Speaker 1: Denver wasn't the only city in Colorado that saw racial
Speaker 1: justice protests and clashes. There was also a lot going
Speaker 1: on south of Denver in the much smaller city of
Speaker 1: Colorado Springs. In the summer of twenty twenty, a nonprofit
Speaker 1: organization in Colorado Springs called the Chinook Center has opened
Speaker 1: their new office in a low rent strip mall near
Speaker 1: the airport. The founders are hoping to make it a
Speaker 1: gathering point for left wing activists and organizations across the area.
Speaker 1: Not long after it opens, a young white woman named
Speaker 1: Chelsea shows up offering to volunteer. She had like bright
Speaker 1: pink hair. She dressed in a way that was sort
Speaker 1: of noticeable. This is Samantha Christiansen, who co founded the
Speaker 1: Chinook Center. Samantha is guarded with her language, a little
Speaker 1: politically correct even. I mean, there was nothing wrong with
Speaker 1: the way that she dressed, but it was noticeable, right,
Speaker 1: and for provoking certain types of I don't know, I
Speaker 1: didn't want to say that. I'll take that part out.
Speaker 1: Chelsea dressed in a way that was noticeable, Samantha says.
Speaker 1: What she won't say is what I'll say, Chelsea dressed
Speaker 1: in a way that was sexually provocative miniskirts, tall boots,
Speaker 1: fishnet stockings, a lot of skin on display. She implied
Speaker 1: over the course of like getting to know her or whatever,
Speaker 1: that she was a sex worker to me, and I
Speaker 1: know other people she told other people she was. That's
Speaker 1: John Christiansen, Samantha's husband and one of the other co
Speaker 1: founders of the Chinook Center. But yes, that was sort
Speaker 1: of her story. She had hinted at that it was
Speaker 1: like sex work, but never like outright came and said it.
Speaker 1: So I guess we all just assumed. And this is
Speaker 1: Autumn Carter Wallace, another Colorado Springs activist. I think somebody
Speaker 1: else had told me that, and I just was like, oh, okay,
Speaker 1: that makes sense, Like I never questioned it, which is
Speaker 1: very weird too, because I normally questioned everything. And that's
Speaker 1: the one time I didn't. Just about everyone in the
Speaker 1: Colorado Springs activist community knew Chelsea, and most everyone thought
Speaker 1: she's a sex worker. But Chelsea isn't a sex worker.
Speaker 1: Chelsea isn't even her real name. And even though she
Speaker 1: doesn't drive a hearse, she does just like Mickey Windecker,
Speaker 1: take orders from the FBI. I'm Trevor Aaronson from Western
Speaker 1: Sound and I Heeart podcasts. This is Alphabet Boys Episode eight,
Speaker 1: the Springs. So we're gonna leave Denver and take a
Speaker 1: break from the story of Mickey Windecker for just one episode.
Speaker 1: It might seem like a tangent, but trust me, it's not.
Speaker 1: The story of what happened seventy miles south in Colorado
Speaker 1: Springs ends up having big consequences for Mickey. The actual
Speaker 1: Colorado Springs investigation was only loosely connected to what Mickey
Speaker 1: was doing, but it reveals that what the FBI was
Speaker 1: up to in Denver wasn't isolated. It was part of
Speaker 1: a larger strategy, an FBI investigative technique that likely played
Speaker 1: out in cities across the United States in the summer
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty. The lead up to the racial justice
Speaker 1: demonstrations in Colorado Springs were similar to what happened in Denver,
Speaker 1: where a young black man, Elijah McClain, was killed during
Speaker 1: an encounter with the police. There were protests, but things
Speaker 1: cooled down a bit, and then George Floyd was murdered
Speaker 1: in Minnesota. The same pattern initial outrage over a killing,
Speaker 1: which then cooled and flared again with national protests happened
Speaker 1: in the Springs. In August twenty nineteen, a man called
Speaker 1: nine one one reporting that he'd been robbed at gunpoint
Speaker 1: by two young black men. Call it a spring to
Speaker 1: nine one one location of emergency. So ill was walking
Speaker 1: on the street and some men just confronting me with
Speaker 1: the gun, and they pawed me and tried to taking
Speaker 1: all belongings. The nine one one caller then gave a
Speaker 1: description of the perpetrators, and local police officers stopped two
Speaker 1: young black men near where they left robbery occurred. The
Speaker 1: encounter was recorded by one of the officer's body cameras.
Speaker 1: So we got to report to two people similar descriptions,
Speaker 1: possibly having a gun, all right, So don't reach for
Speaker 1: your waist. We're gonna just second make sure that you
Speaker 1: don't have a weapon, all right. Just as another police
Speaker 1: officer was coming behind the two men, one of them ran.
Speaker 1: The cops chased after him. Hands up, heads up, hands up,
Speaker 1: here's your heads up. Here's your heads up. The officer
Speaker 1: fired his gun multiple times and the young man was
Speaker 1: shot in the back. In the bodycam video, blood can
Speaker 1: be seen soaking through the left side the injured man's shirt.
Speaker 1: There's also blood spilling on the street, a lot of blood.
Speaker 1: The man died later at the hospital. His name was
Speaker 1: Devon Bailey and he was just nineteen years old. Protesters
Speaker 1: went into the streets after the Colorado Springs Police Department
Speaker 1: released the bodycam footage. The shooting of Devon Bailey made
Speaker 1: national news. Newly released bodycam video from Colorado Springs and
Speaker 1: nineteen year old shot and killed by police. At one point,
Speaker 1: the video shows his hands in the air running away
Speaker 1: he's been shot. But a few months later, in November
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, a grand jury declined to bring criminal charges
Speaker 1: against the officers involved in Devon's killing. The El Paso
Speaker 1: County District Attorney called the shooting horrible tragedy, but said
Speaker 1: that the grand jury's decision is just. Then, George Floyd
Speaker 1: is killed by a cop in Minneapolis. In Denver, Colorados,
Speaker 1: Rings and cities across the country erupt in anger and activism.
Speaker 1: According to FBI internal reports, Mickey Windecker had provided information
Speaker 1: to federal agents about a racial justice activist in Colorado Springs.
Speaker 1: That information appears to have been used to launch a
Speaker 1: separate investigation there. And this is when a woman with
Speaker 1: long pink hair named Chelsea enters the Colorado Springs activist scene.
Speaker 1: She signs up to join the Democratic Socialists of America,
Speaker 1: the same political group Mickey allied with in Denver. Chelsea
Speaker 1: also contacts John Christiansen, one of the Chinooks Center's founders
Speaker 1: and volunteers, to help around the office. We exchanged messages.
Speaker 1: She's like, Oh, I want to I could do some
Speaker 1: administrative work for you guys, you know, And I was like,
Speaker 1: that's great, because that's like the most overwhelming thing. You know.
Speaker 1: It's like uploading email addresses and things like this. You know,
Speaker 1: it's a pain in the neck with John and other
Speaker 1: activist at the Chinook Center. Don't realize at the time
Speaker 1: is Chelsea isn't really Chelsea. Her real name is April
Speaker 1: Rogers and she's a young detective with the Colorado Springs
Speaker 1: Police Department. More after the break, Mickey in Denver and
Speaker 1: Chelsea or April Rodgers in Colorado Springs have the same
Speaker 1: mandate from the FBI infiltrate racial justice activists and try
Speaker 1: to set them up in crimes. While Mickey is working
Speaker 1: directly with the FBI and getting cash payments in return,
Speaker 1: Chelsea is part of something called the Joint Terrorism Task Force,
Speaker 1: a partnership between local police and the FBI, and in
Speaker 1: Colorado Springs, the FBI and its partners in the local
Speaker 1: police come to the conclusion without any discernible evidence, that
Speaker 1: the city's activist community is potentially dangerous and should be
Speaker 1: the target of a long intrusive investigation. Colorado Springs sought
Speaker 1: share of demonstrations during the summer of twenty twenty, but
Speaker 1: it wasn't among the cities whose racial justice protests you'd
Speaker 1: hear about on the national news like Minneapolis, Seattle, Portland,
Speaker 1: and Denver. The Springs is small, and it's very conservative,
Speaker 1: home to air force and army bases and a number
Speaker 1: of evangelical megachurches. It's also a popular place for retired
Speaker 1: military officers. As a result, the city's voter base is
Speaker 1: consistently conservative, and the left wing activist community, well ambitious,
Speaker 1: is pretty small by comparison, But that left wing activist
Speaker 1: community hit just the right buttons in Colorado Springs. On
Speaker 1: August third, twenty twenty, the one year anniversary of Devon
Speaker 1: Bailey's death, dozens of activists gathered with signs in bullhorns
Speaker 1: in front of the House of Alan van Land, the
Speaker 1: Colorado Springs police officer who shot von Bailey in the back. Okay,
Speaker 1: committed to homicide of barely accost other people of color
Speaker 1: in this city. The demonstrators blocked the road through the
Speaker 1: neighborhood and soon things got tense, with threats escalating to
Speaker 1: a potential gun battle. One of the demonstrators, named Charles Johnson,
Speaker 1: got into an altercation with a man who was opposing
Speaker 1: the protest. That woman jumps up, Okay, just like how
Speaker 1: you do, Guss right. Videos from the protest outside the
Speaker 1: Colorado Springs police officers home made the rounds on social media,
Speaker 1: with right wing commentators using the incident to allege that
Speaker 1: antifa activists were becoming more dangerous. Michelle Malcolin, a far
Speaker 1: right commentator and conspiracy theorist, tweeted, it's not just Seattle,
Speaker 1: in Portland, in Austin, in twin City, it's freaking Colorado Springs.
Speaker 1: She later added, nowhere is safe. Nearly a year passes,
Speaker 1: and the same people who had organized the protest outside
Speaker 1: the cops house all the actives from the Chinook Center.
Speaker 1: They start putting together a march for housing rights. They
Speaker 1: plant for July thirty first, twenty twenty one, the same
Speaker 1: day the city has planned an expensive one hundred and
Speaker 1: fiftieth anniversary celebration. That isn't a coincidence, it's intentional, a
Speaker 1: bit of a dick move. Yeah, but the demonstrators aren't
Speaker 1: trying to be polite. So the actors from the Chinook
Speaker 1: Center March. They're wearing red shirts that read housing is
Speaker 1: a Human Right and caring signs that read rent is
Speaker 1: theft and in Spanish, housing for All. Among the marchers
Speaker 1: is the committed young activists with pink hair and provocative clothing,
Speaker 1: whom everyone knows as Chelsea. Here's Samantha Christiansen, one of
Speaker 1: the founders of the Chinook Center again, and then the
Speaker 1: day of the housing march. I mean, I really hadn't
Speaker 1: seen her in a long She wasn't someone I really
Speaker 1: thought of that often, right, So I saw her and
Speaker 1: she's very recognizable in her appearance. With Samantha and the
Speaker 1: other marchers don't realize is that the Colorado Springs Police Department,
Speaker 1: working with the FBI, is planning to arrest a bunch
Speaker 1: of them today. Oh boys, we sit, we wait, we
Speaker 1: get paid. Nearby, sitting in a police cruiser is local
Speaker 1: cop Scott Alamo. Alamo has his body camera on and
Speaker 1: he's talking to other officers as the marchers are coming
Speaker 1: up the street. Well, they think we're going to arrest
Speaker 1: twenty people, Dude, Obviously you're underestimating how awesome we are.
Speaker 1: As the demonstrators are passing by Scott Alamo, the local
Speaker 1: cop sees John Christiansen, Samantha's husband and another one of
Speaker 1: the march's organizers. Alamo calls him professor because John teaches
Speaker 1: sociology at a local college. Christians Who is the worker. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Alamo pulls out what appears to be an intelligence report,
Speaker 1: and on every page are pictures of Christiansen and a
Speaker 1: dozen or so other marchers. It's like a rogues gallery,
Speaker 1: but these aren't mugshots. They're photos from social media, from Facebook, Instagram,
Speaker 1: and LinkedIn. This document is likely the product of a
Speaker 1: new FBI program called Social Media Exploitation, developed during the
Speaker 1: summer of twenty twenty. Under this program, the FBI partners
Speaker 1: with local law enforcement agencies to mind social media data
Speaker 1: to build files on people without probable cause for the search.
Speaker 1: As Scott Alamo is flipping through the pages of photos,
Speaker 1: he jokes about how violent the arrests are going to
Speaker 1: get to see boot to the face. Boot to the face, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that pretty much does happen. About six cops surround a
Speaker 1: black man with a shaved head and tackle him to
Speaker 1: the ground. His name is Sean Walls, and he's one
Speaker 1: of the primary organizers of Colorado Spring's activist community. A
Speaker 1: few minutes later, the cops target another black man among
Speaker 1: the demonstrators. He's Charles Johnson, one of the men who
Speaker 1: got into the altercation earlier outside the Colorado Springs cops House.
Speaker 1: Four cops forced Charles to the ground, violently pulling his
Speaker 1: arms behind his back. Get your hand out depending As
Speaker 1: more cops are running in toward the people being arrested.
Speaker 1: The officers charged towards a demonstrator on her bicycle and
Speaker 1: I see what I thought was a bunch of cops
Speaker 1: dogpiled on the entire crowd, and I was like, holy shit,
Speaker 1: like they're coming for everybody. Then, like what the fuck?
Speaker 1: Like just just shell shocked, right. Jacqueline Amandada's Unsweta is
Speaker 1: a former newspaper journalist who at this time it's working
Speaker 1: as a Colorado based staffer for Democratic US Senator Michael Bennett.
Speaker 1: And then I immediately turned around after that and see
Speaker 1: a riot cop like in full gear, sprinting towards us
Speaker 1: in like flight or fight response. And in my case, honestly,
Speaker 1: flight is not my default. And in doing that, I
Speaker 1: just threw my bike down. It was like, bitch, you
Speaker 1: coming for me, Like that's the honest truth. And I
Speaker 1: know you've seen the video. Jacqueline can be seen on
Speaker 1: a police body camera as the officer rushes toward the
Speaker 1: people being arrested. Thinking the cop is charging at her,
Speaker 1: Jacqueline throws her bike down. The police officer sidesteps the bike,
Speaker 1: it never touches him, and runs toward the pile of
Speaker 1: officers arresting the activists. And I was like, oh my god, dude,
Speaker 1: they just reacted, Like imagine if it had hit a cop,
Speaker 1: they would have had me on a felony. About a
Speaker 1: half dozen activists are arrested that day, in charge with
Speaker 1: crimes were related to their roles in the demonstration outside
Speaker 1: the Colorado Springs Cops house. Jacqueline isn't among those arrested,
Speaker 1: but the cops aren't going to let the bicycle throwing
Speaker 1: incident go unpunished. Daniel Sumei, a Colorado Springs detective who
Speaker 1: is part of the Joint Terrorism Task Force, decides he's
Speaker 1: going to figure out the identity of the woman who
Speaker 1: threw down the bike. Sumi is just a local cop,
Speaker 1: but he makes a big deal of his assignment. His
Speaker 1: business card suggests he's a federal agent FBI logo and all. Anyway,
Speaker 1: because Jacqueline was wearing sunglasses and a face mask, it
Speaker 1: wasn't clear from the police bodycam video who she was,
Speaker 1: so Sumei goes on social media and searches the friends
Speaker 1: lists of people who were at the demonstration. He finds
Speaker 1: Jacqueline's profiles and pictures of Jacqueline wearing the same bicycle,
Speaker 1: helmet and shoes that can be seen on the woman
Speaker 1: in the bodycam video. Sumi has a suspect, and so
Speaker 1: to find the bike and other evidence they need to
Speaker 1: prosecute her. Sumi in the Colorado Springs police get a
Speaker 1: warrant to search Jacqueline's home. So they were like at
Speaker 1: least six officers in multiple vehicles, and I was like,
Speaker 1: are you fucking kidding me? Like I am not el chapel,
Speaker 1: Like this is ridiculous. In my journalism career. I've read
Speaker 1: a ton of search warrant applications and evidence reports. Detective
Speaker 1: Sumi's are among the most bizarre I've ever read, and
Speaker 1: definitely the creepiest. First the bizarre part, Sumi, in a
Speaker 1: search warrant application notes that the demonstrators carried red flags.
Speaker 1: He then writes, and I'm not joking here, that he
Speaker 1: went on the internet, found some random website about red
Speaker 1: flags and writes, quote, the red flag is significant in
Speaker 1: that it is a radical political symbol and designates the
Speaker 1: march as revolutionary and radical in nature. Sumi in black
Speaker 1: and white letters on a page. It's describing how the
Speaker 1: FBI is investigating ideology, something FBI Director Christopher Ray has
Speaker 1: told Congress doesn't happen. He's also employing a depth of
Speaker 1: research that probably wouldn't earn a passing grade in a
Speaker 1: high school class. Okay, And now the creepy part. Sumi,
Speaker 1: for some reason, includes in a search warrant application a
Speaker 1: full page photo of Jackline in a bikini. Sometimes you've
Speaker 1: got a laugh right to keep from crying. And we
Speaker 1: had to laugh. It just had like how fucking creepy
Speaker 1: that was. And it's like this will be fun when
Speaker 1: we get to disclose to Colorado Springs taxpayers that their
Speaker 1: money is going to police greenshotting my bikini picks. Wow.
Speaker 1: Following the search and after a police took Jaqueline Spike
Speaker 1: and her electronic devices into evidence, local prosecutors charged her
Speaker 1: with attempted aggravated assault on a police officer, a second
Speaker 1: degree felony. But local police working with the FBI aren't
Speaker 1: done in Colorado Springs. They still have an undercover embedded
Speaker 1: inside the activist group that's up to the break in
Speaker 1: the Springs, the pink haired woman everyone knows as Chelsea
Speaker 1: starts digging in. She started friending of a bunch of
Speaker 1: different people on Facebook who were at the housing march.
Speaker 1: This is John Christiansen. He was among those arrested at
Speaker 1: the housing march. Like in retrospect, that should have been
Speaker 1: a red flag, but you know, it's just one of
Speaker 1: those things. People kind of come and go. Chelsea starts
Speaker 1: inviting activists over to her apartment. Always men, remember, Chelsea
Speaker 1: dresses provocatively, and most of the activists are under the
Speaker 1: impression that she's a sex worker. I walk up these
Speaker 1: sketchy steps, open up this apartment and there's two guys
Speaker 1: sitting there with her. This is one of the activists
Speaker 1: Chelsea invites over. He agreed to be interviewed and recorded
Speaker 1: as long as they referred to him by his nickname
Speaker 1: art Yam. Anyway, I need to tell you for contact
Speaker 1: that art Yam loves guns. Now, I'm a gun nun
Speaker 1: when it comes to like history and mechanical stuff like
Speaker 1: this is like my passion since I was a kid.
Speaker 1: And he started a local chapter of the Socialist Full
Speaker 1: Association kind of like a left wing version of the
Speaker 1: NRA minus the money in corruption. Nothing as the ASTRA
Speaker 1: he does is anything besides legal, and that's not me
Speaker 1: just doing a disclaimer. Like I think our next last
Speaker 1: event was we went camping, like you know, it's nothing crazy.
Speaker 1: So when art Young gets to Chelsea's apartment, it's weird.
Speaker 1: There are these two guys with Chelsea, and Chelsea's there
Speaker 1: and she's like, hey, how you doing. These are my friends.
Speaker 1: You know, this is my half brother. She pointed to
Speaker 1: this guy who's like forty five. She looked at me
Speaker 1: like twenties to twenty five. Right points this guy that's
Speaker 1: forty five, says, this is my half brother, and I'm like, no,
Speaker 1: it's not. But I'm like sure, and she's like, oh,
Speaker 1: going to go in the kitchen. We have beer and pizza.
Speaker 1: I'm like, cool. I go in there. There's like twenty
Speaker 1: fucking pizzas there, like an absurd amount of pizzas. I
Speaker 1: may be over exaggerating, but enough that I was like,
Speaker 1: who the fuck you feeding? Like, I know, I'm kind
Speaker 1: of a chunky guy. There's a lot of pizza there,
Speaker 1: and like thirty rack of like cores in the fridge
Speaker 1: and some Mike's hard Everything about the situation made no
Speaker 1: fucking sense to me. Chelsea, with her friend and supposed
Speaker 1: half brother sitting nearby, tells art Yum that she needs
Speaker 1: his help to get a gun. She's like, hey, I
Speaker 1: want to get this, and I'm like, cool, Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 1: I can go and source it for one of my
Speaker 1: friends and yeah, we can just go down to a
Speaker 1: gun shop and you can fill out a background check
Speaker 1: and good bye it. She was like, Oh, okay, that's
Speaker 1: what a conversation ended. With the pistol. It's clear to
Speaker 1: Artyam that Chelsea is suggesting that he finds an illegal
Speaker 1: gun for her, something off the books from the black market.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, yeah, I'll source you a gun, no problem.
Speaker 1: I guarantee you I find I could find somebody who
Speaker 1: has one for sale, but we're not going to selt
Speaker 1: you illegally. Like no. Artyam leaves a little later, thinking
Speaker 1: the evening was bizarre and half wondering whether Chelsea's friends
Speaker 1: are undercover cops, and still wondering who's going to eat
Speaker 1: all those pizzas. Then, not long after, Chelsea invites another
Speaker 1: activist over. Just as before, Chelsea has two people with her.
Speaker 1: I met up with her and Omar. This is Gabriel Pulsic.
Speaker 1: These guys with Chelsea, Mike and Omar. They tell Gabriel
Speaker 1: that they're truckers. Mike was missing his left leg from
Speaker 1: the knee down. Omar was kind of a Middle Eastern
Speaker 1: looking guy with a big beard. Both had tattoos. Both
Speaker 1: are very buff. Unlike art Yam, who quickly shuts down
Speaker 1: any discussion of a legal activity, Gabriel is intrigued by
Speaker 1: these guys. They ask Gabriel if he wants to buy
Speaker 1: any weapons. He said that he had grenades, t and
Speaker 1: t ak forty sevens like fully automatic weapons. Gabriel says
Speaker 1: he'd be interested in seeing the weapons, so they agree
Speaker 1: to meet up again, and Gabriel talks specifics types of guns,
Speaker 1: dates deliver, how they'd be transported, but he never commits
Speaker 1: to any purchase. He's kind of using them, leading them
Speaker 1: on Mike and Omar, who is very generous, buying me cigars, drinks, food,
Speaker 1: whatever I wanted, and so there were a few times
Speaker 1: where they were obviously like pumping drinks in me or
Speaker 1: trying to, you know, be like, yeah, do you want
Speaker 1: another double shot? About sixteen years Scotch. At one meeting,
Speaker 1: Mike and Omar show Gabriel a fully automatic AK forty seven.
Speaker 1: I never saw any like grenades, routine to or any
Speaker 1: of that other shit they're talking about. Gabriel eventually tells
Speaker 1: Mike that he's not interested in buying anything, and then
Speaker 1: he ghosts them. Mike then tries to keep the relationship
Speaker 1: going and it was like hey, bro, hope you're okay,
Speaker 1: blah blah blah. And I didn't respond in that text
Speaker 1: because I at this point I was like highly suspicious.
Speaker 1: And that's about when the activists in Colorado Springs discover
Speaker 1: that Chelsea isn't Chelsea. Her cover is blown by a
Speaker 1: fellow cop in the Colorado Springs Police Department. I just
Speaker 1: threw my bike down. It was like, bitch, you coming
Speaker 1: for me. As a result of her criminal charge for
Speaker 1: supposedly attempting to assault a cop with her bicycle, goal,
Speaker 1: Jacqueline Amandata Unsweta request to review the evidence in her case,
Speaker 1: including police recordings from the day of the housing march,
Speaker 1: and via Jacqueline, the activists get to see the footage.
Speaker 1: Among the evidence is the bodycam video of officer Scott Alamo.
Speaker 1: We sit, wait, we get paid. He's the one who
Speaker 1: is slipping through the pages of social media photos, the
Speaker 1: photos of the people the cops were planning to arrest
Speaker 1: around this time. In the recording, Alamo let something slip.
Speaker 1: He starts talking about the police officers who are secretly
Speaker 1: among the protesters. He says there are two undercovers and
Speaker 1: four plane closed officers. He's looking down on his phone
Speaker 1: at photos of the undercover cops. Alamo thinks one of
Speaker 1: the pictures highlights his undercover colleagues physical attributes picture April
Speaker 1: with her giant boobs. Alamo's referring to April Rodgers, the
Speaker 1: woman the activists knew as Chelsea and unlike the activists
Speaker 1: who think the undercover cop is a sex worker and
Speaker 1: are careful enough to use objectifying language to describe her,
Speaker 1: Alamo goes straight to locker room talk with his giant
Speaker 1: boobs comment. And so we started immediately looking for April
Speaker 1: Rodgers and started looking through photos of people like we
Speaker 1: didn't know, this is John christ Jansen again from the
Speaker 1: Chinook Center, you know, And it was like, you know,
Speaker 1: there was a process of the elimination, trying to figure
Speaker 1: out like, okay, this this person April Rodgers, and then
Speaker 1: eventually we were able to like triangulate that April Rodgers
Speaker 1: was Chelsea. Once the information got around that Chelsea isn't
Speaker 1: Chelsea and that Chelsea is really a cop, the undercover
Speaker 1: April Rodgers disappears and for a time nothing more happens. Then,
Speaker 1: in the spring of twenty twenty two, I start communicating
Speaker 1: with some of the activists in Colorado Springs, and it
Speaker 1: turns out, seemingly by coincidence, the FBI takes a renewed
Speaker 1: interest in the Colorado Springs activist community. The FBI starts
Speaker 1: knocking on doors, calling up people who had gotten a
Speaker 1: no Chelsea the sex worker or if Al Rodgers, the
Speaker 1: undercover cop, Hey, good morning. This message is for Autumn
Speaker 1: Carter Wallace. This message was left for Autumn Carter Wallace,
Speaker 1: one of the activists. This is Special Agent Henderson from
Speaker 1: the FBI office in Colorado Springs. We came down to
Speaker 1: chat with you if you're available. I think that it
Speaker 1: would be great to sit down with you and talk
Speaker 1: about some things that we are concerned about as it
Speaker 1: relates to something's happening in the community. The FBI appears
Speaker 1: to be interested in Gabriel Pulsic. This is Autumn who
Speaker 1: called back the FBI after receiving that voicemail. They asked
Speaker 1: about Gabe and if I knew anything about I don't
Speaker 1: even know who gave is. They were like, well, we
Speaker 1: have pictures and videos of you near him at a protest.
Speaker 1: A protest was like a thousand people. I'm standing near
Speaker 1: one guy. You think I know him, well, you guys
Speaker 1: are both connected through That doesn't mean I know him.
Speaker 1: I don't know a lot of the people. Federal agents
Speaker 1: also come to see Art Yam, the activist April Rodgers
Speaker 1: approached about buying a legal gun. He agrees to meet
Speaker 1: with them at the local FBI office on the condition
Speaker 1: that he's allowed to record their conversation, so soul kind
Speaker 1: of a interest statements that way, they know if you're
Speaker 1: aware that there's a recorder on the desk. Ye, I'm
Speaker 1: Brandy Kempbell Withdrew Rosen and the detective Love at the
Speaker 1: FBI Colorado Springs our office Thursday at eleven o five.
Speaker 1: In this meeting, the FBI agents confirm art yam suspicions
Speaker 1: that those two guys with April were in fact FBI agents.
Speaker 1: You felt there was a gun running conspiracy we're trying
Speaker 1: to throw at you, which those war in fact undercovers. However,
Speaker 1: they basically weren't do a meeting with Gabe to sell
Speaker 1: them hand grenades. Figured that was time why I got
Speaker 1: my name got mixed into the moss. The FBI agents
Speaker 1: tell Artyum that they're investigating Gabriel since he had several
Speaker 1: discussions with the undercover agents about weapons, but as of
Speaker 1: this recording, Gabriel has not been arrested or charged with
Speaker 1: a crime. He denies any wrongdoing or illegal behavior. Hey, Trevor,
Speaker 1: can you hear me? Coming back from a recent trip
Speaker 1: to England. Gabriel is stopped at the Denver Airport, he
Speaker 1: calls me. Following the encounter. When I was leaving, I
Speaker 1: met the two FBI agents who have been investigating me
Speaker 1: for a year. Okay, they basically recounts me, you know
Speaker 1: why they were looking into me, you know, because I
Speaker 1: was you know, I inquired about acquiring those weapons, and
Speaker 1: they said that, you know, they have obviously recordings of
Speaker 1: all the conversations I had with the UCS, which obviously,
Speaker 1: you know, they made it clear that I wasn't under
Speaker 1: us or that I wasn't being detained. The FBI agents
Speaker 1: also tell Gabriel in this conversation that they aren't just
Speaker 1: investigating him, They're investigating the entire Chinook Center, in anyone
Speaker 1: involved with the political organization. An investigation solely focused on
Speaker 1: political activity should be confined to FBI history books. But
Speaker 1: it's happening right now. It's June twenty twenty two, and
Speaker 1: I'm back in Colorado Springs at the local state courthouse
Speaker 1: to attend a hearing in the criminal case of Charles Johnson,
Speaker 1: the black activist who is dogpiled by cops and arrested
Speaker 1: at the housing March. He's been charged with attempt at
Speaker 1: robbery menacing and obstructing a roadway, all for his role
Speaker 1: during the demonstration in front of the police officer's house
Speaker 1: on August third, twenty money in Colorado Springs. Charles Johnson's
Speaker 1: lawyer is named Alison Blackwell. She believes the charges against
Speaker 1: her client are politically motivated, so during a hearing, she
Speaker 1: calls April Rodgers as a witness over the objections of
Speaker 1: prosecutors who do not want the undercover cop to testify.
Speaker 1: For the hearing, a lawyer representing the US Department of
Speaker 1: Justice is sitting at the prosecution's table. When you were
Speaker 1: marching in the housing march, were you doing that for
Speaker 1: the Colorado Springs Police Department? I was under the authority
Speaker 1: of the FBI. Okay, how many other FBI agents were
Speaker 1: in that march? Are respectfully declined to answer. Does the
Speaker 1: Colorado Springs Police Department so that you're working for that PI? Yes,
Speaker 1: So I want to talk about going back to the
Speaker 1: SECT Center. Did you feel guilty about that? I respectfully
Speaker 1: declined to the answer. April is wearing a black dress
Speaker 1: with a black face mask to protect her undercover identity.
Speaker 1: She has long, dark brown hair, but it looks like
Speaker 1: a wig. A good one, but a wig all the same.
Speaker 1: On request will on the witness stand, April pulls down
Speaker 1: her face mask, but only to her chin. Attorney Alison
Speaker 1: Blackwell asks April question after question, and nearly every time
Speaker 1: April answers, I respectfully decline to answer. She keeps looking
Speaker 1: over at the lawyer from the Justice Department. It's a
Speaker 1: truly bizarre scene, one of the strangest I've ever witnessed
Speaker 1: in a courtroom. This is a state courthouse, and in
Speaker 1: this case, the United States government is not a party.
Speaker 1: And yet a Justice Department lawyer is instructing a local
Speaker 1: cop not to answer questions about a criminal case she
Speaker 1: helped investigate. Did you think that Mike Planet was a
Speaker 1: terrorist threat? At any point I respectfully declined to answer.
Speaker 1: I would you say now I've been told to respond
Speaker 1: or respectfully declined to answer. Someone else who declines to
Speaker 1: answer about any of this is the FBI officials in
Speaker 1: Colorado and Washington d C refused to respond to a
Speaker 1: list of questions about the investigation in Colorado Springs. And
Speaker 1: in Denver, there's our old friend Mickey, and Mickey's about
Speaker 1: to face some trouble. Some activists from the Springs are
Speaker 1: about to post information online alleging that the man behind
Speaker 1: the wheel of the Silver Hearse is a secret informant,
Speaker 1: and Mickey will respond with his own accusations. So there's
Speaker 1: a group or an individual it's claiming that they are
Speaker 1: Antifa Colorado Springs and in fact that that I believe
Speaker 1: that they are actually not Antifa Colorado Springs because I
Speaker 1: believe they are actually a cop. I for one, am
Speaker 1: not amused or pleased about the fuckery that's going on.
Speaker 1: That's in the next episode. This is Trojan Hearst Season
Speaker 1: one of Alphabet Boys. Alphabet Boys is a production of
Speaker 1: Western Sound and iHeart Podcasts. The show is reported, written
Speaker 1: and hosted by me Trevor Aaronson. For more information about
Speaker 1: the series or to drop us a tip, head to
Speaker 1: our website Alphabet Boys dot xyz. You can contact me
Speaker 1: on Twitter or Instagram at Trevor Aaronson. We believe this
Speaker 1: story is important and could result in changes to FBI
Speaker 1: oversight and public policy. But to have an impact, people
Speaker 1: need to hear the story, so we need your help. First,
Speaker 1: tell your friends about the show. Personal recommendations are the
Speaker 1: best recommendations. Second, spread the word on social media. At
Speaker 1: alphabet boys dot xyz, you'll find FBI undercover recordings and
Speaker 1: secret documents. You can share stuff the government never wanted public.
Speaker 1: Third help us ride the algorithms by leaving a rating
Speaker 1: or review on your favorite podcast app that helps other
Speaker 1: people find us, and thanks for listening.