Alleged kidnap plot also considered Virginia governor
GRAND RAPIDS, MICH. >> Members of anti- government paramilitary groups implicated in an alleged plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor over measures to slow the spread of the coronavirus during a fraught election year also discussed abducting Virginia’s governor during a June meeting, an FBI agent testified Tuesday.
During a hearing in a Grand Rapids federal court to review the evidence against the five Michigan defendants, Magistrate Judge Sally Berens ordered Kaleb Franks, Daniel Harris and Brandon Caserta to be held without bond until the trial. She said she would rule at a later date on the bond status of the other two Michigan men, Adam Fox and Ty Garbin. A sixth defendant from Delaware, Barry Croft, was ordered Tuesday to be transferred to Michigan to face the charges.
Berens’ ruling came after a day-long hearing in which FBI agent Richard Trask revealed new details about investigators’ use of confidential informants, undercover agents and encrypted communication in the alleged plot to kidnap Michigan’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, before Election Day.
“They discussed possible targets, taking a sitting governor, specifically issues with the governor of Michigan and Virginia based on the lockdown orders,” Trask said, noting that the roughly 15 people at the June 6 meeting in Dublin, Ohio, were unhappy with the governors’ responses to the coronavirus pandemic.
Trask said Fox, who authorities say was one of the ringleaders and who was the only defendant without a mask at the hearing, said during a post-arrest interview that he considered taking Whitmer from her vacation home out onto Lake Michigan and stranding her there on a disabled boat.
The FBI learned of the June meeting while investigating various anti-government groups, leading to the months-long case in Michigan that relied on confidential sources, undercover agents and clandestine recordings to foil the alleged kidnapping conspiracy, according to the criminal complaint and Trask’s testimony.
It wasn’t immediately clear if the talk of targeting Virginia’s Democratic governor, Ralph Northam, went beyond the June meeting, and nothing from the criminal complaint or Trask’s testimony indicated that anyone had been charged with plotting against Northam. Trask said members of anti-government groups from “four or five” states attended that meeting, and the complaint noted that Croft and Fox were among those who were there. During a news conference Tuesday, Northam did not discuss the alleged plot.