the word "Minuteman" in their name, many harboring hostilities with each other. They share an interest in stopping illegal immigration.
"It's a hodgepodge of folks, including some real decent people of good will who are not racist, who are for strict immigration laws and border enforcement," said Cal State's Levin. "However, peppered in there are some unstable folks; peppered in there are some racists."
Garza and others noted, though, that the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps and other groups have rules in place forbidding racism in their organizations, and that their vetting is intended to catch white supremacists. They also note that the whole movement has had few negative incidents during its many patrols and has helped hundreds of border-crossers in trouble.
Still, Forde showed up wherever she could find border-security hard-liners.
She came to Spencer's Sierra Vista-area ranch, from which the American Border Patrol conducts high-tech border surveillance, at least a half-dozen times, Christie said. (Spencer said she came a maximum of three times.)
"She would use it as a place to stay when she would go out and scout the border," he said.
Last summer, she stayed for a week, Spencer said. He said he decided to keep her away after she asked if her teenage daughter could stay and work at the ranch, which he found inappropriate.
In August 2008, Forde showed up uninvited at Camp Vigilance, used by the Minuteman Corps of California and the private group Border Patrol Auxiliary as a base for patrols, said member Carl Braun. She was ejected after 40 minutes.
Last October, she showed up at a camp near Three Points where the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps had a group, Simcox said. There, too, she was ejected not long after arriving, he said.
That same month, Chuck Stonex met Forde for the first time at a border operation near Three Points, he said. "She said she was trying to infiltrate the cartel in Arivaca," said Stonex, of Alamogordo, N.M.
On May 30, Stonex said, he was in Arizona to attend a barbecue at Spencer's home when Forde called him asking for medical supplies because a colleague, Bush, had been shot during a patrol. Stonex drove to Arivaca and helped clean and bandage Bush's wound, which he says was minor. Forming an association
As Forde made forays into other groups, she formed an association with Gilchrist, the founder of the Minuteman Project. She posted reports from the border on his Web site, and they defended each other publicly from critics.
In July 2008, Forde wrote about Gilchrist, identifying herself as "Operations Director For The Project," and saying, "The Project has worked closely with MAD (Minutemen American Defense) for several years now."
On Feb. 23, the day after Forde's hometown newspaper, the Everett (Wash.) Herald, published an exposé of Forde's background, Gilchrist defended her in an Internet posting.
"In my experience with Ms. Forde I conclude that she is no whiner. She is a stoic struggler who has chosen to put country, community, and a yearning for a civilized society ahead of avarice and self-glorifying ego."
"The Minuteman Project is proud to be a supporter of Shawna Forde's Minutemen (women) American Defense (M.A.D.)"
On June 2, three days after the murders, Gilchrist received an e-mail from a Southern Arizona associate who had been visited by investigators looking for Forde. Gilchrist forwarded the e-mail to Forde, he said.
He said he called her and asked if there was a warrant for her arrest. She said no.
But after roaming Southern Arizona for another nine or so days, she was picked up outside Spencer's home.
Contact reporter Tim Steller at tsteller@azstarnet.com or 807-8427.

[TruthBrigade]

3 arraigned in killings of girl, 9, father

Prosecutors have 60 days to decide whether to pursue the death penalty
By Kim Smith
ARIZONA DAILY STAR
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 06.30.2009
http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/newsletter/299035.php

advertisementThree people suspected of killing a 9-year-old Arivaca girl and her father late last month were arraigned in Pima County Superior Court Monday on multiple felony counts, including first-degree murder.
Pima County hearing officer Roger Duncan entered a plea of not guilty on behalf of Shawna Forde, 41, Albert Robert Gaxiola, 42, and Jason Eugene Bush, 34.
Duncan also assigned county-paid attorneys for all three defendants and scheduled their next court appearance for Aug. 18.
The three are accused in the slayings of Brisenia Flores, 9, and Raul Junior Flores, 29, and the attempted murder of Gina Marie Gonzalez.
In addition to two counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted first-degree murder, the three are facing burglary, aggravated-assault and robbery charges in the May 30 incident.
Gonzalez called 911 in the middle of the night on May 30 to report that several men and a woman claiming to be police officers forced their way into her home. She told authorities one of the men killed her husband and daughter, and wounded her in the leg.
Sheriff Clarence Dupnik said at the time that Raul Flores was suspected of being a drug dealer, and the three suspects targeted the house with the intention of stealing money and drugs.
Forde's family members have said Forde told her brother and her mother earlier this year that she planned to start attacking drug traffickers on the Arizona-Mexico border and robbing them.
Forde, a Washington state resident, was allegedly going to use the proceeds to fund a group called Minutemen American Defense to fight illegal immigration and drug trafficking.
Authorities have said Gaxiola, an Arivaca resident, was used by Forde and Bush to gather intelligence on drug traffickers. Police records released last week indicate Gonzalez told investigators her husband and Gaxiola got into a dispute last year because Gaxiola was storing marijuana on their property.
Prosecutors have until 60 days after the arraignment to announce if they intend to seek the death penalty.
Bush, another member of Minutemen American Defense, is also charged in the 1997 stabbing death of a homeless Hispanic man in Wenatchee, Wash.
Contact reporter Kim Smith at 573-4241 or kimsmith@azstarnet.com.

[TruthBrigade]

Slaying suspects' pasts troubled

By Tim Steller
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 07.13.2009
http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/newsletter/300682.php

Long before Shawna Forde and Jason Bush were accused of killing two people in an Arivaca home invasion, investigators and others had clues that each was headed for trouble.
Forde told several people she planned to form a group to rob drug traffickers near the Mexican border, associates and relatives said. But they either didn't report the comments to police or didn't take them seriously.

Forde's brother, Merrill Metzger, said he even recorded Forde talking about "robbing drug cartel leaders, ripping them off and taking their drugs." But Everett, Wash., police, who were investigating the December shooting of Forde's husband, say they haven't received any recording.


Now Forde is accused of killing a suspected drug trafficker and his 9-year-old daughter, as well as shooting and injuring the girl's mother, during what investigators said was to be the first in a series of robberies to fund Forde's border-watch activities. Forde is in the Pima County jail, as is Bush and co-defendant Albert Gaxiola of Arivaca, charged with first-degree murder, attempted murder and other crimes.
A shirt containing Bush's DNA led Washington state authorities to charge him with a 1997 slaying in the town of Wenatchee this year, but only after the Arivaca killings occurred.

The Washington laboratory that linked the DNA to Bush had the garment for almost four years before it sent results to the Wenatchee police Jan. 29.

"I wish that we could have done something and gotten him in jail," said Chelan County, Wash., prosecutor Douglas Shae.

Ousted by Minutemen

Suspicions about Forde's activity related to the U.S.-Mexico border arose long before this year. Chris Simcox, founder of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, said members of his group in Washington state reported her to authorities in 2007 for taking part in shady fundraising after she was kicked out of the Minuteman group.

Last year, she and a group of men entered a site south of Three Points that Simcox's Minuteman group was using as a base camp for border-watch operations.

"They had a military, bad-ass posture about them," Simcox said.

"She had made a comment at that time that they were going to be stopping any drug dealers that they came into contact with. They were going to be carrying long arms and not be letting people pass," Simcox said.

He said his group kicked Forde out of the camp and contacted the U.S. Border Patrol.
Agents "went out and talked to them. And they B.S.'d them (the agents) as well," Simcox said.
The U.S. Border Patrol did not return an e-mail seeking comment.

In December, Forde's husband was shot and wounded in their Everett home, said Sgt. Robert Goetz of the Everett Police Department. A few days later, Forde reported she had been raped and beaten in their home. Then in January, residents heard a gunshot and found Forde in an alley with a gunshot wound to the arm.
Forde talked to police the day of her husband's shooting but then repeatedly missed appointments to speak with them again about the attack, Goetz said. Police never called her a suspect.

"We don't have any evidence, testimonial or physical, that she was involved in that shooting," he said. The attacker in that case was a man, he noted.

Police also heard allegations that Forde either faked or staged her other attacks, but they did not receive any evidence of that, Goetz said. Both of the latter cases are closed.

Forde relatives were worried

The series of incidents worried relatives in California, whom Forde occasionally visited. They began cooperating with a reporter in Everett and the police.

That's what led Metzger to surreptitiously record his sister during a visit to his Redding, Calif., home last spring, he said.

During that conversation, Metzger said, she said she planned to rob drug traffickers to fund her small border-watch group, Minutemen American Defense.

Metzger, who participated in Forde's group before quitting, sent the recording to Scott North, a reporter for the Everett Herald who wrote an exposé on Forde in February. Metzger said last week that he believed North gave the recording to Everett police investigating the shooting of Forde's husband.

North would not confirm that, saying he would only discuss material that has been published.
"I'm reasonably confident that investigators have the recording," he said via e-mail.
Goetz, of the Everett police, said of the paper, "If it was their intention to give it to us, we don't have it."
Forde said things that worried some associates in the Minutemen American Defense, including Chuck Stonex of Alamogordo, N.M., who met Forde during a border-watch operation near Three Points last fall.
"She said she was trying to infiltrate the cartel in Arivaca. I think she said she found a stash house at one time," Stonex said. "I kept telling her, 'Shawna you need to share this information.' She wouldn't do it for whatever reason."

Neither did Stonex report the comments to police.

Forde reportedly made similar comments to Bob Dameron of Yakima, Wash., who said he had done border-watch operations with her.
Forde occasionally stayed with Dameron and his wife in their Yakima home, he said, including once in January or February.

"When she said she was going to infiltrate the drug cartel, it was too stupid to take serious," he said.
What Dameron did take seriously was when he caught Forde stealing painkillers from his wife early this year, he said. They cut Forde out of their lives, he said, but they didn't report her to police.

Deputy Dawn Barkman, a spokeswoman for the Pima County Sheriff's Department, which is investigating the Arivaca killings, said the department had not heard of Forde until she became a suspect after the May 30 killings.

DNA from a shirt

Bush was behind bars in Washington state from late 1997 to 2003, and authorities had a sample of his DNA.
It wasn't until February 2005, police said, that science had evolved to such a point that they could get useful DNA off a shirt found near the scene of the 1997 slaying in Wenatchee. In that case, a homeless Hispanic man was stabbed seven times while he slept near a grain silo, according to an affidavit filed in Chelan County Superior Court.

Wenatchee police sent evidence, including the shirt, to the state crime lab. The slaying was considered a cold case.

Cold cases take lower priority at the lab than those with a suspect in jail, prosecutor Shae said.
That could explain why it took until Jan. 29 of this year for the laboratory to send a report. Nobody from the Washington laboratory returned a call seeking comment about the case.

In the meantime, Forde and Bush had joined forces in Minutemen American Defense and were planning operations this year, according to her group's now-defunct Web site.

There was already an arrest warrant for Bush, for violating the terms of his probation, Shae said. Chelan County authorities attached a request that he be sent back to Wenatchee.

"What we ended up doing based on the DNA is we increased the bail and made it extraditable throughout the country," Shae said.

That meant that if Bush had been arrested, he might have had a harder time getting out of jail, and officials in the arresting jurisdiction would likely have contacted Wenatchee to see if they wanted to have him extradited there.

But Bush apparently stayed out of trouble with police — Chelan County authorities heard nothing of him until early June.

That's when Pima County Sheriff's Department investigators began looking to arrest Bush in connection with the slayings days earlier in Arivaca.

Contact reporter Tim Steller at 807-8427 or at tsteller@azstarnet.com.

[TruthBrigade]

3 accused of killing girl, dad in Arivaca likely to have 2 trials

By Kim Smith
ARIZONA DAILY STAR
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 11.24.2009
http://www.azstarnet.com/allheadlines/318763

The three people accused of killing an Arivaca girl and her father in May will likely be tried during at least two separate trials.
In Pima County Superior Court, Judge John Leonardo agreed Monday to try Jason Bush separately from his co-defendants. Leonardo scheduled Bush's trial for Nov. 2, 2010, and the trial of Shawna Forde and Albert Gaxiola for Jan. 4, 2011.
Forde's and Gaxiola's attorneys want their clients to get their own separate trials, too, but Leonardo declined to split them up, defense attorney Eric Larsen said.
Larsen, one of Forde's attorneys, said he has been given permission to ask for a severance again in the future.
The three are accused of killing Brisenia Flores, 9, and Raul Flores, 29, and trying to kill Gina Marie Gonzalez.
Gonzalez called 911 on May 30 to report that several men and a woman claiming to be police officers forced their way into her home. She told authorities that one of the men killed her daughter and husband, and wounded her in the leg.
Sheriff Clarence Dupnik said at the time that Raul Flores was suspected of being a drug dealer, and the three suspects targeted the house with the intention of stealing money and drugs.
Forde's relatives said Forde had talked about robbing drug traffickers on the Arizona-Mexico border to fund a group called Minutemen American Defense to fight illegal immigration and drug trafficking.
Bush, another member of Minutemen American Defense, also is charged with two murders in Washington state.
Forde's and Gaxiola's attorneys believe separate trials are needed because it would be impossible for a jury to believe one of the defendants "without excluding the defense" of the other.
According to court documents, Larsen said if Gaxiola points the finger at Forde, she would want to tell jurors about Gaxiola's drug ties and convictions.
She also would point out a friend of Gaxiola's, who has not been charged in this case, "most fits the description" of the man who was seen with Gaxiola "scouting the victims' residence."
Larsen also said text messages were sent that morning saying the "competition" was gone and "cops on scene, stay low." The text messages were sent from a phone Forde said she could prove was "associated" with Gaxiola and in the possession of one of the home invaders, Larsen wrote in his motion.
Even if Gaxiola and Forde's defenses aren't "mutually exclusive," the trials should be separate because Gaxiola would probably want to "inflame the passions" of the jury by telling them about Forde's association with the border defense movement, Larsen said.
Gaxiola's attorneys, Jack Lansdale and Steve West, contend Gaxiola wasn't inside the house when the victims were shot.
They want a separate trial because Bush told police he shot the victims under duress from Gaxiola, and they believe Forde probably will say the same thing.

Contact reporter Kim Smith at 573-4241 or kimsmith@azstarnet.com

[TruthBrigade]

No boundaries: Shawna Forde and the Minutemen movement

By Scott North, Herald Writer
http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20091025/NEWS01/710259945

Many people met Shawna Forde through the Minutemen movement. Many tell similar stories.

It doesn't matter if they are national leaders or "boots on the ground" activists, private detectives or political strategists, they all say Forde, 41, comes on strong, makes big promises and in time tries to twist their relationships to promote herself.

The Everett woman showed up on the Minuteman scene in 2006 with boundless energy, expressing heartfelt love for the United States.

The Minutemen were looking for people like her. She spent hours spreading the word, talking about border security and illegal immigration. She showed others how to make their voices heard at rallies, in city council meetings and on television.

By this June, after she was arrested on double murder charges in Arizona, those in Forde's circle described somebody who seemed part action figure, part petty criminal.

There was Forde the self-described patriot who claimed to be the leader of a national Minutemen organization, who signed off her e-mails with a crisp, military "10-4" or "Copy out." She dressed in high heels and camouflage, accessorizing with a .380-caliber handgun tucked into her waistband.

There also was Forde the teller of tall tales, the abuser of trust, the trickster who, several acquaintances suggest, couldn't be trusted around loose cash, prescription pain pills or another's reputation.

Forde now awaits trial in the killings of Raul Flores, 29, and his 9-year-old daughter, Brisenia. She's accused of leading a May 30 raid on their Arivaca, Ariz., home because she suspected Flores was a drug smuggler. Police say she planned to use any drugs and money she found to bankroll her Minutemen American Defense group. Prosecutors plan to seek the death penalty. The case isn't likely to go before jurors until 2011.

Minutemen around the country have raced to distance themselves from Forde.

She really wasn't one of them, they contend. Her agenda was preying on others, not protecting the country.

Without doubt, Forde's is a crime story and a close look at her trail turns up interlocking lies. Separating Forde from her work with the Minutemen movement, though, denies much of what happened.

Multiple interviews and dozens of e-mails sent by Forde over the years detail how she inserted herself into a loose-knit, fractious network that needed volunteers enough to set aside skepticism. Some found their faith and friendship abused. Many seemed willing to overlook what today seem like clear warning signs. Those include wild tales Forde told last winter in Everett, when she suggested that gang members from Central America had nearly shot her ex-husband to death and in separate attacks raped her and put a bullet through her arm in retaliation for her Minutemen activism.

Forde used to joke that she one day would be martyred and that that would galvanize people to take action, said Bob Dameron of Yakima, who is among those in the Minutemen movement who has known Forde the longest.

"I think she wanted to be famous," he said. "I think she made it to infamous."



***

God placed a challenge before Bob Dameron. So did Shawna Forde.

In the middle of summer 2007, with little besides a pup tent and the goodwill of strangers, the Minuteman from Washington found himself for five weeks in the Sonora Desert, guarding the Arizona side of the border.

This exercise of his patriotism tested his faith.

"That was the most humbling experience of my life," he said. "I learned to trust God."

The Yakima man and his wife, Kathy, joined Minutemen Civil Defense Corps because of their beliefs. They are devout Christians. They are open about their love for family and the United States. They worry that porous borders invite criminals and erode U.S. sovereignty.

They met Forde in 2006 during a border watch operation along the U.S.-Canada boundary not far from Bellingham. Dozens of people gathered at the home of the state's Minutemen leader, to get to know each other and to join in a common cause.

During a dinner visit, Forde was caught alone in a bedroom, rummaging through a dresser, the Damerons said. Her explanation didn't wash and she was banned from the house -- not from the Minutemen. Every ally mattered, and her defenders believed she could contribute.

In the months that followed, the Damerons saw a lot of their Everett counterpart.

"She was adamant about the country, patriotism," Bob Dameron said. "She was constantly going all over the state getting things done."

While the Damerons were leading Minutemen efforts in the Yakima Valley, they welcomed Forde's statewide involvement. She spent days helping organize rallies, protests outside day-labor sites and presentations at city council meetings.

They were convinced Forde cared about the cause, and, in time, about them. They eventually invited Forde to stay at their home.

"She called us 'Mom and Dad,'" Kathy Dameron said, "and that was probably to get what she wanted."

They got to know about Forde's family and learned that her marriage was ending. They met her teenage daughter, a sweetheart who seemed to like staying with them. The girl called Kathy Dameron "Grandma."

Forde's conduct raised questions from the start, said Hal Washburn, vetting officer for the state's Minuteman Civil Defense Corps chapter.

Forde often used The Line, a Minutemen e-mail list, to share stories that were hard to believe.

For example, in a lengthy Aug. 20, 2006, e-mail she described being attacked by a group of men -- she said they were Mexicans -- outside a Seattle Starbucks. The men were enraged after seeing signs against immigration piled inside her car.

Forde wrote about finding herself "face to face with a pair of dark brown eyes ... filled with pure hate."

One man, she wrote, wanted "to rape me or kill me probably both." Just before the confrontation got physical, though, Forde said she was saved by a group of U.S. Army soldiers, in full uniform, who happened to be in the area.

She acted as the group's spokeswoman but often fought with other Minutemen who were not as impressed as the Damerons with her efforts. She also claimed to have more authority in the Washington organization than she actually had. Some leaders wanted her out.

Bob Dameron was instructed to fire her on Nov. 14, 2006, after she was done with a Yakima public television station's town hall forum about illegal immigration.

Dameron broke the news before Forde left the next morning to return to Everett. "I told her I was told to fire her," he said. "I also told her I couldn't do it."

As she drove out of the Yakima Valley, Forde's Honda Civic slammed into a guardrail. She was taken to the hospital, shaken but not seriously hurt. The car was totaled.

Forde told the Damerons she was run off the road by truck drivers -- she claimed they were Mexicans.

The Washington State Patrol's report on the incident notes Forde said she crashed after a truck pulled in front of her. Troopers determined the trucks were driving 55 mph and Forde lost control. The report contains no information about the truckers.

The accident temporarily halted the effort to fire Forde.

Then in December she sent out an e-mail to raise money for an ailing Minuteman. She didn't name him, but said he was too sick to work and too proud to ask for help. Forde asked people to send her cash or checks, made out in her name.

Fundraising is supposed to go through the group's chain of command, Washburn said, and Forde had crossed the line again.

Meanwhile, she secretly approached Chris Simcox, who at the time was the group's national director and now is a candidate in Arizona for U.S. Senate.

Minutemen leadership in Washington was ineffective and listless, Forde told him in January 2007 e-mails. She had a plan to restructure the organization.

A few days later Simcox sent out an e-mail saying he was promoting Forde to a statewide leadership post. It was to a job she urged him to create.

Leaders among Washington's Minutemen threatened to quit and bombarded Simcox with angry messages.

"I feel that somewhere this has just gone wrong," Forde wrote Washburn and others. "You ... think I just want to be in charge. In fact I don't want to be in charge! I'm terrified for our future and the country that my children will be forced to live in. All I ever wanted to do is get out there and 'DO.' "

They voted her out of the group the next month.

She started her own group, Minutemen American Defense, or MAD.

"She had maybe 15 or 20 members, but it gave her a lot of credibility," Washburn said.

A Web site was cobbled together, at her request, by Bob Dameron, who still felt Forde meant well and had promise.

Forde wanted to use the Web site to promote herself. She wanted it to feature photographs and video of her in the desert, mixed with accounts of undercover investigations she claimed to be conducting involving drug cartels, human smugglers and prostitution rings.

That summer, Forde persuaded Bob Dameron to join her in Arizona at a gathering of Minutemen who planned a vigil on the Mexican border.

The plan was for Dameron to act as the cameraman for Forde, creating a documentary film "by Minutemen about Minutemen."

They drove down together. Forde led him to a desert camp and drove away. He spent five weeks living in a small tent, joining Minutemen on desert patrols and relying on the kindness of strangers for rides into town to buy food.

That was the last time he did anything on the border, or put his faith in Forde.

But Kathy Dameron's relationship continued, mostly out of love for Forde and her teenage daughter.

A disturbing pattern soon developed, of Forde telephoning just when, she claimed, her life was in danger. The calls often would cut off in the middle, leaving Kathy Dameron sick with worry.

In November 2008, Forde e-mailed photographs of drugs and cash she said she found at an Arizona stash house. That's one reason why the Damerons didn't immediately doubt Forde when she said her family had been targeted by the drug cartels.

Forde's ex-husband was shot by an intruder at his Everett home on Dec. 22, 2008, in a case that remains unsolved. A week later, Forde claimed she was raped by a Latino gang. Police dropped that case for lack of evidence.

Then, on Jan. 15, Kathy Dameron was on the phone with Forde when the Everett woman said she had been shot while walking in an alleyway. Dameron heard no gunfire and she now believes Forde staged the attack.

Their friendship soon ended. Kathy Dameron's prescription pain medication seemed to disappear whenever Forde was visiting. It happened again in March. She found her pills in Forde's purse and confronted her.

"She said, 'I've been busted, haven't I?' " Kathy Dameron recalled. "I said, 'Yes, you have.' She said. 'I'm sorry, Mom.' I said, 'Not good enough.'"



***

Doug Parris is director of The Reagan Wing, an Edmonds-based political action group that promotes principles of limited government and unapologetic support for moral convictions.

It was a successful formula that resonated with voters under the leadership of President Ronald Reagan.

Parris always is trying to help Republicans reconnect with blue-collar voters. He agreed with strategists who believed border security could galvanize people who weren't inclined to wait for government to fix their problems.

Who could argue against enforcement of laws to thwart drug traffickers, human smugglers and people seeking to enter the country illegally?

Shawna Forde presented herself as uniquely qualified to help, Parris said. And she had support from some Republican leaders in Snohomish County.

Forde knew Minutemen. She was the leader of Minutemen American Defense and owned a company specializing in "Take Back America" T-shirts.

Enter Jim Gilchrist. The founder of the California-based Minuteman Project was willing to speak and wanted to recruit Washington allies for his brand of border-watch activism.

"Shawna came in and was dynamic, engaging, flashy; made all sorts of claims about what she could produce in terms of the Minutemen side," Parris said.

She also told him a compelling back story about being abandoned as a toddler and growing up in the care of the state; years supposedly spent as a wild-child promoter of rock 'n' roll bands; parenthood; and a steady drift toward conservative ideology.

"Here was a person I felt sorry for in a lot of ways," he said. "Never concluding or even suspecting really that this was all a con."

By the time Gilchrist finished speaking in Everett -- June 30, 2007 -- Parris wanted nothing more to do with Forde. He'd pegged her as a ruthless self-promoter who simply took what she wanted.

The trouble started almost immediately. Most traced back to her.

Without Parris' permission, or even consulting him, Forde made decisions about who would be invited to speak and how tickets would be sold.

When he raised questions, Forde got angry, made a scene and quit.

The day of the forum, though, she was there and took the stage.

He didn't object. The event, and what it meant for connecting with voters, was more important.

But Forde wanted to rearrange the speakers' lineup.

Parris said "no."

She walked up behind him, snatched the event clipboard from his hands and headed off to tell others she was changing things.

Parris grabbed the clipboard back and maintained control of the event.

"It was at that moment that our relationship was over," he said.

It would have been anyway, after Parris learned that Forde apparently had pocketed money from sales of forum tickets, which went for $30 each. He went to Everett police to report what had happened, but decided against pursuing a complaint after detectives showed scant interest.

On reflection, Parris realized Forde had attempted to make off with something far more precious: his reputation. Forde's meddling had a purpose beyond money, he said. She was trying to network at his expense. "She's the kind of person who shows up at a meeting with important people, invites herself, and makes you think she is aligned with me, and makes me think that she is aligned with you, and is basking in the glow of credibility," he said.

Forde was able to pull it off, Parris said, because she can "very precisely duplicate" real connection to a cause.



***

Jim Gilchrist counts himself among those fooled by Forde.

He stuck with her when some questioned her methods. He stood by her through the blood and tumult in Everett that started last December. He remained her ally right up until the day she was arrested in connection with the two murders in Arivaca, Ariz.

"If she hadn't been able to use me she would have used somebody else," Gilchrist said. "It is so unfortunate because I really thought this person, in spite of her checkered past had, in lieu of a better term, 'found Jesus' and really wanted to be a do-gooder."

Gilchrist said he was oblivious to the behind-the-scenes drama at his 2007 speech in Everett. He'd never met Forde before she e-mailed to arrange his travel. He was impressed by her and her fledgling Minutemen operation and donated the money he was paid to cover his travel expenses to Everett -- cash that actually came from Parris.

Gilchrist gave that money to Forde.

Forde arrived in Gilchrist's life at a time when his running feud with Simcox and other Minutemen leaders left him in need of allies.

He communicated with Forde largely by e-mail, telling her he admired her dedication. Forde praised Gilchrist for being controversial.

"You are a powerful man when in name only you can stir a state," Forde wrote. "I just am amazed sometimes. I've never been attacked so much for a associate. But you are my friend and I'm proud to be associated with you so (expletive) 'em!!"

By early 2008 Gilchrist had made Forde the Minuteman Project's border patrol coordinator. He sent volunteers her way, telling them she "is one tough lady." Forde's role in bringing Gilchrist to Everett was noted in a profile of Minutemen figures around the country prepared by the Southern Poverty Law Center, a high-profile Alabama-based civil-rights watchdog group.

Gilchrist now says his only concerns about Forde revolved around her claims that she was using "undercover" tactics to infiltrate border-area drug traffickers.

"I really thought that she was getting into the wrong crowd and was going to end up murdered," he said.

Gilchrist stood by Forde when her ex-husband was shot, after her reported rape and after her mysterious shooting, when she was wounded in the arm. When The Herald in February revealed Forde's history of childhood felonies and teenage prostitution, Gilchrist said what mattered more was her ability to overcome a troubled past.

"She is no whiner," he wrote at the time. "She is a stoic struggler who has chosen to put country, community and a yearning for a civilized society ahead of avarice and self-glorifying ego."

Gilchrist remained in touch with Forde after she left Everett without giving detectives a chance to question her closely about the attempted murder of her ex-husband.

On the Minuteman Project Web site, Gilchrist continued to post press releases and Forde's dispatches detailing her Arizona border exploits.

One of the last arrived on May 31, just hours after the Arivaca killings.

Forde reported that she and her group had been in "boots on the ground" patrols of the border for eight days and had observed thousands of pounds of dope being smuggled into the country.

"A (sic) American family was murdered 2 days ago including a 9 year old girl," Forde wrote. "Territory issue's (sic) are now spilling over like fire on the US side and leaving Americans so afraid they will not even allow their names to be printed in any press releases."

In a few days Gilchrist began receiving e-mails from a Minuteman in Tucson who had previously let Forde's teenage daughter live at his home. The man asked Gilchrist why a SWAT team had shown up at his door looking for Forde.

"I called her," Gilchrist said. "She was as calm as can be."

Forde told him there was no cause for worry. The man, she said, was a disgruntled former member of her group.

At the same time, though, she was sending out a list of 17 people around the country she wanted contacted if she was arrested or killed. After her arrest, Gilchrist learned he was 10th on her list.

He and Steve Eichler, executive director of the Minuteman Project, almost certainly were among the last people Forde e-mailed before her June 12 arrest. They talked about adding her and her officers to their Web site's list of national Minutemen leaders.

"The border is going to be HOT. Good things to come my brother," Forde wrote Eichler that morning. She was in police handcuffs later that day.

Gilchrist has since scrubbed references to Forde from his Web site. He says she appears to have cloaked her true self behind the Minutemen movement.

"We all have to be aware that there are individuals who have motives other than altruistic ones," he said. "But you don't know until they present themselves."



***

Many Minutemen who encountered Forde in the Southwest deserts expect to be called as witnesses in her upcoming murder trial.

Among them are two Colorado men who tried to get investigators near Denver to look at Forde's activities in Arivaca. In April, they say, Forde tried to recruit them to help commit home-invasion robberies of people she suspected of drug trafficking.

Their concerns weren't taken seriously until after the Arivaca killings, they said.

Joe Adams also has been talking with law enforcement about Forde. He is a former private investigator from St. Louis whose tough-guy credentials include combat tours with the Marines and federal prosecution for his activities linked to the CIA during the Iran-Contra scandal of the 1980s.

Forde was fascinated with Adams' "Project Bluelight," which he ran in the desert south of Tucson. Instead of simply observing from lawn chairs, Adams' cadre of well-equipped former Marines went on patrols, looking for people who were up to no good. He told people his operation had the blessing of federal officials, including the Department of Homeland Security.

Adams and Forde at one point were on friendly terms, and she even appeared to brag about the connection during a Feb. 5 interview with The Herald.

E-mails examined by The Herald show that Adams didn't particularly welcome the attention.

Around the time she allegedly was trying to recruit people for drug-house robberies, he told her to get lost.

"Here is what I am suggesting," he wrote in a May 11 e-mail. "1. Stop dropping mine and Project Bluelight's name to give you and your amateur operations credibility. 2. Stay in Washington and off the border for the good of the movement. Shauna (sic), you are a dangerous sociopath and anyone who would listen to your (expletive) is an idiot. You do not know what you are doing, and you put people in the border movement in harms way. ... Go away. Good luck in prison."

Adams refused to be interviewed about that e-mail or others he exchanged with Forde. He confirmed the contents of several messages, including some in which he warned Forde that federal officials had been asking questions about her for roughly six months.

He confirmed that Forde at one point tried to convince him that she had been born into an Italian New York crime family -- "the Gambinis." He also believes she was behind phony messages he received from somebody who claimed to be a former Marine running border teams just like those fielded by Adams.

The messages, sent from an e-mail account controlled by Forde, warned Adams not to threaten her, bragged about Forde's commitment to the country, and suggested she had links to "big brass" in the government.

"I give her projects to work and they get done," one message read. "She uses her good looks to all of our advantage she can get Intel like I have never seen haha."



***

For months, others in the Minutemen movement received messages from the same e-mail account. Forde led them to believe the e-mails came from Scott Shogren, a former Marine aviator who is now an airline pilot.

Shogren, who now lives Florida, said he hasn't had contact with Forde for years.

He sent none of the e-mails, he said.

They met in 2007 in the Yakima Valley, where Shogren's family is well known. He was drawn to her because she talked about the link between border security and thwarting terrorists.

Shogren's military service took him to Lebanon, and he knew some who died in the 1983 terrorist truck bombing that devastated a Marine compound in Beirut. At least 240 Americans died, most of them Marines.

People who don't worry about border security in the U.S. "are just ignoring the fact that bad guys are coming across, too," he said.

He encouraged Forde to form Minutemen American Defense after she was kicked out of Minutemen Civil Defense Corps.

He later spent thousands of dollars bankrolling her failed attempt to film a documentary about Minutemen on the border.

Forde seemed charming and well-meaning, he said. But she also was a source of personal drama and tall tales, like her claim that guitarist Eddie Van Halen was her ex-boyfriend.

He put up with most of it because they were working for the same goals. But one day she tried to give the former Marine major an order, he said, and that was the end.

He sent Forde a text message telling her he wanted no more contact.

Shogren got a phone call from Gilchrist in June, after Forde's arrest. Shogren was told that Forde had claimed he was the person who truly called the shots for her group.

Others gave him e-mails that appeared to be sent by him but actually were from Forde's e-mail account. Those e-mails took Forde's side in internal Minutemen squabbles, threatening legal action, or worse, against anyone who challenged her leadership.

Shogren said he has no idea why Forde apparently picked him.

"I can't say I really knew Shawna very well," he said. "And I don't think anyone knows Shawna at all."



***

Mike Carlucci is a Seattle-area private investigator and security consultant. Over the years, Forde told reporters and others that the big, gravel-voiced detective was her link to legal muscle and even how she got dirt on her enemies.

That is a lie, Carlucci said. It's one of many that apparently went down easy in Minutemen circles, he said.

Some within the border-watch movement seem particularly susceptible to manipulation and fraud, Carlucci said. Their groups are largely volunteer, emotional about patriotism and love of country. They can't agree how to conduct themselves and, he said, for some that ambivalence extends to whether they should follow the nation's laws.

"I think it is a user-friendly environment for folks who aren't necessarily accountable because there are not hard and fast standards of accountability," he said.

Carlucci said Forde first came to him in early 2007, seeking advice on security procedures for her Minuteman group.

Forde never hired him, he said, and ignored his counsel. He suggested she conduct criminal background checks on everyone in Minutemen American Defense.

She said no, because "she was familiar with a number of people who had made mistakes in their past and had paid for them, and were some of the hardest workers she knows," he said.

Forde has her own criminal past. So do some of her associates. For example, the man she introduced in Everett last winter as both her boyfriend and a Minuteman is now in prison serving time on the latest of his 15 felony convictions.

Carlucci also told Forde to retain a lawyer if she wanted to make sure the group stayed out of trouble.

She never did.

Still, Carlucci said Forde kept trying to involve him, and before and after her arrest arranged from jail to provide him access to her personal e-mail accounts.

Dozens of e-mails show Forde was in regular contact with Minutemen leaders around the country, right up until her arrest, and that she was relentless about making her Minuteman activism pay her bills.

With police on her trail, the messages show Forde was negotiating a publishing deal to tell her life story to Laine Lawless, an Arizona border-watch figure who now writes on a Web site proclaiming Forde's innocence.

Carlucci said he never took money from Forde, not even when Forde asked him to provide a security escort to Jim Gilchrist of the Minuteman Project when he spoke in Central Washington in February 2008.

He said his last conversations with Forde were earlier this year, when she called to discuss the violent incidents in Everett involving her ex-husband and her.

Forde seemed to have trouble keeping details straight, Carlucci said, and he confronted her about it.

Suspicious, he said he sought out the lead detective Everett had assigned to the case at the time and told him Forde should be investigated in her ex-husband's shooting.

He's been in contact with Arizona detectives since the murders there.

Carlucci is convinced Forde was desperate to be recognized and that the Minutemen movement was a means to that end.

"She had an insatiable need to be validated and it truly didn't matter by who or how," Carlucci said.



***

Andrew Ong went to the Arizona desert to document not what Minutemen think or say, but what they do.

One night, tagging along with a few of Shawna Forde's team, the young photojournalist witnessed something that still troubles him.

The patrol stopped to check a brushy area for smugglers.

In the dark, Forde picked up a couple of rocks and tossed them over the heads of her Minutemen.

One rock hit something hard. It sounded like a ricocheting bullet.

Convinced they were being shot at, the Minutemen scrambled for cover. Forde quietly laughed behind their backs.

Ong was appalled. "'Have some fun, Andrew,'" he said she told him. "'Have some fun.'"

Later, Forde had her group report to the U.S. Border Patrol that they had been shot at. She also posted a video of the incident on YouTube as evidence of the risks Minutemen were taking to protect the nation's borders.

Ong met Forde in October 2008, not long after graduating from college. He decided the Minutemen movement would make an interesting subject to photograph. He learned about Forde on the Internet and contacted her.

They struck a deal: She'd let him hang out and take pictures if he was willing to give her some photos to use on her Web site.

Ong spent close to two weeks with Forde in the desert, living at a campground south of Tucson that different Minutemen groups were using as a staging area for their border activities.

From what he'd been told, he expected to find a couple dozen people, a command post, a communications hut, a chain of command. Instead, it was just Forde and about five others who didn't seem to have a plan or any notion of how best to patrol the desert.

None of the patrols Ong went on turned up smugglers. The only illegal immigrants he saw were a couple of hapless, dehydrated men from Central America who wandered into camp, begging for water. The men were taken into a cool mobile home and the Border Patrol was called to collect them, he said.

After the ricochet hoax, Ong wondered about other stories she passed along to Minutemen.

One unfolded in Arivaca's lone cantina, a place where some say the locals make sport of visitors by getting them to buy beer for a burro, who drinks from a mug.

"We walked into there and it felt like it was almost out of a movie," he said.

Every head swiveled toward the door when the Minutemen entered.

Then the regulars went back to their beers. Nothing happened, and before long Ong went back to camp.

Forde showed up a few hours later. She claimed a drug kingpin took her, blindfolded, to the house where he'd stashed cash and drugs. She showed Ong a small knife she said the man gave her as a memento of his respect.

Forde told a similar story in a Nov. 3, 2008, e-mail to supporters.

She attached what appeared to be photos of drugs and money.

"Do not share these!!!!!!!!!!!! It would be my life," Forde wrote in the message subject line.

She claimed to have won over the trafficker by agreeing to use drugs with him, and by flashing her signature tattoo: the Minutemen American Defense logo, inked across most of her back.

Forde seemed to spend most of the time on the border laboring over e-mails or articles intended for her Web site, Ong said. She also met with journalists interested in the border-watch story.

In a series of photos, Ong documented Forde on patrol, checking an abandoned home. She pointed a handgun toward the shadows, her uniform a short skirt and high-heeled sandals. Forde was locked and loaded, ready for the bad guys.

Ong said he had a hard time determining precisely what Forde was doing on the border.

"It was very, very bizarre," he said. "It was not at all what I expected."

Scott North: 425-339-3431 or north@heraldnet.com.



Epilogue

Andrew Ong last heard from Forde in an e-mail a few months before her arrest. She wanted to post some of his photographs on her Web site. After her arrest, bloggers stole many of his photographs and spread them illegally around the Internet.

Mike Carlucci continues to work as a private investigator, chased at times by journalists put on his trail by Forde.

Joe Adams is a source of intense interest for some bloggers. It started after an Internet talk show host suggested Adams' past ties to the CIA may somehow factor into Forde's fall. He recently told an Arizona newspaper that Forde was a nuisance.

Doug Parris continues to lead The Reagan Wing, blogging regularly about liberals, conservatives and the importance of the rule of law.

Jim Gilchrist remains embroiled in lawsuits over control of the Minuteman Project. Earlier this month, an invitation to speak at an immigration forum at Harvard University was withdrawn by the event's organizers. Investigators haven't approached him about Forde, he said.

Bob and Kathy Dameron are no longer active in the Minutemen movement. They recently provided Everett police with a statement about their time with Forde.

[TruthBrigade]

Show about this topic here:

http://truthbrigade.org/smf/index.php/topic,4498.0.html

What do you think?  Trial is set to come up here soon and I get emails from people requesting a new show...what do you all think?