Ammon Bundy offered to plead guilty if Oregon protesters' charges dropped
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Version 0 of 1. Oregon standoff leader Ammon Bundy offered to plead guilty in January in exchange for federal prosecutors dropping charges against all other protesters who occupied a wildlife refuge, a new court filing revealed. Bundy, the 40-year-old activist who spearheaded the anti-government occupation of the Malheur national wildlife refuge, offered to “take all responsibility for the protest” and enter a plea agreement with prosecutors on 29 January – three days after his arrest, his attorney Mike Arnold wrote in a motion on Wednesday. Bundy made that offer, Arnold wrote, “despite being innocent of the charge and simply requested that the government dismiss charges against all other protesters and let those then at the refuge go home without charges or violence”. The US attorney’s office rejected the offer, according to Arnold. The admission is a notable disclosure in the high-profile case involving more than two dozen defendants who participated in an armed militia standoff that began 2 January and dragged on for 41 days on public lands to protest the federal government’s treatment of ranchers. Bundy and several other protest leaders were arrested on a remote highway near the wildlife sanctuary on 26 January, causing the the occupation to quickly unravel and leaving behind only four holdouts at the refuge. Days later, Bundy offered to “take a hit for the team” so that other protesters could avoid arrest and charges and so that the four remaining activists could leave the refuge without incident, Arnold said in an interview Wednesday. “He was afraid and compassionate for the remaining people at the refuge,” Arnold said, noting that Bundy was particularly concerned given that state police had also shot and killed protest leader LaVoy Finicum. “Ammon was mourning over the death of LaVoy and was terribly frightened that they were going to have a violent takedown of the remaining protesters.” Two weeks after Bundy’s arrest, FBI officers surrounded the compound and the four holdouts surrendered and were arrested and charged. Arnold said he made the offer of a plea on Bundy’s behalf directly to prosecutors and that the US attorney’s office formally rejected it weeks later, saying, “It is simply too early to discuss resolution of the case,” according to the filing. Bundy and the other defendants, including his brother Ryan, are accused of using “force, intimidation and threats” to conspire against the government and are also facing a number of serious firearm charges that could result in decades in prison. The revelation of the guilty plea offer came as a footnote in a filing requesting that Bundy’s legal team receive a 30-day extension to file motions in the case, which is scheduled for a September trial. If a judge denies the extension request, his attorney asked that Bundy instead receive an “immediate trial date”, within the next 30 days. Even if Bundy had signed a plea agreement in January, “he would still maintain innocence”, Arnold said. A spokeswoman for the US attorney’s office in Oregon did not respond to a request for comment. Bundy’s lawyers also argued in court filings this week that the federal government does not have jurisdiction over the public land where the occupation occurred – a claim he and his supporters made throughout the protest. Bundy is also facing serious felony charges in a separate federal case stemming from his father Cliven Bundy’s 2014 standoff with the government at the family’s ranch in Nevada. |