How did the Arizona Daily Star overlook J.T. Ready?

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The Sunday Arizona Daily Star published this report, Report: Border-watch movement declining:

The Minuteman border-watch movement that exploded in Southern Arizona in the last decade has virtually disappeared, says a new report [by the Southern Poverty Law Center].

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In 2011, the number of groups termed by the center as “nativist extremists” — such as the Minuteman — declined by 42 percent, but at the same time the number of anti-government “Patriot” groups grew to record levels, the center said. The 1,274 extreme anti-government groups tabbed as belonging to the Patriot movement was the highest number since the center counted 858 in 1996.

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Groups such as the Arizona-based Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, once the best known of this category, splintered and dissolved. The arrest of one-time Minuteman Shawna Forde, for murdering an Arivaca man and his daughter in 2009, also drove people away.

Most important, anti-illegal-immigrant actions were taken up by state legislatures and absorbed as a major concern by groups such as the tea parties and the Republican Party. Many people who once concerned themselves with border-watch activities moved on to the broader concerns of the tea-party movement, she said.

Well, today there is an investigative report by Nick Martin at Talking Points Memo that has more details than what the Star report glosses over. Extremists Go To ‘War’ In The Arizona Desert | TPMMuckraker:

Arizona became a hotbed for a certain brand of extremist groups in the past decade as it took center stage in discussion about how to handle the nation’s broken immigration system. But while a report by the nation’s leading watchdog of the extremist movement shows the numbers of so-called “border watch” groups are dwindling, some that remain have shown a surprising penchant for violence. They are armed, angry and desperate to fight in what they see as a real-life war taking place in the nation’s borderlands.

In just the past few years alone, federal agents in Arizona have gone on a hunt for a man who claimed to have littered the desert with explosive devices. They have been told a Minuteman-style organization planned to shut down a major freeway. They have discovered a bomb planted along a known smuggling route. And more recently, a militia group has talked openly about buying a tank to combat what it calls “narco terrorism” flowing across the border.

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[Jeffery] Harbin was an active member of the National Socialist Movement, the largest neo-Nazi group in the United States, and was known to don the organization’s full dress uniform: black pants, black shirt, swastika armband and helmet emblazoned with the white letters SS to mimic the look of Hitler’s army.

More than six months before his arrest, members of the National Socialist Movement were spotted in plain clothes at a Tea Party rally in the Phoenix suburbs, passing out fliers that called for landmines to be placed along the US-Mexico border.

“We all should be actively advocating daily to mainstream America the most humane, non-racist, fair border security plan available,” the fliers said. “Namely, A MINEFIELD!”

The fliers carried the name of one of the group’s local leaders, JT Ready, a man who had recruited Harbin to the cause. Another member of the group later posted photos of the rally on Facebook. In one image, Ready, two other men, a women and two young girls can be seen holding the fliers, smiling and standing next to a news van for Univision, the Spanish language television network.

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What [Harbin] didn’t know was that FBI agents were watching him the whole time. When he got to the house, he showed the informant an olive green homemade hand grenade, which he nicknamed his “little baby.” He also showed off a pipe bomb complete with end caps and a model rocket fusing system.

The FBI coordinated with local police to pull Harbin over for a traffic violation on his drive home later that day. In his truck, investigators found three homemade bombs. In a later search of his home, they found 12 more.

Harbin’s case is by far the best documented example of Arizona extremists trying to escalate things at the border. But authorities there have been dealing with similar cases for years.

Proof of that came last year in a series of documents that the hacker group LulzSec stole from law enforcement in Arizona and then posted on the internet.

News reports at the time focused largely on what the stolen documents said about the drug war in Mexico and how law enforcement in the United States was handling it. But the documents also revealed several incidents, which were previously undisclosed to the public, showing how extremist groups in were escalating their tactics in the Arizona borderlands.

One document, for example, showed that US Border Patrol agents ran into a heavily armed man on March 30, 2011, in the desert south of Tucson. The man, identified as Tim Foley, told them he was patrolling the border. He said he was getting $350,000 in funding from people he described as “concerned citizens” to recruit five other men to help him.

The document, which was marked “Law Enforcement Sensitive” from the Department of Homeland Security, said Foley bragged to the agents about having military experience as a sniper and ranger. He said his group planned to conduct “mercenary type operations” on both sides of the border.

Most concerning to the agents, according to the document, was what the man told them next. “Tim stated that he has Improvised Explosive Devices deployed in the desert near Sasabe (Ariz.),” the document said. The sentence was typed in bright red letters.

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By then, the idea of explosives hidden in the desert was not altogether new to law enforcement in Arizona. Another document released by the hacker collective showed that on May 30, 2009, a US Border Patrol agent discovered a pipe bomb west of Tucson along a known smuggling route.

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Beyond explosives, the groups have also demonstrated an ability to put law enforcement on high alert in other ways.

A third “Law Enforcement Sensitive” document released by the hackers showed that authorities were told on April 28, 2010 to be on the lookout for a “civilian Minuteman type group” that had talked about shutting down a major freeway in the central part of the state.

The group, which called itself “A Concerned Citizen,” believed Interstate 8 was being used by smugglers to transport cargo. The warning of a freeway shut down came just days after Gov. Jan Brewer signed her state’s harsh immigration measures.

“The request comes in support of Governor Jane (sic) Brewer’s signing of SB1070 into law,” according to the warning, “and at the opposition of the media’s coverage of the protests in Phoenix.”

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Meanwhile, at least two of Harbin’s associates from the National Socialist Movement have founded a new group that intends to go well beyond anything the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps ever did.

Led by longtime white supremacists JT Ready and Harry Hughes, the US Border Guard routinely treks out in the desert south of Phoenix, heavily armed for what it describes as “operations” to stop “narco terrorists.” Its members often boast of confronting immigrants and detaining them until authorities can arrive.

But Ready, the same man whose name adorned the landmine fliers in 2010, hopes the group will someday do even more.

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Ready, who is also now running for sheriff of Pinal County, Ariz., describes himself these days as a humanitarian. As he takes a leading role in the new group, he has publicly disavowed the National Socialist Movement. However, he is still a frequent writer on the message boards of the white nationalist website Stormfront.org, where he is recognized as a “friend” of the website and a “sustaining member” — or donor. A search of the site shows he has posted there as recently as February.

Hughes, meanwhile, remains an avowed member of the National Socialist Movement and acts as its spokesman in Arizona. He occasionally posts updates from the field on the NSM’s main website.

On the US Border Guard website, alongside photos of its members wearing camouflage and carrying large guns, he recently posted a call for supporters to help the group with donations through PayPal.

* * *

As for Harbin, his attorney said in court documents earlier this year that the young man is done with the National Socialist Movement.

Harbin pleaded guilty late last year to two felonies in connection with the bombs. One was for possessing unregistered destructive devices and the other for transporting explosive material.

* * *

Harbin [was] sentenced him in February to two years in prison, with more than a year of it already having been served.

Prison records show Harbin, 29, is scheduled to be released on Oct. 11 of this year. When he does, he is then scheduled to spend three years on probation.

I previously posted about J.T. Ready running for Pinal County Sheriff. Russell Pearce's Neo-Nazi pal J.T. Ready running for Pinal County Sheriff.

In related (?) news, dethroned by recall and disgraced former "King" Russell Pearce announced on Monday that he is running for the Senate from the new LD 25. Pearce to run for Arizona Senate.