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.. On June 15, mBoise, Idaho, the Randy Weaver case was sent to the jury. Thecase is an example of a government gone' plad, a government that deployed! more than 400 FBI agents and US marshals to a remotddaho mountaintop Ito "get Randy Weaver". Randy Weaver, his wife Vicki, their four children, and friend Kevin Harris have now become a cause celebre among 'anti-govemment/anti-establishment' political networks throughout the West. It began [last August 21, when US marshals initiated a shoot-out with the Weavers and Kevin Harris neat Bonner's Ferry, Idaho. During the assault against the Weaver household, the federal agents managed to murder the Weavers' 14-year-old son, shooting him in the back as he ran toWard his home, assassinated Vicki Weaver as she stood in her doorway with her baby m her arms, wounded Randy Weaver and Kevin Harris, and even killed the Weavers' dog, with a shot in the back as it was nmning away. After an }I-day siege, Wcaver, Harris, and the surviving children surrendered to the FBI, after former presidential candidate Lt. Col. (Retired) Bo Gritz intervened and helped to negotiate the surrender. If it had not been for Gritz's personal mtervention, the FBI would have undoubtedly ensured that there would have been no live witnesses to testify in court The assault pn the Weavers by the FBI and the Bureau of~lcohol Tobacco, and !Firearms (BArF) was run by thc same FBI "Hostage Rescue Team" that carried out the assault and murder against the Branch Davidians in. Waco, Texas earlier this year. The government learned several lessons in the Weaver siege that were applied in Waco, among them not let ting the media get too close, destroying all the evidence, and killing everyone possible, ~.e.• not leaving any evidence on the scene that could point to government misconduct The federal marshals had had the Weaver home, locatedl in an is.oJated area of northern Idaho, under surveillance for 18 months, attempting to arrest Weaver on a warrant that charged him with failure to appear on a 1990 weapons chllIge for Hlegally selling two sawed-off shotguns to a BATF undercover infortflant THE GOVERNMENT SET UP WEAVER As revealed in court testimony, this original charge was a complete set-up by the BATF, using a government-paid provocateur named Kenneth Fadeley, who is now fmding hims:elf a new identity under the Federal Witness Protection Il1'0gram. Fadeley is a self-described spy for the BATf who was posing as'll firearms dealer and using the alias Gus MagioSOno. According to Weaver's attorney, Chuck Peterson, Fadeley was so determined to set Weaver up, that he even pointed out where to cut O:n the barrel of the shotgun, to ensure that Weaver cut it short enough to qualify it as "sawed-off', and therefore as an illegal weapon. Herb Byerly, a BATF agent in Spokane who supervised Fadeley, te.stifi_ed that after two sawed-off shotguns were sold to the informant, allegedly by Weaver, Byerly and another agent confronted Weaver with the evidence, to try to coerce him into becoming their agent Despite 'the threat of prosecution, Weaver angrily refused to become a "snitch". So, he was arrested on January 17, 1991, at the same cabin which in 1992 would become the scene of the deadly shoot-out The set-up continued. Weaver was ordered to appear for trial on Fe.bruary 19, 1991. After Weaver had left the courthouse, the trial date was changed to February 20. Then a court official supposedly made a mistake and notified Weaver that the Itrial date was March 20. When Weaver did not appear on February 20 for the tria', a federal judge issued 'a bench warrant for ibis arres~ for failing to appear. Even after ,authorities discovered their errQr, Weaver was i1ldicted for failing to appear. Maurice Ellsworth, US Attorney for Idaho, testi fied that after Weaver failed to show up for the February 20 trial, he directed his staff to obtain the indictment, even though he knew a court officer had toldl Weaver in a letter that the trial would begin March 20. 22·NEXUS OCTOBER -NOVEMBER 1993