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Speaker 1: Cool Zone Media. Hey everybody, Molly here, I don't have

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Speaker 1: a new episode for you this week. I'm sorry about that.

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Speaker 1: I promise I'll be back next week with a new

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Speaker 1: Weird Little Guy for you. This rerun is almost a

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Speaker 1: year old. The show is almost a year old. This

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Speaker 1: was the second ever episode of Weird Little Guys, So

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Speaker 1: if you haven't been a listener from the beginning, it

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Speaker 1: might not be a rerun for you. Like I said,

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Speaker 1: I promise I'll have something new for you next week.

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Speaker 1: But for now, I hope you'll enjoy the story of Gerald,

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Speaker 1: a man who loved historical reenactment, sex dolls, and writing

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Speaker 1: online reviews of fast food restaurants. On October fourteenth to

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Speaker 1: twenty seventeen, the Battle of Cedar Creek was happening all

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Speaker 1: over again. Originally fought on October nineteenth, eighteen sixty four,

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Speaker 1: the crushing defeat meant Confederate troops could no longer maneuver

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Speaker 1: through the Shenandoah Valley to march on Washington, and the

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Speaker 1: Union victory was the last minute boost for Lincoln's reelection campaign.

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Speaker 1: One hundred and fifty three years later, as re enactors

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Speaker 1: in Middletown Virginia, milled around in their historically accurate wool

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Speaker 1: uniforms and replica weaponry, waiting for the battle to begin.

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Speaker 1: One of them found an alarming anachronism in the Sutler's tent,

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Speaker 1: a pipe bomb. I'm Molly Conger, and this is weird,

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Speaker 1: little guys. The Cedar Creek Battlefield Foundation has held their

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Speaker 1: annual re enactment of the battle since nineteen ninety, but

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Speaker 1: twenty seventeen was a politically fraught time in America. On

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Speaker 1: August twelfth, twenty seventeen, the Unite the Right rally in Charlesville,

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Speaker 1: Virginia ended when a young rally attendee who kept a

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Speaker 1: framed picture of Adolph Hitler on his nightstand, ran his

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Speaker 1: car through a crowd of peaceful protesters marching on a

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Speaker 1: closed street. He injured dozens and killed Heather Hire. Images

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Speaker 1: of the crowd that day, with rally attendees carrying Confederate

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Speaker 1: flags and swastikas side by side, flooded the national consciousness.

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Speaker 1: Most Americans heard the word antifa for the first time

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Speaker 1: that week. The national conversation about Confederate monuments, which had

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Speaker 1: been simmering all year, boiled over the city council in Baltimore, Maryland,

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Speaker 1: voted to remove their Confederate statues. Just two days later.

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Speaker 1: The same week, the mayor of Lexington, Kentucky, asked his

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Speaker 1: city council to approve the removal of the statues at

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Speaker 1: their courthouse. A Confederate monument in Hollywood Forever Cemetery in

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Speaker 1: LA was removed overnight. From Florida to California, Confederate monuments

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Speaker 1: were removed, toppled, and vandalized. No one wanted to be

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Speaker 1: the next Charlottesville. Six days after the rally, officials in Manassas,

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Speaker 1: a small city outside of d C about two hours

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Speaker 1: north of Charlottesville, announced they were calling off the annual

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Speaker 1: Civil War Reenactment weekend scheduled for the end of August.

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Speaker 1: The Washington Posts reported that the reenactors themselves were worried

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Speaker 1: the quote racially charged atmosphere around the country over whether

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Speaker 1: to remove Civil War monuments would lead to violence. So

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Speaker 1: the concern was not whether it was appropriate to continue

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Speaker 1: celebrating the Confederacy in the wake of the deadly rally,

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Speaker 1: but rather anxiety about the possibility that Antifa America's new

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Speaker 1: black clad boogeyman would target these events and these growing

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Speaker 1: fears of persecution from the radical left were confirmed on

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Speaker 1: September twenty third, when the Cedar Creek Battlefield Foundation received

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Speaker 1: an ominous letter in the mail. Instead of a return haddress,

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Speaker 1: the envelope bore a symbol that was fresh in their minds,

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Speaker 1: a black circle containing a black flag overlaying a red flag.

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Speaker 1: It was from Antifa. The letter inside read, you need.

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Speaker 2: To cancel your coming up celebration of the Civil War

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Speaker 2: on October thirteen, fourteen fifteen, twenty seventeen. If you choose

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Speaker 2: to continue with this farce of history that clearly celebrates

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Speaker 2: the war to keep African Americans in chains, then we

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Speaker 2: have no choice but to come in protest. We will

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Speaker 2: come and disrupt and cause problems for all those who

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Speaker 2: attend the atrocity of history. Several hundred of our supporters

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Speaker 2: will attend and slash tires, block traffic, harass patrons and reenactors.

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Speaker 2: We will make Charlottesville look like a Sunday picnic. Many

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Speaker 2: of us have dogs, so we'll bring dog feces to

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Speaker 2: throw on people. We will also throw cups of human urine.

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Speaker 2: We might resort to actually firing guns into the camps

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Speaker 2: and at the reenactors will put poison in the water.

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Speaker 2: You would use noise to disrupt the battles in sleep.

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Speaker 2: These events must stop. Our local organizer tells us he

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Speaker 2: is ready to go. You have been warned now. If

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Speaker 2: it is not.

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Speaker 1: Called off, we will destroy you.

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Speaker 2: You have less than one month to issue a cancelation

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Speaker 2: notice to it asap.

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Speaker 1: Days before the event in October, the Cedar Creek Battlefield

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Speaker 1: Foundation did announce publicly that they had received a threatening letter,

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Speaker 1: but that the event would go on with increased security,

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Speaker 1: and the details of the threat were not released, but

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Speaker 1: speculation immediately turned to the Culture War, and after the

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Speaker 1: bomb was discovered, the National Review wrote, the simplest and

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Speaker 1: most logical explanation is that this is a new, violent

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Speaker 1: extension of the effort to remove Confederate statues. The Federalists

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Speaker 1: lamented that history itself was becoming another casualty in the

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Speaker 1: culture War. The threatening letters continued for over a year,

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Speaker 1: becoming increasingly gruesome and terrifyingly specific, targeting members of the

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Speaker 1: board at Cedar Creek and their family members. Cedar Creek

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Speaker 1: had to cancel the reenactment in twenty eighteen after one

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Speaker 1: director of the Foundation resigned in fear for his family

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Speaker 1: safety when the letter writer threatened to put a bomb

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Speaker 1: under his mother's car. The new director started getting threats

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Speaker 1: of sexual violence against her young daughters. The mayor of

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Speaker 1: Gettysburg received a letter threatening to bomb the annual Gettysburg

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Speaker 1: Remembrance Day parade. Would Antifa stop at nothing to destroy history?

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Speaker 1: But it was at Antifa. It wasn't Antifa at all.

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Speaker 1: It was Gerald. Gerald Leonard Drake born in nineteen fifty

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Speaker 1: eight in Michigan, loves the Civil War. In nineteen ninety six,

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Speaker 1: his hometown paper, The port Here in Thymes, Harold wrote

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Speaker 1: an article about his dedication to reenactment. He'd gotten a

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Speaker 1: second job to save up the ten thousand dollars it

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Speaker 1: would cost him to transport Judith, his five hundred and

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Speaker 1: twenty five pound replica Civil War canon, from Mission Wigan

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Speaker 1: to Columbus, Georgia for the Chattahoochee Heritage Festival. Judith the

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Speaker 1: Canon was named after his wife, Judy, who would file

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Speaker 1: for divorce the following year. When he married his third wife,

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Speaker 1: Donna in twenty ten, they took wedding photos in Civil

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Speaker 1: War era address at the Historic Adams County courthouse in Gettysburg.

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Speaker 1: They got two cats and named them Shiloh and Musket.

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Speaker 1: But the world was changing. The world of eighteen sixty

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Speaker 1: falls further away every day, no matter how historically accurate

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Speaker 1: the brass buttons on your coat are. In twenty eleven,

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Speaker 1: he posted a thread on a Civil War reenactment forum

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Speaker 1: about a living history event he'd recently participated in a

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Speaker 1: tour group. Was appalled that the re enactors, role playing

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Speaker 1: as soldiers reading aloud letters from home, read a letter

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Speaker 1: describing the brutal whipping of an enslaved person that was

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Speaker 1: riddled with racial slurs. Though he felt that the event

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Speaker 1: itself went well, he wrote that shit hit the fan

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Speaker 1: afterwards and the liberals in the group had a bitch

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Speaker 1: session about appropriate language.

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Speaker 2: I guess what I'm asking here is, as living historians

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Speaker 2: and reenactors, aren't we supposed to do as good of

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Speaker 2: a job and impression of our ancestors as we possibly can.

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Speaker 2: We used to get praise and accolades for doing a

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Speaker 2: great first person impression. Let me know if anyone else

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Speaker 2: is having this kind of trouble for being the best

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Speaker 2: you can be.

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Speaker 1: Surprisingly, even in twenty eleven, fellow users on the Civil

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Speaker 1: War message board disagreed with Gerald. Their reenactment groups is

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Speaker 1: committed as they were to historical accuracy, did not use

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Speaker 1: the N word. One user, whose profile bears the badge

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Speaker 1: for Member of the Year wrote that he is quote

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Speaker 1: careful to avoid certain language in terms, always realizing that

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Speaker 1: my performance is in the present century. To modern day

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Speaker 1: folks who live in the present, it would not understand

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Speaker 1: the customs, practices, and language of the nineteenth century with

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Speaker 1: any real clarity. Another user, a former moderator of the forum,

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Speaker 1: replied to a comment from Drake that he was looking

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Speaker 1: for a less PC group, wrote that he can't imagine

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Speaker 1: there is any group out there that would condone that

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Speaker 1: kind of language, and all this achieves his bad publicity

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Speaker 1: for reenactors, adding that those tourists surely all went home

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Speaker 1: that day and told their friends about the racists they

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Speaker 1: saw at the event. A year later, Drake posted again

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Speaker 1: in the same Civil War forum, complaining that people are

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Speaker 1: getting too hung up on safety, writing remember when reenacting

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Speaker 1: used to be fun and mourning the old days when

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Speaker 1: battle reenactments were more like real battle. Again. Fellow reenactors

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Speaker 1: pushed back with one veteran reenactor, writing that he did

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Speaker 1: indeed remember those days. He'd once had a costume ruined

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Speaker 1: and gotten pretty serious burns when another reenactor shot him

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Speaker 1: with a replica shotgun. Even in his chosen community of

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Speaker 1: Civil War reenactors, Gerald was living in a version of

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Speaker 1: the past that was becoming increasingly lonely. In October of

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Speaker 1: twenty fourteen, things really started to fall apart. His third

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Speaker 1: marriage was on the rocks, and after what sounds like

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Speaker 1: a pretty petty dispute, Gerald was kicked out of his

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Speaker 1: Civil War reenactment unit as a volunteer at the Cedar

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Speaker 1: Creek Battlefield. He'd heard a rumor that someone was planning

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Speaker 1: to sneak into the reenactment without paying the registration fee.

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Speaker 1: Gerald and his friend and fellow reenactor Daryl found this

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Speaker 1: to be an outrageous offense and decided to print up

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Speaker 1: flyers letting everyone know that Duffy Miller wasn't going to

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Speaker 1: pay his entry fee and anyone who sees him should

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Speaker 1: stop him. Duffy Miller, as it turns out, was their

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Speaker 1: unit commander, and he was not pleased to see the posters.

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Speaker 1: He kicks Gerald and Daryl out of the unit. Jerald

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Speaker 1: continued volunteering at Cedar Creek, but it seems this incident

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Speaker 1: was the end of his love for reenacting. Now. I

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Speaker 1: can't find exactly how much it cost to register for

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Speaker 1: the event in twenty fourteen, but the twenty twenty four

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Speaker 1: registration fee is thirty five dollars, and I know from

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Speaker 1: the forum post that's actually been increased in the last

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Speaker 1: couple of years to cover the new security measures that

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Speaker 1: they have to have, So you have to assume it

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Speaker 1: was much less ten years ago. So the inciting incident

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Speaker 1: for this entire debacle was a couple of old guys

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Speaker 1: fighting about twenty bucks and the sanctity of Confederate reenactment.

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Speaker 1: I guess, so what's a guy to do now, First

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Speaker 1: they stop letting him say the N word, You're not

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Speaker 1: even allowed to shoot each other anymore, and now he's

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Speaker 1: kicked out of his unit entirely, a hobby he'd loved

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Speaker 1: since the early nineties was being ruined. They weren't saying

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Speaker 1: like wokeness back then, but I think if this happened today,

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Speaker 1: Gerald would say that it was being ruined by woke

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Speaker 1: He'd been left by three wives and now his own

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Speaker 1: civil war unit didn't want him around, but he continued

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Speaker 1: volunteering at Cedar Creek. He retired, He built and little models,

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Speaker 1: He got into model rockets. He traveled the world, and

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Speaker 1: he posted a lot, and apparently he held on to

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Speaker 1: his anger about that incident at the twenty fourteen Cedar

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Speaker 1: Creek Reenactment. I spent a lot of time combing through

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Speaker 1: hundreds of pages of court documents, years and years of

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Speaker 1: his posts on forums, but I can't quite sort out

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Speaker 1: what the catalyst was in twenty seventeen. Why did he

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Speaker 1: wait three years to put that bomb at Cedar Creek.

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Speaker 1: Maybe he saw the news about the Manassas Reenactment getting

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Speaker 1: canceled out of fear of political violence at the wake

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Speaker 1: up Unite the Right and just got an idea, because

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Speaker 1: within weeks of that news story, Gerald started writing letters.

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Speaker 1: After his first letter to the Cedar Creek Battlefield Foundation

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Speaker 1: in September, he followed up by placing an actual bomb

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Speaker 1: at the event in October. The reenactment community is pretty

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Speaker 1: small and the bomb was big news, but a rumor

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Speaker 1: was going around on Facebook that a teenager had been

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Speaker 1: arrested for the original letter, and then that was sort

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Speaker 1: of conflated. As you know, people are posting and reposting

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Speaker 1: and talking about the post that they saw. It was

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Speaker 1: conflated to the idea that someone had been arrested for

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Speaker 1: the bomb, and the rumor was very quickly disproven. No

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Speaker 1: one was arrested, replacing the bomb in the vendor's tent,

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Speaker 1: But the letter writer was frustrated. If they thought the

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Speaker 1: culprit had been apprehended, they wouldn't be afraid anymore. John Buchheister,

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Speaker 1: a vendor at the event who told a reporter that

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Speaker 1: he was present when the bomb was found, was one

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Speaker 1: of the posters in that Facebook rumor mill And there's

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Speaker 1: nothing malicious here. He just reposted something that someone else

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Speaker 1: had said that the would be bomber had been apprehended.

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Speaker 1: I think there was a lot of relief in believing that,

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Speaker 1: so a lot of people were posting it. But I

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Speaker 1: guess our letter writer saw John Buchheister's post because on

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Speaker 1: November thirteenth, twenty seventeen, he opened a letter addressed to

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Speaker 1: his home in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Like the first letter, the

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Speaker 1: envelope was printed with the ANTIFA symbol in place of

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Speaker 1: a return address, inside a typed letter read.

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Speaker 2: Thank you so much for putting on Facebook that a

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Speaker 2: teenager was arrested for the threat to Cedar Creek. It

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Speaker 2: was so much easier to bring in a bomb do

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Speaker 2: something like this again for us. We are coming to

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Speaker 2: Gettysburg parade and speech. Thank you again for all your

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Speaker 2: help in the last terror event.

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Speaker 1: That same week, a local newspaper in Gettysburg received a

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Speaker 1: letter threatening the upcoming Gettysburg Remembrance Day parade. The letter

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Speaker 1: threatened to drive trucks through the crowd at the parade,

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Speaker 1: a troubling callback to the still recent vehicular murderer Unite

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Speaker 1: the Right, and threatened to put sharpshooters in windows and

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Speaker 1: on rooftops. The letter writer ended the note by giving

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Speaker 1: a detailed description of the bomb at Cedar Creek quote

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Speaker 1: for proof that we did the sea terror attack. But

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Speaker 1: just as Cedar Creek had not canceled when they were threatened,

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Speaker 1: the Gettysburg Rememberance Day parade was not canceled that year,

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Speaker 1: but the route was significantly shortened to allow for a

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Speaker 1: heavy police presence. S Chris Anders, a Republican political activist,

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Speaker 1: wrote on Facebook, apparently Antifa and other hate groups are

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Speaker 1: headed to try and cause problems this Saturday at the

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Speaker 1: annual Remembrance Day parade, but he wrote that he would

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Speaker 1: be marching with his brothers in gray rather than giving

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Speaker 1: in to terrorists. There are nearly one hundred comments on

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Speaker 1: this Facebook post, mostly agreeing that Dantifa must be stopped

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Speaker 1: or offering questionable safety tips, like advising that you should

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Speaker 1: use a wool scarf to protect yourself from tear gas.

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Speaker 1: I have to assume that would only make things worse.

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Speaker 1: I feel like wool is very absorbent. But one loan commenter,

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Speaker 1: a reenactor from New England who rides with the First

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Speaker 1: Main Cavalry, had a different theory. He wrote, I bet

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Speaker 1: you five dollars that the perpetrator is a reenactor or

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Speaker 1: former reenactor. No offense to anyone, but no one knows

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Speaker 1: about rem Day beyond reenactors and locals. For it to

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Speaker 1: be a target, someone would have to be aware of it,

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Speaker 1: and there are plenty of other high profile, low security

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Speaker 1: events with bigger crowd numbers to choose. From his comment,

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Speaker 1: drew ire from the victimized Confederates, obsessed with the idea

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Speaker 1: of a massive conspiracy from the radical left. He was,

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Speaker 1: of course correct and now here's where things start to

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Speaker 1: get really weird. Just some truly inexplicable behavior with deep

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Speaker 1: weird roots. I mean, I guess that's the show, right,

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Speaker 1: This guy's weird. But here's where it takes its super

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Speaker 1: weird turn. Gerald is retired at this point, and when

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Speaker 1: he's not traveling, he's volunteering. He's still volunteering at Cedar

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Speaker 1: Creek even though he doesn't reenact anymore. But he's also

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Speaker 1: volunteering at sky Meadows State Park. It's not entirely clear

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Speaker 1: why a registered sex offender was allowed to volunteer at

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Speaker 1: the state park alongside a high school student, but that's

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Speaker 1: what it says in the affidavit. So I guess that

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Speaker 1: one fell through the cracks at sky Meadows because while

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Speaker 1: he did successfully petition to get himself removed from the

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Speaker 1: sex offender registry in twenty twenty one, in twenty eighteen,

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Speaker 1: the background check required for volunteers at state parks would

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Speaker 1: have shown that he was a registered sex offender for

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Speaker 1: a two thousand and four conviction in Ohio for sexual

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Speaker 1: imposition and child endangerment. And again, I'll be so clear

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Speaker 1: with you right up front, there's no allegation that Drake

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Speaker 1: was involved in any inappropriate sexual conduct as a volunteer anywhere,

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Speaker 1: not at the state park, not anywhere. So in the

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Speaker 1: time period of these events, there's no allegation that he's

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Speaker 1: touching any children or engaging in any inappropriate sexual conduct.

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Speaker 1: But I'm not just telling you he's a registered sex

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Speaker 1: offender to sort of point and laugh at that. As

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Speaker 1: a circumstance, these things intersect. So in twenty eighteen, he's

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Speaker 1: volunteering at the park with this teenage boy, and one

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Speaker 1: afternoon in February, they're volunteering together. They're shooting the shit

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Speaker 1: fill in the time, and Gerald, who is sixty at

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Speaker 1: this point, is telling this teenage boy about his hobby

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Speaker 1: of Civil War reenactment, which is very tragically in decline.

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Speaker 1: The topic of the twenty seventeen reenactment at Cedar Creek

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Speaker 1: comes up. I have to assume Gerald brought it up,

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Speaker 1: because why would the seventeen year old boy have brought

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00:18:41,320 --> 00:18:44,159
Speaker 1: that up. But Gerald is telling the kid about some

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Speaker 1: funny articles about that twenty seventeen event. He later emailed

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Speaker 1: the teenager what appeared to be photographs of newspaper clippings

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Speaker 1: about the bombing. But in these articles the bomb went off.

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00:18:58,680 --> 00:19:01,960
Speaker 1: The articles he emails this tea nag contained details of

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Speaker 1: the bomb actually killing people, with more deaths caused by

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00:19:05,920 --> 00:19:10,359
Speaker 1: subsequent sniper fire. But we know the bomb didn't really

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00:19:10,400 --> 00:19:14,200
Speaker 1: go off. No one got shot, no one got hurt,

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Speaker 1: nothing really happened. The articles he showed his young friend

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Speaker 1: were completely fake. The federal agents investigating the case wrote

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Speaker 1: that attempts to locate sources for these fake newspaper clippings

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00:19:26,800 --> 00:19:30,480
Speaker 1: turned up nothing. I mean, not even anything online showing

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Speaker 1: these fake articles. Nothing, there's nothing. He must have made

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Speaker 1: them himself, and that's where his sex offender status ties

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Speaker 1: back in. In two thousand and three, he was indicted

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Speaker 1: in Auglaize County, Ohio for gross sexual imposition, and shortly

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Speaker 1: after he's indicted, someone start sending weird letters to the

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Speaker 1: Auglais County prosecutor. The letters were made to appear as

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Speaker 1: though they were sent by a member of the police

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Speaker 1: department in Drake's hometown of Port Huron, Michigan, and they

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Speaker 1: appeared to prove that Drake's second wife was a child abuser.

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Speaker 1: The letter writer sent a forged polygraph report on Michigan

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Speaker 1: State Police letterhead and a forged notarized statement from Drake's

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Speaker 1: estranged wife, and when his home was eventually searched, police

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Speaker 1: found a doctored page from the local newspaper. He had

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Speaker 1: taken an actual newspaper and manually altered it with a

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Speaker 1: false news story about his estranged second wife, Susan, pleading

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00:20:29,119 --> 00:20:32,960
Speaker 1: guilty to child abuse and endangerment. No such news story

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00:20:32,960 --> 00:20:35,480
Speaker 1: ever existed, and I can find no evidence that Susan

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Speaker 1: was ever charged with such a crime. Maybe a more

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Speaker 1: thorough journalist would have pushed harder for the details here,

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Speaker 1: but court cases involving sexual abuse of a minor tend

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Speaker 1: to be completely closed. Those documents are sealed unless someone

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Speaker 1: was sitting in those hearings, and there's local news reports

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Speaker 1: about the testimony. You're just you're not going to find it,

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00:20:56,400 --> 00:20:59,120
Speaker 1: and short of reaching out to the parties involved, there's

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00:20:59,160 --> 00:21:01,960
Speaker 1: no way from me to know exactly what led to

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Speaker 1: Gerald Drake being convicted of sexual imposition and child endangerment

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00:21:06,680 --> 00:21:08,840
Speaker 1: or why he tried to frame his strange wife for it.

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Speaker 1: But I can tell you that after his conviction, there's

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Speaker 1: a note on the docket that the judge prohibited Drake

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Speaker 1: from contacting his second ex wife and her minor daughter

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Speaker 1: from a prior marriage. So I think we can get

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Speaker 1: the gist of the situation without me asking a young

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Speaker 1: woman why her stepdad, a man now in prison for

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Speaker 1: making a bomb, was court ordered to stay away from

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Speaker 1: her when she was ten. Take from that what you will.

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00:21:34,960 --> 00:21:37,520
Speaker 1: The relevant kernel of that story, though, is those fake

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Speaker 1: newspaper articles. In two thousand and three, he's manually cutting

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00:21:42,080 --> 00:21:46,080
Speaker 1: and pasting by hand and xeroxing his creations to disguise

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00:21:46,119 --> 00:21:50,000
Speaker 1: the alterations. He's arts and craftsing his way into an

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00:21:50,000 --> 00:21:52,359
Speaker 1: alternate reality where his ex wife is the one in

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Speaker 1: dangering children, not him. And in twenty eighteen, he's doing

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Speaker 1: it again. He's making fake newspaper clippings about what he

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Speaker 1: wished were real. He's showing this teenage boy a reality

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Speaker 1: where the bomb did go off and the people who

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00:22:06,240 --> 00:22:10,080
Speaker 1: snubbed him died. And while he was in jail for

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00:22:10,119 --> 00:22:12,399
Speaker 1: that sex offense a short eight months in an Ohio

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00:22:12,480 --> 00:22:18,199
Speaker 1: County jail, he made another art project of sorts. In

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00:22:18,240 --> 00:22:20,960
Speaker 1: September two thousand and four, the Auglais County Sheriff's office

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Speaker 1: reached out to the FBI Field office in Cleveland. Gerald

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00:22:25,240 --> 00:22:27,400
Speaker 1: had been trying to make friends in jail by showing

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00:22:27,480 --> 00:22:31,199
Speaker 1: off his knowledge of explosives. He produced eight pages of

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00:22:31,240 --> 00:22:34,520
Speaker 1: hand drawn diagrams and instructions for creating a pipe bomb,

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00:22:34,960 --> 00:22:38,119
Speaker 1: a CO two cartridge bomb, a Coleman fuel bomb, a

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00:22:38,160 --> 00:22:41,600
Speaker 1: propane tank bomb, and diagrams about how to modify the

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00:22:41,680 --> 00:22:44,840
Speaker 1: kind of inert grenades you can buy as antiques or

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00:22:44,840 --> 00:22:47,640
Speaker 1: at the Army surplus store, and how to turn them

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00:22:47,680 --> 00:22:52,360
Speaker 1: back into live grenades. And the diagram of the pipe

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Speaker 1: bomb he drew in jail in two thousand and four

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00:22:55,280 --> 00:22:59,760
Speaker 1: is remarkably similar to the device he made in twenty seventeen.

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Speaker 1: It doesn't appear that anything ever came of the incident

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Speaker 1: in the jail back in two thousand and four. You know,

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00:23:05,119 --> 00:23:07,560
Speaker 1: the Sheriff's office contact of the FBI, and they said, hey,

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00:23:07,600 --> 00:23:09,240
Speaker 1: we've got these weird drawings. What do you guys think

376
00:23:09,240 --> 00:23:12,040
Speaker 1: about this. There's no indication that there was follow up

377
00:23:12,040 --> 00:23:16,240
Speaker 1: from there, but apparently they held on to them. Those

378
00:23:16,320 --> 00:23:19,920
Speaker 1: drawings remained in a filing cabinet somewhere in Ohio for

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Speaker 1: twenty years. It's kind of surprising that they still had

380
00:23:23,680 --> 00:23:27,000
Speaker 1: those drawings in twenty nineteen, but they are included in

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00:23:27,040 --> 00:23:30,520
Speaker 1: the affidavit for the search warrant, so in the spring

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00:23:30,560 --> 00:23:33,600
Speaker 1: of twenty eighteen, he seems pretty content with his hobbies.

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Speaker 1: He's making fake newspaper articles about his bomb going off

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00:23:37,119 --> 00:23:40,480
Speaker 1: and showing them to a kid he volunteers with based

385
00:23:40,480 --> 00:23:43,320
Speaker 1: on his eBay review history. He's painting miniature models of

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00:23:43,359 --> 00:23:47,680
Speaker 1: Godzilla and Frankenstein, both five stars from Gerald, and he's

387
00:23:47,680 --> 00:23:51,240
Speaker 1: getting into model rocketry. In March, he took a solo

388
00:23:51,320 --> 00:23:55,879
Speaker 1: vacation to Amsterdam. His trip Advisor account provides a pretty

389
00:23:55,960 --> 00:23:59,160
Speaker 1: robust log of his travels. He wasn't a big fan

390
00:23:59,200 --> 00:24:02,560
Speaker 1: of the Jewish History Museum, titling his review not really

391
00:24:02,600 --> 00:24:06,000
Speaker 1: for Gentiles and writing that he felt shorted by the

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00:24:06,080 --> 00:24:09,280
Speaker 1: lack of artifacts from the death camps at the Holocaust Museum.

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00:24:09,800 --> 00:24:12,240
Speaker 1: He felt that it had been quote scrubbed of shock

394
00:24:12,480 --> 00:24:15,280
Speaker 1: due to the new PC way all museums are going.

395
00:24:16,520 --> 00:24:18,840
Speaker 1: He felt the same way about the Dutch Resistance Museum,

396
00:24:18,840 --> 00:24:21,080
Speaker 1: writing if you were looking for the story of the

397
00:24:21,080 --> 00:24:23,760
Speaker 1: full account of atrocities done on the citizens, well this

398
00:24:23,880 --> 00:24:28,159
Speaker 1: display doesn't have it it. Like many museums today have

399
00:24:28,280 --> 00:24:30,760
Speaker 1: had to lighten up on their truth so as not

400
00:24:30,840 --> 00:24:35,680
Speaker 1: to offend anyone. He did, however, really enjoy the Museum

401
00:24:35,680 --> 00:24:38,440
Speaker 1: of Prostitution and his visit to the Red Light District.

402
00:24:39,440 --> 00:24:41,679
Speaker 1: In a later post on a forum for sex doll owners,

403
00:24:41,720 --> 00:24:44,120
Speaker 1: he boasted that he is familiar with the female condoms

404
00:24:44,119 --> 00:24:47,160
Speaker 1: he uses to keep his dolls clean because he's used

405
00:24:47,160 --> 00:24:50,639
Speaker 1: them in European brothels. And for what it's worth, the

406
00:24:50,640 --> 00:24:52,800
Speaker 1: Anne frank House got his seal of approval as a

407
00:24:52,840 --> 00:24:55,680
Speaker 1: World War II history buff. He loved the Ripley's Believe

408
00:24:55,680 --> 00:24:58,439
Speaker 1: It or Not Museum, and he was deeply upset that

409
00:24:58,480 --> 00:25:01,400
Speaker 1: his hostel did not provide a t additional American breakfast

410
00:25:01,760 --> 00:25:06,240
Speaker 1: with quote hot meats. I don't know why you would

411
00:25:06,280 --> 00:25:09,920
Speaker 1: expect a cheap hostel in Amsterdam to have American breakfast,

412
00:25:10,040 --> 00:25:14,520
Speaker 1: but he was not satisfied, and just as an aside

413
00:25:14,520 --> 00:25:17,040
Speaker 1: about his trip Advisor reviews, I think that was my

414
00:25:17,080 --> 00:25:22,399
Speaker 1: favorite thing about researching this. He loves to review the

415
00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:24,960
Speaker 1: cell site location data in one of the search warrant

416
00:25:24,960 --> 00:25:27,760
Speaker 1: affidavits shows that he likely dropped off that very first

417
00:25:27,760 --> 00:25:30,160
Speaker 1: threat letter at a USPS drop box in a strip

418
00:25:30,200 --> 00:25:33,240
Speaker 1: mall near the Dulles Airport just before boarding an Air

419
00:25:33,280 --> 00:25:36,280
Speaker 1: France flight from DC to Madrid on September twenty first,

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00:25:36,359 --> 00:25:40,119
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen. So while his letter threatening to throw piss

421
00:25:40,160 --> 00:25:42,480
Speaker 1: and shit at Civil War reenactors was making its way

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00:25:42,480 --> 00:25:45,000
Speaker 1: to Cedar Creek, he was on his way to Spain.

423
00:25:46,240 --> 00:25:49,399
Speaker 1: He hated the bullfighting, but he raved about the burger

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00:25:49,520 --> 00:25:53,000
Speaker 1: king on Plaza de Castilla. Apparently the burger king at

425
00:25:53,040 --> 00:25:55,800
Speaker 1: home is always getting his order wrong. He had to

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00:25:55,840 --> 00:25:57,760
Speaker 1: go all the way to Spain to get his whopper

427
00:25:57,800 --> 00:26:01,920
Speaker 1: with no onions and no pickle. The burger king in

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00:26:01,960 --> 00:26:05,800
Speaker 1: his hometown only gets four stars from Gerald. And since

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00:26:05,880 --> 00:26:09,440
Speaker 1: visiting Italy in April twenty seventeen, he rated four different

430
00:26:09,440 --> 00:26:12,840
Speaker 1: Italian restaurants in Winchester, Virginia, based on how the pizza

431
00:26:12,880 --> 00:26:15,920
Speaker 1: measures up to the pizza in Rome is given out

432
00:26:15,920 --> 00:26:21,080
Speaker 1: two just like Rome's, and two were failures according to Gerald.

433
00:26:22,600 --> 00:26:25,040
Speaker 1: So maybe he's done. Maybe it's out of his system.

434
00:26:25,560 --> 00:26:28,160
Speaker 1: Three threatening letters and one bomb that didn't go off,

435
00:26:28,200 --> 00:26:32,600
Speaker 1: and then he's back to his hobbies. But on June nineteenth,

436
00:26:32,600 --> 00:26:35,000
Speaker 1: twenty eighteen, his local newspaper ran a story about the

437
00:26:35,080 --> 00:26:38,560
Speaker 1: upcoming reenactment at Cedar Creek. The event was just four

438
00:26:38,560 --> 00:26:40,639
Speaker 1: months away and the board of directors wanted everyone to

439
00:26:40,640 --> 00:26:43,240
Speaker 1: know that the reenactment weekend would have additional security after

440
00:26:43,240 --> 00:26:46,800
Speaker 1: the incident the year before. Days after the paper ran

441
00:26:46,840 --> 00:26:49,639
Speaker 1: that story, a pair of identical letters were mailed to

442
00:26:49,640 --> 00:26:53,320
Speaker 1: the newspaper, the Winchester Star and the Cedar Creek Battlefield Foundation.

443
00:26:54,680 --> 00:26:57,040
Speaker 1: Like the first letters, the envelopes had a symbol where

444
00:26:57,040 --> 00:26:59,639
Speaker 1: the return address should be, But for some reason, these

445
00:26:59,720 --> 00:27:02,000
Speaker 1: letters a version of the anti fascist symbol with the

446
00:27:02,040 --> 00:27:04,600
Speaker 1: red flag on top and the black flag behind, which

447
00:27:04,640 --> 00:27:07,720
Speaker 1: is reversed from the original letters. I think he probably

448
00:27:07,760 --> 00:27:10,600
Speaker 1: just downloaded a new image and didn't notice that it

449
00:27:10,680 --> 00:27:13,360
Speaker 1: was different. I don't think he realized he was signaling

450
00:27:13,359 --> 00:27:17,399
Speaker 1: a preference for anarchism over communism, or vice versa. You know,

451
00:27:17,560 --> 00:27:20,680
Speaker 1: both versions of that symbol exist and are perfectly real

452
00:27:20,760 --> 00:27:23,439
Speaker 1: and valid and are used by different people, but they

453
00:27:23,480 --> 00:27:26,359
Speaker 1: are in fact different symbols and do mean something slightly different.

454
00:27:27,240 --> 00:27:30,720
Speaker 1: I don't think Gerald knew that. And this time both

455
00:27:30,800 --> 00:27:33,480
Speaker 1: letters were addressed to Joe Derezzo, the president of the

456
00:27:33,480 --> 00:27:36,919
Speaker 1: foundation's board, and they threatened to kill his mother with

457
00:27:36,960 --> 00:27:39,119
Speaker 1: a car bomb if he didn't call off the reenactment

458
00:27:39,119 --> 00:27:42,480
Speaker 1: in October. Dereza later told agents that he took the

459
00:27:42,520 --> 00:27:45,280
Speaker 1: threat seriously enough that he began checking underneath his mother's

460
00:27:45,280 --> 00:27:49,080
Speaker 1: car for explosive devices. But the language in the letters

461
00:27:49,200 --> 00:27:54,919
Speaker 1: was odd and oddly specific. Though the Winchester Star article

462
00:27:54,960 --> 00:27:58,960
Speaker 1: didn't actually mention what those increased security measures would be,

463
00:27:59,760 --> 00:28:03,600
Speaker 1: the letter writers seemed to know. One of the private

464
00:28:03,600 --> 00:28:07,320
Speaker 1: discussions the board had was about banning spectators from bringing

465
00:28:07,359 --> 00:28:10,560
Speaker 1: bags of any kind to the event, but they were

466
00:28:10,600 --> 00:28:12,679
Speaker 1: worried that this would be an issue for people like

467
00:28:12,920 --> 00:28:16,600
Speaker 1: parents with diaper bags. The letter writer said there were

468
00:28:16,720 --> 00:28:19,960
Speaker 1: quote many ways for us to sneak in a surprise,

469
00:28:20,480 --> 00:28:23,960
Speaker 1: specifically mentioning putting a bomb inside of a diaper bag.

470
00:28:25,200 --> 00:28:27,159
Speaker 1: And the board had also quietly been in contact with

471
00:28:27,200 --> 00:28:30,760
Speaker 1: the local sheriff's office about providing metal detectors, and the

472
00:28:30,840 --> 00:28:33,840
Speaker 1: letter writer seemed to know this too, boasting that he'd

473
00:28:33,840 --> 00:28:37,040
Speaker 1: already outsmarted their security.

474
00:28:37,600 --> 00:28:41,480
Speaker 2: We now have plastic bombs, so metal detectors are useless.

475
00:28:41,920 --> 00:28:43,920
Speaker 2: We have found a man that's going to pose as

476
00:28:43,960 --> 00:28:47,240
Speaker 2: an enactor to drive in some kind of fertilizer bomb.

477
00:28:47,560 --> 00:28:53,000
Speaker 2: We have coolers, thermoses, water bottles, all made into small IEDs.

478
00:28:54,440 --> 00:28:57,400
Speaker 1: And in the completely real and very serious way that

479
00:28:57,800 --> 00:29:00,880
Speaker 1: real Antifa terror cells sign off their terror some threat letters.

480
00:29:01,200 --> 00:29:04,240
Speaker 1: The letter writer explained why the bomb didn't work in

481
00:29:04,280 --> 00:29:05,120
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen.

482
00:29:06,800 --> 00:29:08,960
Speaker 2: We are the ones that did it to you last year.

483
00:29:09,240 --> 00:29:11,680
Speaker 2: We used a bad bomb guy. His mercury switch and

484
00:29:11,760 --> 00:29:14,160
Speaker 2: rocket launch wire didn't work on the pipe bomb covered

485
00:29:14,200 --> 00:29:17,480
Speaker 2: in nuts. Just so you know we are real and returning.

486
00:29:20,120 --> 00:29:23,120
Speaker 1: Yeah, just so you know we're real. Okay, it's such

487
00:29:23,160 --> 00:29:27,280
Speaker 1: a weird mess, but silly or not. The letters recipient

488
00:29:27,520 --> 00:29:31,480
Speaker 1: was terrified they were threatening to blow up his mom,

489
00:29:32,360 --> 00:29:34,640
Speaker 1: and there really was a real bomb the year before,

490
00:29:34,720 --> 00:29:36,960
Speaker 1: so you know he's not bluffing. You already know he

491
00:29:37,080 --> 00:29:40,760
Speaker 1: really can build a bomb. So you can't laugh it

492
00:29:40,800 --> 00:29:44,960
Speaker 1: off while it's happening. But in hindsight, what a goofy

493
00:29:45,000 --> 00:29:47,960
Speaker 1: ass sign off? Just so you know, we had a

494
00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:50,800
Speaker 1: bad bomb guy last year, but we're very real and

495
00:29:50,840 --> 00:29:56,680
Speaker 1: we fixed that. Okay, we're real. A sixth letter, the

496
00:29:56,720 --> 00:29:59,640
Speaker 1: third in this second batch, was sent to John Buchheister,

497
00:30:00,160 --> 00:30:03,000
Speaker 1: that vendor in Pennsylvania who had spoken to the media

498
00:30:03,040 --> 00:30:05,600
Speaker 1: about being there when the bomb was discovered in twenty seventeen.

499
00:30:06,680 --> 00:30:08,880
Speaker 1: He'd gotten a letter in the first batch too, thanking

500
00:30:08,960 --> 00:30:11,120
Speaker 1: him for spreading that rumor that someone had been arrested

501
00:30:11,160 --> 00:30:14,760
Speaker 1: for placing the bomb. Confusingly, the letter he got in

502
00:30:14,840 --> 00:30:18,400
Speaker 1: July twenty eighteen was addressed to Joe, just like the

503
00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:21,200
Speaker 1: letter sent to Joe Derezo the same week, and it

504
00:30:21,240 --> 00:30:24,280
Speaker 1: seemed to be speaking to Joe Derezzo asking for him

505
00:30:24,320 --> 00:30:27,720
Speaker 1: to call off the event, which presumably Durezzo could do

506
00:30:27,960 --> 00:30:30,840
Speaker 1: as president of the board. But John Buchheister is just

507
00:30:30,880 --> 00:30:35,200
Speaker 1: a guy in Pennsylvania who sells antiques and Civil War reproductions.

508
00:30:36,600 --> 00:30:39,640
Speaker 1: This letter, like the others, threatened to kill Derezo's mother.

509
00:30:41,720 --> 00:30:44,080
Speaker 2: Since we can't seem to get to to stop this

510
00:30:44,200 --> 00:30:47,520
Speaker 2: celebration of a war to keep men in chains, maybe

511
00:30:47,520 --> 00:30:49,760
Speaker 2: if we go after your volunteers that help out, you

512
00:30:49,800 --> 00:30:52,760
Speaker 2: will stop this. I like the idea of burning your

513
00:30:52,800 --> 00:30:54,479
Speaker 2: mother alive in a car bomb.

514
00:30:57,280 --> 00:31:00,160
Speaker 1: Days after these letters were received, the Foundation announced on

515
00:31:00,280 --> 00:31:03,840
Speaker 1: July third, twenty eighteen, they were calling off the reenactment

516
00:31:03,840 --> 00:31:06,920
Speaker 1: in October. You know, they got that letter in twenty

517
00:31:06,960 --> 00:31:10,120
Speaker 1: seventeen and they decided we're going to soldier On, We're

518
00:31:10,160 --> 00:31:13,040
Speaker 1: going to have the event, and then there was a

519
00:31:13,120 --> 00:31:15,680
Speaker 1: real bomb. People were really in danger. So when they

520
00:31:15,720 --> 00:31:17,440
Speaker 1: got this second set of letters. In the middle of

521
00:31:17,480 --> 00:31:20,120
Speaker 1: twenty eighteen, they decided, we got to call it off.

522
00:31:20,200 --> 00:31:22,440
Speaker 1: It's not safe. What if the bomb goes off this year.

523
00:31:22,480 --> 00:31:24,560
Speaker 1: We know this guy's not bluffing, we know he got

524
00:31:24,560 --> 00:31:28,040
Speaker 1: a bomb in the tent last year. We can't risk it.

525
00:31:29,560 --> 00:31:32,160
Speaker 1: And on the Civil War Talk Forum, that online forum

526
00:31:32,200 --> 00:31:37,200
Speaker 1: where Gerald's been posting for years, reactions were mixed. A

527
00:31:37,240 --> 00:31:39,600
Speaker 1: lot of users agreed that it was the right thing

528
00:31:39,640 --> 00:31:42,320
Speaker 1: to do. It's just not worth the risk people bring

529
00:31:42,360 --> 00:31:46,240
Speaker 1: their children, their families. Others didn't think it was right

530
00:31:46,280 --> 00:31:49,520
Speaker 1: to let the terrorists win, with one poster noting that

531
00:31:49,600 --> 00:31:52,240
Speaker 1: he never stopped going to NASCAR races after nine to eleven.

532
00:31:53,200 --> 00:31:55,200
Speaker 1: I don't know that NASCAR was like a big target

533
00:31:55,200 --> 00:31:58,120
Speaker 1: for al Qaida, but he's been carrying that weight for years,

534
00:31:58,160 --> 00:32:02,600
Speaker 1: I guess. But some posters were starting to ask questions

535
00:32:02,720 --> 00:32:08,760
Speaker 1: like why Cedar Creek and why only Cedar Creek. It's

536
00:32:08,800 --> 00:32:11,800
Speaker 1: not the largest or most high profile reenactment, even in

537
00:32:11,880 --> 00:32:13,920
Speaker 1: just the immediate area. I mean, I don't know if

538
00:32:13,960 --> 00:32:16,760
Speaker 1: you've ever spent time in Virginia, but most of that

539
00:32:16,840 --> 00:32:18,800
Speaker 1: part of Virginia just is as hip will wear a

540
00:32:18,840 --> 00:32:22,800
Speaker 1: battlefield every town has When every town has a plaque

541
00:32:22,960 --> 00:32:26,200
Speaker 1: and Cedar Creek was a Union victory, wouldn't these people

542
00:32:26,240 --> 00:32:30,960
Speaker 1: be happier targeting a reenactment of a Confederate win. And then,

543
00:32:31,560 --> 00:32:34,200
Speaker 1: after pages and pages of going back and forth about

544
00:32:34,200 --> 00:32:38,800
Speaker 1: this decision on the forum, Gerald himself weighed in.

545
00:32:40,640 --> 00:32:43,680
Speaker 2: I volunteer at Cedar Creek from what we have been told,

546
00:32:43,960 --> 00:32:46,600
Speaker 2: and this is not for general release. The foundation has

547
00:32:46,600 --> 00:32:49,440
Speaker 2: received threats of bodily harm to the board members. They're

548
00:32:49,440 --> 00:32:52,400
Speaker 2: families and everyone that helps out. Then there is the

549
00:32:52,520 --> 00:32:55,280
Speaker 2: very high cost of security. It is sad that we

550
00:32:55,320 --> 00:32:57,040
Speaker 2: live in a world with such a hostile climate to

551
00:32:57,080 --> 00:33:00,160
Speaker 2: the Confederacy, and PS has taken battle flags out of

552
00:33:00,160 --> 00:33:03,360
Speaker 2: all its stores, and statues are being taken down here

553
00:33:03,360 --> 00:33:07,680
Speaker 2: in Virginia, schools, streets, parks, anything named about the Confederacy

554
00:33:07,800 --> 00:33:10,480
Speaker 2: is being changed. I do not know if they will

555
00:33:10,480 --> 00:33:14,360
Speaker 2: officially announce the reason or reasons for this decision. Last

556
00:33:14,440 --> 00:33:16,760
Speaker 2: year they refused to say much, and rumors were all

557
00:33:16,800 --> 00:33:19,160
Speaker 2: over the place. We all need to maybe send some

558
00:33:19,240 --> 00:33:21,960
Speaker 2: money to the foundation for expenses, as this was their

559
00:33:21,960 --> 00:33:24,480
Speaker 2: only way of raising funds. With the fall of so

560
00:33:24,520 --> 00:33:28,120
Speaker 2: many Confederate symbols and events going by the wayside, I

561
00:33:28,200 --> 00:33:31,040
Speaker 2: now can feel what my ancestors did when the actual

562
00:33:31,080 --> 00:33:32,080
Speaker 2: Confederacy fell.

563
00:33:34,560 --> 00:33:37,920
Speaker 1: So he is victim and perpetrator here lingering in the

564
00:33:37,960 --> 00:33:41,360
Speaker 1: comment section, watching his fellow Civil War enthusiasts argue about

565
00:33:41,400 --> 00:33:45,800
Speaker 1: how the community should respond to what he has done.

566
00:33:45,920 --> 00:33:48,920
Speaker 1: It's like in every police procedural drama where the killer

567
00:33:48,960 --> 00:33:51,120
Speaker 1: returns to the scene of the crime just to take

568
00:33:51,120 --> 00:33:55,040
Speaker 1: in the aftermath and again, just as suddenly as the

569
00:33:55,160 --> 00:33:59,840
Speaker 1: letters began, they stopped again. He got what he wanted.

570
00:34:00,600 --> 00:34:17,480
Speaker 1: The event was canceled in October, just before the now

571
00:34:17,600 --> 00:34:21,239
Speaker 1: canceled event would have been approaching, Joe Derezo resigned as

572
00:34:21,280 --> 00:34:24,080
Speaker 1: head of the foundation's board. He didn't feel the board

573
00:34:24,120 --> 00:34:28,000
Speaker 1: was taking the threat seriously enough, although it's unclear what

574
00:34:28,120 --> 00:34:31,200
Speaker 1: discussions were taking place behind closed doors because there'd been

575
00:34:31,239 --> 00:34:33,840
Speaker 1: no threats in several months and the event was already canceled,

576
00:34:33,840 --> 00:34:36,600
Speaker 1: so I don't know what prompted him to resign just then.

577
00:34:36,640 --> 00:34:40,560
Speaker 1: In October and the local paper, The Winchester Star, ran

578
00:34:40,600 --> 00:34:45,239
Speaker 1: an article about Derezo's resignation, and like clockwork, a few

579
00:34:45,320 --> 00:34:48,680
Speaker 1: days after the article ran, the letter started up again.

580
00:34:49,680 --> 00:34:52,560
Speaker 1: The foundation got a letter addressed to Deurezzo, who again

581
00:34:52,600 --> 00:34:56,080
Speaker 1: had just resigned, saying we're sorry to see you go,

582
00:34:56,880 --> 00:34:59,840
Speaker 1: and moving on to threatening the foundation's new acting director,

583
00:35:00,040 --> 00:35:04,920
Speaker 1: Jeanette Schaeffer, and I'm sorry it gets gross here. I mean,

584
00:35:04,960 --> 00:35:07,479
Speaker 1: none of this was good, but it gets gross again.

585
00:35:08,280 --> 00:35:10,920
Speaker 1: I'm always on the fence about repeating things like this, right,

586
00:35:10,960 --> 00:35:13,560
Speaker 1: Like is this just for shock value? Does this add

587
00:35:13,640 --> 00:35:17,120
Speaker 1: information to the story? Do you need to know exactly

588
00:35:17,160 --> 00:35:20,400
Speaker 1: what he said in order for the story to make sense?

589
00:35:21,239 --> 00:35:23,719
Speaker 1: But given his prior conviction for a crime of a

590
00:35:23,760 --> 00:35:27,240
Speaker 1: sexual nature involving a young girl, I think it does matter.

591
00:35:27,800 --> 00:35:29,759
Speaker 1: He wasn't just saying whatever he thought would be the

592
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:33,520
Speaker 1: scariest and the nastiest, Like this kind of ties back

593
00:35:33,560 --> 00:35:38,719
Speaker 1: into his own past. The letter writer told Derezo that

594
00:35:38,840 --> 00:35:43,240
Speaker 1: his quote pretty mother and bald headed dad were safe

595
00:35:43,280 --> 00:35:47,600
Speaker 1: now that he'd resigned, But quote, if Jeanette Schaeffer thinks

596
00:35:47,640 --> 00:35:51,320
Speaker 1: she is safe, well she is right, but her children

597
00:35:51,400 --> 00:35:54,600
Speaker 1: are not. If she puts together a reenactment to celebrate

598
00:35:54,680 --> 00:35:57,280
Speaker 1: keeping men in chains, we will come after her girls.

599
00:35:58,200 --> 00:36:01,160
Speaker 1: We have a convicted rapist that was love to introduce

600
00:36:01,280 --> 00:36:07,040
Speaker 1: them to his penis. There are letters that are a

601
00:36:07,200 --> 00:36:10,680
Speaker 1: lot more graphic than this. When it comes to the

602
00:36:10,719 --> 00:36:14,720
Speaker 1: sexual threats to those girls, it's in the court record.

603
00:36:14,760 --> 00:36:17,560
Speaker 1: If you're interested in that, I don't see the value

604
00:36:17,560 --> 00:36:23,920
Speaker 1: in proceeding further. You get it at this point. But again,

605
00:36:24,920 --> 00:36:28,840
Speaker 1: even though these letters are obviously very frightening, there's something

606
00:36:29,480 --> 00:36:33,440
Speaker 1: off about them. The letter writer seems to know way

607
00:36:33,600 --> 00:36:37,400
Speaker 1: too much about the specific inner workings of the Cedar

608
00:36:37,480 --> 00:36:41,360
Speaker 1: Creek Battlefield Foundation. He knows a lot about the personal

609
00:36:41,400 --> 00:36:45,000
Speaker 1: lives of these individuals and the way that they interact

610
00:36:45,080 --> 00:36:47,400
Speaker 1: in this space, and the way they run this organization,

611
00:36:47,440 --> 00:36:51,240
Speaker 1: which again is not large. This is not a massive,

612
00:36:51,480 --> 00:36:56,440
Speaker 1: significant operation. This is a pretty small, regional, annual event.

613
00:36:58,640 --> 00:37:00,720
Speaker 1: One of the letters in this batch threatened to shoot

614
00:37:00,760 --> 00:37:03,600
Speaker 1: a man named Pat as he opens up the visitor

615
00:37:03,640 --> 00:37:06,399
Speaker 1: center in the morning, and members of the board told

616
00:37:06,440 --> 00:37:09,600
Speaker 1: federal investigators that since those threats in June, the visitor

617
00:37:09,600 --> 00:37:12,480
Speaker 1: center was only open on a limited basis, and not

618
00:37:12,560 --> 00:37:15,360
Speaker 1: many people knew about that. You'd have to be really

619
00:37:15,440 --> 00:37:18,080
Speaker 1: close to the operation to know that Pat, who is

620
00:37:18,120 --> 00:37:21,560
Speaker 1: the board's only full time employee, sometimes opened up the

621
00:37:21,640 --> 00:37:25,279
Speaker 1: visitor center in the morning alone. And the letter tried

622
00:37:25,280 --> 00:37:29,080
Speaker 1: to cast blame on a ract in the organization, claiming

623
00:37:29,080 --> 00:37:32,280
Speaker 1: that their inside knowledge came from a man named Sean Mowbray.

624
00:37:32,920 --> 00:37:35,720
Speaker 1: But Mowbray hadn't been a volunteer with the organization since

625
00:37:35,800 --> 00:37:40,600
Speaker 1: twenty fourteen. But in twenty fourteen, Mowbray was at the

626
00:37:40,640 --> 00:37:43,080
Speaker 1: center of that dispute that got Gerald kicked out of

627
00:37:43,120 --> 00:37:46,640
Speaker 1: his re enactment unit. And it's not just the letters

628
00:37:46,640 --> 00:37:50,160
Speaker 1: that seemed to be escalating in intensity. The same way

629
00:37:50,200 --> 00:37:53,439
Speaker 1: he sent that letter threatening to rape those girls, Drake

630
00:37:53,520 --> 00:37:56,719
Speaker 1: posted on the subredit for his hometown of Winchester, Virginia,

631
00:37:56,760 --> 00:38:01,000
Speaker 1: asking for recommendations for a good lawyer. He owned a

632
00:38:01,000 --> 00:38:04,520
Speaker 1: lot of antique and reproduction firearms and was an enthusiastic

633
00:38:04,560 --> 00:38:09,360
Speaker 1: hobbyist in black powder weapons, but he wanted a real gun,

634
00:38:10,239 --> 00:38:13,719
Speaker 1: a gun that shoots real bullets, and when he went

635
00:38:13,760 --> 00:38:16,000
Speaker 1: to buy one, the store refused to sell him anything

636
00:38:16,040 --> 00:38:19,480
Speaker 1: after pulling a background check. Now, his own account of

637
00:38:19,520 --> 00:38:22,759
Speaker 1: the situation is sort of murky and one sided, and

638
00:38:22,960 --> 00:38:25,520
Speaker 1: some of the details I've been able to verify indicate

639
00:38:25,560 --> 00:38:29,279
Speaker 1: that he's not telling the truth. But it appears that

640
00:38:29,400 --> 00:38:33,279
Speaker 1: despite having no felony record, that's true his conviction for

641
00:38:33,360 --> 00:38:35,920
Speaker 1: child endangerment comes up on his record as a domestic

642
00:38:36,000 --> 00:38:39,400
Speaker 1: violence conviction, so they wouldn't sell him a gun because

643
00:38:39,440 --> 00:38:43,880
Speaker 1: of that. There's no information in any of the hundreds

644
00:38:43,920 --> 00:38:46,120
Speaker 1: of pages of court documents I read that gives me

645
00:38:46,160 --> 00:38:49,360
Speaker 1: any real insight into why he may have wanted to

646
00:38:49,360 --> 00:38:52,759
Speaker 1: buy a gun that week in particular. But if I

647
00:38:52,800 --> 00:38:54,319
Speaker 1: were one of the people who had gotten one of

648
00:38:54,360 --> 00:39:00,400
Speaker 1: those letters, that timing would take my breath away. He

649
00:39:00,440 --> 00:39:03,560
Speaker 1: also traveled to Paris thought October, somehow squeezing it into

650
00:39:03,600 --> 00:39:07,480
Speaker 1: his busy schedule of threatening letters. He loved the Louver

651
00:39:07,880 --> 00:39:10,720
Speaker 1: and Notre Dame, noting in his review that the movie

652
00:39:10,760 --> 00:39:14,319
Speaker 1: The Hunchback of Notre Dame really doesn't do it justice,

653
00:39:14,520 --> 00:39:17,480
Speaker 1: and he visited several notable World War two historical sites.

654
00:39:18,640 --> 00:39:21,000
Speaker 1: He'd posted on Readit earlier that month that he was

655
00:39:21,040 --> 00:39:23,680
Speaker 1: thinking of getting into World War II re enacting because

656
00:39:23,680 --> 00:39:27,839
Speaker 1: the Civil War scene was dying out. McDonald's and Five

657
00:39:27,880 --> 00:39:31,239
Speaker 1: Guys in Paris both got four stars from Gerald, with

658
00:39:31,360 --> 00:39:35,040
Speaker 1: run review saying seeing McDonald's in Paris was like seeing

659
00:39:35,040 --> 00:39:38,160
Speaker 1: an old friend to me. Cheap and consistent food that

660
00:39:38,280 --> 00:39:43,640
Speaker 1: is the same flavor around the world, fair enough, But

661
00:39:43,680 --> 00:39:45,880
Speaker 1: when he got home, it was back to business, firing

662
00:39:45,920 --> 00:39:48,160
Speaker 1: off a letter to the mayor of Gettysburg on Halloween,

663
00:39:48,680 --> 00:39:53,120
Speaker 1: again threatening to bomb the annual parade. The letter demanded

664
00:39:53,120 --> 00:39:56,480
Speaker 1: that the mayor quote canceled the flying of Confederate flags

665
00:39:56,480 --> 00:39:59,120
Speaker 1: and posted on Facebook, then we will leave you alone.

666
00:40:00,080 --> 00:40:04,560
Speaker 1: Don't and someone is going to die. The ninth and

667
00:40:04,560 --> 00:40:07,080
Speaker 1: final letter was sent to the Cedar Greek Battlefield Foundation

668
00:40:07,239 --> 00:40:11,160
Speaker 1: after the embattled organization announced in December twenty eighteen that

669
00:40:11,200 --> 00:40:16,080
Speaker 1: they would be holding the reenactment in twenty nineteen. This

670
00:40:16,200 --> 00:40:19,960
Speaker 1: letter was addressed to Pat, the foundation's only full time employee,

671
00:40:20,000 --> 00:40:24,239
Speaker 1: that guy that opens the visitor center sometimes. The letter

672
00:40:24,280 --> 00:40:28,280
Speaker 1: asked him, would you like to bury your sister? Your brother?

673
00:40:29,160 --> 00:40:30,959
Speaker 1: We could also just kill you when you sit alone

674
00:40:30,960 --> 00:40:33,680
Speaker 1: in the visitor center. We have a guy that likes

675
00:40:33,680 --> 00:40:36,280
Speaker 1: to rape. We could send him to visit your sister.

676
00:40:37,880 --> 00:40:41,080
Speaker 1: What followed were some sexual threats against the director's daughter

677
00:40:41,160 --> 00:40:45,000
Speaker 1: that really aren't fit to repeat the I mean, they're gross.

678
00:40:46,000 --> 00:40:49,480
Speaker 1: It's definitely the most specific letter in terms of the

679
00:40:49,520 --> 00:40:52,560
Speaker 1: actions being threatened and the particular victims being threatened in

680
00:40:52,600 --> 00:40:57,279
Speaker 1: a way that feels specific enough to be alarming. What

681
00:40:57,440 --> 00:41:00,640
Speaker 1: makes a quote unquote true threat. In the eyes of

682
00:41:00,680 --> 00:41:03,439
Speaker 1: the law is kind of a moving target. You never

683
00:41:03,480 --> 00:41:06,320
Speaker 1: really know where the line is where a federal prosecutor

684
00:41:06,400 --> 00:41:08,120
Speaker 1: is going to say, I'm taking that one to a

685
00:41:08,120 --> 00:41:12,279
Speaker 1: grand jury. But in my experience reading cases like this,

686
00:41:13,000 --> 00:41:16,360
Speaker 1: mailing someone a letter that tells them exactly, when, where,

687
00:41:16,440 --> 00:41:20,400
Speaker 1: and how you plan to kill them, that's usually pretty serious.

688
00:41:20,680 --> 00:41:23,799
Speaker 1: The law does not like to see that. But by

689
00:41:23,840 --> 00:41:27,680
Speaker 1: this time, the defense already know it's Gerald. By the

690
00:41:27,680 --> 00:41:31,440
Speaker 1: time Pat is reading this absolutely unhinged letter threatening to

691
00:41:31,560 --> 00:41:34,759
Speaker 1: rape and kill his sister, the FBI has already gotten

692
00:41:34,800 --> 00:41:39,239
Speaker 1: Gerald's phone records from Sprint. They've been conducting physical surveillance,

693
00:41:39,680 --> 00:41:42,719
Speaker 1: with an FBI agent following him to his storage unit

694
00:41:42,760 --> 00:41:45,080
Speaker 1: and then returning later with a bomb dog to sniff

695
00:41:45,080 --> 00:41:52,120
Speaker 1: around the door. And again suddenly the letter stopped. But

696
00:41:52,200 --> 00:41:55,120
Speaker 1: this time there's no explanation. When the letter stopped before

697
00:41:55,840 --> 00:41:59,160
Speaker 1: it was because he got something that he wanted, but

698
00:41:59,239 --> 00:42:03,440
Speaker 1: this time they just stop. In a letter to the

699
00:42:03,480 --> 00:42:06,960
Speaker 1: court before his sentencing, Gerald claims he came to his

700
00:42:07,080 --> 00:42:10,840
Speaker 1: senses sometime in December twenty eighteen and realized that what

701
00:42:10,880 --> 00:42:14,160
Speaker 1: he was doing was wrong. It seems a little bit

702
00:42:14,160 --> 00:42:16,800
Speaker 1: more likely to me that one of the FBI agents

703
00:42:16,840 --> 00:42:21,800
Speaker 1: following him around said something to him. And that's not uncommon.

704
00:42:22,560 --> 00:42:25,319
Speaker 1: I've read plenty of threatening communications cases where the agent

705
00:42:25,360 --> 00:42:28,359
Speaker 1: writing the affidavit describes his first conversation with a guy

706
00:42:28,400 --> 00:42:32,600
Speaker 1: about threatening to behead a senator or something. Sometimes they'll

707
00:42:32,600 --> 00:42:35,279
Speaker 1: come to a guy's door and say, hey, did you

708
00:42:35,320 --> 00:42:38,960
Speaker 1: post this? Because you can't do that, don't do it again.

709
00:42:39,840 --> 00:42:42,719
Speaker 1: And the only reason we're reading the affidavit is because

710
00:42:42,760 --> 00:42:46,000
Speaker 1: the guy didn't stop posting. So the next conversation had

711
00:42:46,000 --> 00:42:48,640
Speaker 1: a very different tone. And I don't know if that's

712
00:42:48,640 --> 00:42:51,960
Speaker 1: what happened here. It doesn't say. And for as insanely

713
00:42:52,040 --> 00:42:55,439
Speaker 1: detailed as the documents supporting these search warrants are, there's

714
00:42:55,480 --> 00:42:59,960
Speaker 1: some really important details missing right here. If they were

715
00:43:00,200 --> 00:43:03,080
Speaker 1: following him around in November of twenty eighteen, while these

716
00:43:03,160 --> 00:43:06,879
Speaker 1: letters are still being sent, why wasn't he arrested until

717
00:43:06,880 --> 00:43:10,520
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two. It's clear they spent all of twenty

718
00:43:10,600 --> 00:43:14,480
Speaker 1: nineteen investigating the case. There are search warn't applications here

719
00:43:14,480 --> 00:43:17,640
Speaker 1: for his phone, his storage unit, his house, his Google account,

720
00:43:17,920 --> 00:43:20,200
Speaker 1: and warrant served on his cell phone provider for his

721
00:43:20,239 --> 00:43:24,640
Speaker 1: cell location data. The warrants were executed at various times

722
00:43:24,680 --> 00:43:27,080
Speaker 1: throughout twenty nineteen, with the physical search of his home

723
00:43:27,120 --> 00:43:31,000
Speaker 1: and his storage unit happening in October twenty nineteen, and

724
00:43:31,040 --> 00:43:33,840
Speaker 1: they have him dead to rights. The cell site location

725
00:43:34,000 --> 00:43:36,839
Speaker 1: data puts him at the mailboxes where the letters were

726
00:43:36,880 --> 00:43:39,920
Speaker 1: mailed on the days that they were mailed. For some

727
00:43:39,960 --> 00:43:42,239
Speaker 1: of the letters, he drove out of state to mail

728
00:43:42,280 --> 00:43:44,760
Speaker 1: them far from his home, So we have the GPS

729
00:43:44,840 --> 00:43:49,760
Speaker 1: coordinates showing him leaving his home in Winchester, Virginia, driving

730
00:43:49,800 --> 00:43:52,480
Speaker 1: to a strip mall in Pennsylvania where there's a USPS

731
00:43:52,560 --> 00:43:55,799
Speaker 1: drop box, and then coming back home. And we know

732
00:43:55,960 --> 00:43:58,800
Speaker 1: that on the days that he did that, the letter

733
00:43:59,120 --> 00:44:02,920
Speaker 1: was picked up that mailbox and processed at that sorting facility,

734
00:44:03,000 --> 00:44:06,120
Speaker 1: so it's there's not a lot of other explanations for

735
00:44:06,200 --> 00:44:10,160
Speaker 1: why he's driving to these mailboxes on these days. And

736
00:44:10,200 --> 00:44:12,600
Speaker 1: they found the image file for that Antifa logo that

737
00:44:12,640 --> 00:44:15,400
Speaker 1: was printed on the envelopes on a thumb drive in

738
00:44:15,480 --> 00:44:19,080
Speaker 1: his house. We have drone footage from the twenty seventeen

739
00:44:19,160 --> 00:44:21,759
Speaker 1: re enactment showing his car approaching the area where the

740
00:44:21,760 --> 00:44:25,239
Speaker 1: bomb was found shortly before it was placed there. But

741
00:44:25,320 --> 00:44:28,120
Speaker 1: they gathered all of this evidence. I mean more evidence

742
00:44:28,120 --> 00:44:31,000
Speaker 1: than I've ever seen laid out in documentation like this.

743
00:44:31,200 --> 00:44:35,640
Speaker 1: I mean pages and pages of maps showing his GPS

744
00:44:35,760 --> 00:44:39,480
Speaker 1: coordinates on the days the letters were mailed. They gathered

745
00:44:39,480 --> 00:44:43,839
Speaker 1: all this evidence, and they did nothing with it. The

746
00:44:43,880 --> 00:44:46,840
Speaker 1: documents associated with all of these search warrants were sealed.

747
00:44:47,360 --> 00:44:50,080
Speaker 1: That's normal. Usually you keep that sealed until the arrest

748
00:44:50,200 --> 00:44:52,920
Speaker 1: is made, so nobody knew that his house had been

749
00:44:52,960 --> 00:44:56,400
Speaker 1: searched except Gerald. I assume Gerald knew. I think he

750
00:44:56,480 --> 00:45:01,680
Speaker 1: had to know. But after six months, the ceiling order expired.

751
00:45:02,600 --> 00:45:04,759
Speaker 1: That can happen. I think in most cases they're sort

752
00:45:04,800 --> 00:45:07,320
Speaker 1: of set to auto expire after a certain amount of time.

753
00:45:07,800 --> 00:45:10,000
Speaker 1: But you'll see in cases where they haven't made a

754
00:45:10,040 --> 00:45:14,680
Speaker 1: move yet, the prosecutor will apply to continue ceiling. It's

755
00:45:14,719 --> 00:45:17,840
Speaker 1: not uncommon. I think in this case, they must have

756
00:45:18,680 --> 00:45:21,879
Speaker 1: forgotten to file a motion to continue the ceiling. That's

757
00:45:21,920 --> 00:45:24,759
Speaker 1: the only explanation I can think of for why they

758
00:45:24,760 --> 00:45:28,120
Speaker 1: would let these warrants get unsealed when they weren't ready

759
00:45:28,400 --> 00:45:33,520
Speaker 1: to charge him. But the ceiling order expired and somebody

760
00:45:33,600 --> 00:45:38,480
Speaker 1: noticed immediately, because the very same day, Justin Rolick wrote

761
00:45:38,520 --> 00:45:42,239
Speaker 1: an article for Courts with the headline disgruntled Civil War

762
00:45:42,360 --> 00:45:47,240
Speaker 1: reenactor allegedly framed Antifa by fabricating threats against his unit.

763
00:45:48,480 --> 00:45:51,480
Speaker 1: Journalists don'trite their own headlines, but somebody's got to do

764
00:45:51,520 --> 00:45:54,839
Speaker 1: something about that. That's a mouthful. And the next day

765
00:45:54,960 --> 00:45:57,640
Speaker 1: the Washington Post ran an article with the headline, a

766
00:45:57,680 --> 00:46:00,600
Speaker 1: Civil war reenactment group got threats from Antique. It was

767
00:46:00,640 --> 00:46:04,400
Speaker 1: a disgruntled actor. FBI says again the headlines, what are

768
00:46:04,440 --> 00:46:08,520
Speaker 1: we doing, folks. But even after these two articles ran

769
00:46:08,600 --> 00:46:14,239
Speaker 1: in February of twenty twenty, the case sat still. Well,

770
00:46:14,360 --> 00:46:16,279
Speaker 1: because I can't say that because there was no case.

771
00:46:16,320 --> 00:46:19,799
Speaker 1: He hadn't been charged. He did retain an attorney at

772
00:46:19,800 --> 00:46:22,640
Speaker 1: this point, and she told the Washington Post that he

773
00:46:22,719 --> 00:46:27,319
Speaker 1: had no idea why he was being investigated, which, like comene, yes,

774
00:46:27,400 --> 00:46:32,440
Speaker 1: you do, you do. And it wasn't until September of

775
00:46:32,600 --> 00:46:37,320
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two, just days before the five year statute

776
00:46:37,320 --> 00:46:39,719
Speaker 1: of limitations would run out for that first letter sent

777
00:46:39,760 --> 00:46:43,359
Speaker 1: in September twenty seventeen, that Gerald Drake was indicted by

778
00:46:43,360 --> 00:46:46,840
Speaker 1: a federal grand jury. The last bit of his Internet

779
00:46:46,840 --> 00:46:49,399
Speaker 1: activity I can find before his arrest on October six,

780
00:46:49,520 --> 00:46:52,160
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two is a post he made the afternoon

781
00:46:52,200 --> 00:46:55,440
Speaker 1: before he spent a few hours replying to posts on

782
00:46:55,480 --> 00:46:59,359
Speaker 1: a forum for sextal enthusiasts, with his final message being

783
00:46:59,360 --> 00:47:03,440
Speaker 1: praised for a customer service representative named Patrice at a

784
00:47:03,440 --> 00:47:08,319
Speaker 1: Canadian company called Sex Doll Queen. Patrese always answers his

785
00:47:08,400 --> 00:47:10,600
Speaker 1: emails and once sent him a free sex doll head

786
00:47:10,640 --> 00:47:14,160
Speaker 1: as compensation after ups damaged the case his doll arrived in.

787
00:47:16,160 --> 00:47:19,640
Speaker 1: There's no explanation for the nearly three years between solving

788
00:47:19,680 --> 00:47:23,719
Speaker 1: the case and arresting the perpetrator. And maybe it's like

789
00:47:23,760 --> 00:47:26,359
Speaker 1: those cases I mentioned before where they give a guy

790
00:47:26,400 --> 00:47:28,640
Speaker 1: a talking to and they say, you know, if I

791
00:47:28,680 --> 00:47:31,799
Speaker 1: have to come back, it's game over, but you know,

792
00:47:32,120 --> 00:47:35,600
Speaker 1: just knock it off. But I've seen cases like that,

793
00:47:35,680 --> 00:47:39,440
Speaker 1: and usually it's mentioned there will be some sort of

794
00:47:39,520 --> 00:47:42,719
Speaker 1: incident that brings the agent back to his door. But

795
00:47:42,760 --> 00:47:45,840
Speaker 1: there's no indication here of any new conduct, certainly no

796
00:47:46,000 --> 00:47:49,560
Speaker 1: charged conduct in the years between the search warrant and

797
00:47:49,600 --> 00:47:52,720
Speaker 1: the arrest warrant. Right, So if they did all this work,

798
00:47:53,120 --> 00:47:57,520
Speaker 1: they search his house, you know, hypothetically they say to him, hey, Bud,

799
00:47:58,400 --> 00:48:02,040
Speaker 1: knock it off, or we have to charge you. If

800
00:48:02,080 --> 00:48:04,759
Speaker 1: that had happened, you would assume that there would be

801
00:48:04,800 --> 00:48:09,759
Speaker 1: some new incident, but there's not. Maybe it was a

802
00:48:09,920 --> 00:48:13,960
Speaker 1: change in office priorities, or somebody wanted this one close specifically,

803
00:48:14,760 --> 00:48:17,279
Speaker 1: And there was some turnover in the US Attorney's office

804
00:48:17,280 --> 00:48:20,600
Speaker 1: in Virginia's Western District during that time period, but nothing

805
00:48:20,600 --> 00:48:24,480
Speaker 1: that really coincides with this timeline. The assistant US attorney

806
00:48:24,480 --> 00:48:27,120
Speaker 1: whose name is on that warrant in twenty nineteen left

807
00:48:27,160 --> 00:48:29,319
Speaker 1: to become a judge in March of twenty twenty one.

808
00:48:30,239 --> 00:48:32,520
Speaker 1: The US Attorney in the Western District left to become

809
00:48:32,520 --> 00:48:35,760
Speaker 1: a judge in March twenty twenty. The current US attorney

810
00:48:35,840 --> 00:48:38,759
Speaker 1: was sworn in in October twenty twenty one. And that's

811
00:48:38,800 --> 00:48:41,000
Speaker 1: a lot of in and out, but none of that

812
00:48:41,040 --> 00:48:43,560
Speaker 1: does anything to explain how this case got lost. From

813
00:48:43,560 --> 00:48:47,759
Speaker 1: October twenty nineteen to September of twenty twenty two, I

814
00:48:47,800 --> 00:48:51,200
Speaker 1: spent way too much time, like browsing press releases and

815
00:48:51,239 --> 00:48:54,360
Speaker 1: looking at LinkedIn pages and trying to sort of track

816
00:48:54,440 --> 00:48:56,920
Speaker 1: the patterns in the federal indictments coming out of this

817
00:48:57,000 --> 00:48:59,600
Speaker 1: office to try to make these pieces fit together, and

818
00:49:00,200 --> 00:49:04,160
Speaker 1: they just don't. They don't. There's no obvious rationale for

819
00:49:04,200 --> 00:49:07,239
Speaker 1: this timeline, and I don't expect they're going to tell us.

820
00:49:09,040 --> 00:49:11,400
Speaker 1: Drake pled guilty in April twenty twenty three in an

821
00:49:11,400 --> 00:49:14,960
Speaker 1: agreement that dropped most of the charges. He only had

822
00:49:14,960 --> 00:49:17,640
Speaker 1: to plead guilty to one count of possessing an unregistered

823
00:49:17,680 --> 00:49:21,680
Speaker 1: explosive device and one count of stalking. The stalking count

824
00:49:21,719 --> 00:49:25,920
Speaker 1: was specifically regarding the letter sent to Joe Derezo. Accounts

825
00:49:25,920 --> 00:49:30,480
Speaker 1: related to the letters sent to everybody else were dropped

826
00:49:30,520 --> 00:49:36,040
Speaker 1: in exchange. And that's normal. This is really common. Data

827
00:49:36,080 --> 00:49:38,680
Speaker 1: published by the Pew Research Center last year shows nearly

828
00:49:38,760 --> 00:49:41,880
Speaker 1: ninety percent of people charged for the federal crime just

829
00:49:41,920 --> 00:49:46,120
Speaker 1: plead guilty. They take plea agreements. Eight percent of cases

830
00:49:46,200 --> 00:49:51,120
Speaker 1: end up dismissed, leaving only two point three percent of

831
00:49:51,200 --> 00:49:54,399
Speaker 1: people charged with the federal crime who actually take their

832
00:49:54,400 --> 00:50:00,160
Speaker 1: case to trial. The system desperately needs people to plead guilt,

833
00:50:00,239 --> 00:50:03,680
Speaker 1: which is a huge motivator for overcharging. Right, you say

834
00:50:03,719 --> 00:50:05,800
Speaker 1: to a guy, hey, we got you on twenty counts.

835
00:50:05,960 --> 00:50:09,080
Speaker 1: You're going away for one hundred and ten years, but hey,

836
00:50:09,719 --> 00:50:11,680
Speaker 1: maybe we can make a deal for twenty years, and

837
00:50:11,719 --> 00:50:13,840
Speaker 1: then you've saved the United States government, the cost of

838
00:50:13,880 --> 00:50:18,279
Speaker 1: a trial. It's not a great setup overall, right, that

839
00:50:18,840 --> 00:50:23,720
Speaker 1: our justice system requires that we not actually pursue justice,

840
00:50:23,760 --> 00:50:26,600
Speaker 1: because if everyone actually pursued justice in the form of

841
00:50:26,719 --> 00:50:30,080
Speaker 1: the jury trial you're entitled to, the system would collapse.

842
00:50:30,320 --> 00:50:34,520
Speaker 1: I mean, it would fall apart instantly. Just something to

843
00:50:34,520 --> 00:50:37,440
Speaker 1: think about. So when you look at this and you

844
00:50:37,480 --> 00:50:39,880
Speaker 1: see that most of these charges got dropped, it's not

845
00:50:40,000 --> 00:50:42,760
Speaker 1: because they didn't think they could prove those charges at trial.

846
00:50:43,600 --> 00:50:45,520
Speaker 1: They just didn't want to pay for a trial, and

847
00:50:46,239 --> 00:50:50,759
Speaker 1: nine years in prison is enough. So yes, technically he

848
00:50:50,920 --> 00:50:56,560
Speaker 1: is only guilty legally of building the bomb and sending

849
00:50:56,560 --> 00:50:59,000
Speaker 1: the letters to Joe Derezo threatening to blow up his mom.

850
00:51:00,120 --> 00:51:02,960
Speaker 1: The letters threatened to rate Pat's sister and Jeanette's daughters

851
00:51:03,640 --> 00:51:06,080
Speaker 1: are among those dropped counts. So in the eyes of

852
00:51:06,080 --> 00:51:10,600
Speaker 1: the federal government, he is not guilty on those counts,

853
00:51:10,880 --> 00:51:14,680
Speaker 1: not because he was acquitted. He was not found not guilty,

854
00:51:15,160 --> 00:51:17,240
Speaker 1: but he is not guilty of them in the sense

855
00:51:17,280 --> 00:51:20,440
Speaker 1: that he was not prosecuted for those they were dropped.

856
00:51:21,760 --> 00:51:24,919
Speaker 1: Common sense and hundreds of pages of court documents lays

857
00:51:24,920 --> 00:51:27,279
Speaker 1: out a pretty convincing case that can lead you to

858
00:51:27,320 --> 00:51:30,719
Speaker 1: your own conclusion, but the law is what the law is.

859
00:51:31,719 --> 00:51:35,960
Speaker 1: He is not guilty of those things. He's currently serving

860
00:51:35,960 --> 00:51:39,200
Speaker 1: his nine year sentence at the Federal Correctional Institute in Myeland, Michigan.

861
00:51:39,920 --> 00:51:41,920
Speaker 1: He asked for a placement in Michigan to be closer

862
00:51:41,920 --> 00:51:45,120
Speaker 1: to his son. He'll be seventy two when he's released

863
00:51:45,160 --> 00:51:48,719
Speaker 1: in twenty thirty. The government has not yet responded to

864
00:51:48,760 --> 00:51:51,680
Speaker 1: his motion to seal certain case documents related to the

865
00:51:51,760 --> 00:51:54,760
Speaker 1: dropped counts. He wrote a letter from prison in December

866
00:51:54,760 --> 00:52:00,280
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three that certain information in his indictment has

867
00:52:00,280 --> 00:52:04,400
Speaker 1: caused problems for him when other inmates check his paperwork.

868
00:52:05,400 --> 00:52:08,120
Speaker 1: He doesn't get specific, but I assume the threats of

869
00:52:08,280 --> 00:52:11,920
Speaker 1: graphic sexual violence aren't exactly helping him win friends and

870
00:52:12,000 --> 00:52:15,200
Speaker 1: influence people, even if those counts were dropped in the

871
00:52:15,200 --> 00:52:19,600
Speaker 1: plea agreement. Again, he's not guilty of those things, but

872
00:52:19,640 --> 00:52:24,040
Speaker 1: it's in the indictment. So in the end, it turns

873
00:52:24,040 --> 00:52:26,400
Speaker 1: out Antifa never threatened to pour cups of piss on

874
00:52:26,520 --> 00:52:29,920
Speaker 1: Confederate War reenactors or drive a car through the Gettysburg parade.

875
00:52:30,840 --> 00:52:35,000
Speaker 1: Who's just Gerald, a weird little guy, who's Maddie got

876
00:52:35,080 --> 00:52:45,280
Speaker 1: kicked out of his Civil War club. Weird Little Guys

877
00:52:45,280 --> 00:52:49,120
Speaker 1: as a production of Cool Zone Media and iHeartRadio. It's researched,

878
00:52:49,120 --> 00:52:53,280
Speaker 1: written and recorded by me, WHILEI kunger. Our executive producers

879
00:52:53,320 --> 00:52:56,880
Speaker 1: are Sophie Lichterman and Robert Evans. The show is edited

880
00:52:56,880 --> 00:53:00,319
Speaker 1: by the wildly talented Rory Gagan. The theme news was

881
00:53:00,320 --> 00:53:03,479
Speaker 1: composed by Brad Dickert. You can email me at Weird

882
00:53:03,480 --> 00:53:06,920
Speaker 1: Little Guys podcast at gmail dot com. I will definitely

883
00:53:07,000 --> 00:53:10,399
Speaker 1: read it, but I almost certainly will not answer it.

884
00:53:10,400 --> 00:53:12,920
Speaker 1: It's nothing personal. I don't answer any of my emails.

885
00:53:13,800 --> 00:53:16,080
Speaker 1: You can exchange conspiracy theories about the show with other

886
00:53:16,200 --> 00:53:19,800
Speaker 1: listeners on the Weird Little Guys subreddit. Just don't post

887
00:53:19,840 --> 00:53:21,399
Speaker 1: anything that's going to make you one of my Weird

888
00:53:21,400 --> 00:53:22,000
Speaker 1: Little Guys