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Speaker 1: Col Zone Media.

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Speaker 2: When we left off last week, it was April twenty first,

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Speaker 2: twenty twenty a US Army paratrooper Ethan Melzer was having

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Speaker 2: his first chat with the administrator of a telegram channel

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Speaker 2: for a group called rape Waffen, a splinter cell from

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Speaker 2: the Nazi terror organization Adam Woffen who was committed to

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Speaker 2: the Satanic cult called the Order of Nine Angles. Melzer

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Speaker 2: didn't know it at the time, but the user he

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Speaker 2: was chatting with was a psychologically unstable fifteen year old

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Speaker 2: in Canada, and it seems unlikely that either of them

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Speaker 2: had any idea that the teenager's online girlfriend was a

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Speaker 2: government informant. Over the course of the next five weeks,

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Speaker 2: Ethan Melzer developed a plan that he hoped would result

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Speaker 2: in the murder of forty of his fellow soldiers and

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Speaker 2: hopefully provoke a conflict in the Middle East that would

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Speaker 2: claim thousands more lives. I'm Molly Konger. This is weird,

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Speaker 2: little guys. Just a quick note at the top. I

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Speaker 2: do want to start off with a correction today. When

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Speaker 2: we were talking last week about the Hitler based dating

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Speaker 2: system used by the Satanic Nazi cult, I foolishly repeated

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Speaker 2: a claim that I'd read that the origin of feyan

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Speaker 2: was unknown, and that's on me. I should have double

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Speaker 2: check for myself. The order of nine angles marks the

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Speaker 2: passage of time in years since the birth of Hitler,

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Speaker 2: so twenty twenty four would be the year one thirty five,

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Speaker 2: and they write that date out as y F one

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Speaker 2: three five, where y F stands for a year of faeyan.

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Speaker 2: I did a little more digging around because I just

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Speaker 2: couldn't accept the explanation that there is no explanation.

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Speaker 1: And of course, fayan.

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Speaker 2: Spelled fay e n is almost certainly derived from a

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Speaker 2: Middle English word faine fay n, an adverb meaning gladly

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Speaker 2: or joyfully, which in turn comes from the Old English gaffeon,

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Speaker 2: meaning to rejoice. So the Nazi wizards are at least

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Speaker 2: etymologically on track in their choice to refer to the

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Speaker 2: year since Hitler's birth as the year of rejoicing. You

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Speaker 2: don't got a hand it to him, but I had

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Speaker 2: to correct the record on that anyway. Back to the

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Speaker 2: foiled terror plot. Ethan Melzer was taken into custody on

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Speaker 2: May thirtieth, twenty twenty, when military authorities detained him He

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Speaker 2: was standing outside at Camp Betterly, part of a joint

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Speaker 2: Italian American military complex in Vicenza, Italy, with three dozen

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Speaker 2: of his fellow soldiers. They were waiting for the bus

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Speaker 2: that would take them to the air Stone, where they

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Speaker 2: would board a flight to Turkey. His platoon had been

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Speaker 2: assigned to a sensitive mission at in Serlic Air Base,

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Speaker 2: a Turkish air base near the Syrian border and one

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Speaker 2: of a handful of foreign bases where the US military

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Speaker 2: is known to store B sixty one nuclear bombs. His

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Speaker 2: platoon had spent the last few weeks receiving classified briefings

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Speaker 2: on their upcoming mission. They trained, drilled, and studied terrain maps.

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Speaker 2: They sat through a training about possible threat scenarios they

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Speaker 2: could encounter on their mission and how to spot them,

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Speaker 2: none of them knowing that the threat was there in

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Speaker 2: the room, because all the while Ethan Melzer was passing

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Speaker 2: every piece of information he learned on to his new

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Speaker 2: friends in the order of nine angles, every detail about

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Speaker 2: the mission, down to photos he clandestinely took of the

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Speaker 2: maps shown in the briefing was shared immediately with rape Waffen.

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Speaker 2: His platoon had originally been scheduled to deploy two days earlier,

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Speaker 2: on May twenty eighth. The soldiers standing there with their

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Speaker 2: packed bags waiting for the bus hadn't been told why

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Speaker 2: their departure date had been pushed back, but they were worried.

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Speaker 2: It meant something serious was going on. None of them

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Speaker 2: could have guessed, though, that it was one of their

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Speaker 2: own who meant them harm. But that is the end,

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Speaker 2: and I said we were going to start at the beginning.

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Speaker 2: Ethan Melzer was born in nineteen ninety eight to parents

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Speaker 2: who only married because his mother got pregnant. The marriage

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Speaker 2: didn't last. His father's mother seems to blame Ethan's mother

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Speaker 2: for this, and they weren't good with money. His father,

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Speaker 2: Nick Melzer, bought a house the couple couldn't afford, and

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Speaker 2: they filed for bankruptcy in two thousand and two, the

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Speaker 2: same year their marriage ended. His father traveled a lot

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Speaker 2: for work, so Ethan lived with his mother by her

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Speaker 2: own admission. Ethan's mother, Julie, suffered from alcoholism and a

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Speaker 2: variety of mental illnesses, though she didn't get diagnosed until

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Speaker 2: after her son's arrest, and judging by the court filings,

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Speaker 2: one thing everyone agree on is that his mother, Julie

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Speaker 2: struggled to provide a safe and stable home environment for Ethan.

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Speaker 2: She drank too much, She dated terrible men. She came

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Speaker 2: from a family of proud clansmen and dated men who

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Speaker 2: used racial slurs. She had a boyfriend who beat her

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Speaker 2: and her son. That same boyfriend had an older son

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Speaker 2: who allegedly sexually abused Ethan when he was still in

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Speaker 2: elementary school. Ethan's father remarried when he was nine, and

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Speaker 2: his new stepmother resented him. When his step siblings were born,

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Speaker 2: he saw even less of his father. There was no

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Speaker 2: room for this strange boy from her husband's previous marriage

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Speaker 2: and his stepmother's new family. When Ethan was in middle school,

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Speaker 2: his mother's parents died. This sent her into a deep

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Speaker 2: depression and her drinking got worse. And this left a

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Speaker 2: troubled young boy mostly on his own. He spent a

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Speaker 2: lot of time online. He got really into four chan.

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Speaker 2: He started smoking.

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Speaker 1: Pot in the eighth grade, and.

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Speaker 2: His mother didn't seem to notice or care when he

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Speaker 2: skipped school to stay home and play video games and

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Speaker 2: get high, and she would sometimes even smoke pot with him.

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Speaker 2: The psychologist hired by his lawyers prepared a report that

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Speaker 2: expounds at length about this difficult period in Ethan's young life.

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Speaker 2: He was overweighted and unathletic. Who's uncool, Who's bullied? He

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Speaker 2: was starting to realize that he was gay, and that

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Speaker 2: terrified him. He liked art and music, not sports. The

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Speaker 2: men in his mother's life bullied him, the kids at

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Speaker 2: school bullied him, and he retreated deeper and deeper into

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Speaker 2: the Internet and into drugs. By his sophomore year of

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Speaker 2: high school, he was using ecstasy and meth. I think

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Speaker 2: it's important to note that none of this excuses anything.

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Speaker 2: It barely even explains it. I know plenty of wonderful

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Speaker 2: people who were fat gay nerds in middle school. I've

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Speaker 2: come to think of it. I know a lot of

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Speaker 2: really great adults who would tell you today and that

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Speaker 2: they are proud and happy to be fat gay nerds.

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Speaker 2: It's a great kind of person to be. But there's

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Speaker 2: no denying that it's a difficult state of affairs for

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Speaker 2: a middle schooler whose stepmother hates him and whose mom

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Speaker 2: cares more about getting drunk than making sure he gets

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Speaker 2: to school on time. That alone doesn't create a monster,

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Speaker 2: but you can, I think, find a place in your

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Speaker 2: heart to feel sorry for this little boy. It doesn't

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Speaker 2: mean you have to feel sorry for the man he became,

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Speaker 2: and it doesn't change what he did. But there was

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Speaker 2: a time when he could have been someone different. There

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Speaker 2: were days years ago when a little boy who wanted

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Speaker 2: to be loved and accepted and nurtured didn't get that.

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Speaker 2: It's okay to mourn the man who never was because

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Speaker 2: that sad boy went down the wrong path. He dropped

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Speaker 2: out of high school at the end of tenth grade,

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Speaker 2: which would have been in twenty sixteen.

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Speaker 1: I think in.

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Speaker 2: Twenty sixteen is the date he gives for his earliest

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Speaker 2: criminal activity. This was also the year his mother remarried.

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Speaker 2: His mother describes this new husband as physically abusive, just

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Speaker 2: as her earlier boyfriends had been, and recounted an incident

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Speaker 2: in which he choked her until she lost consciousness. She

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Speaker 2: says her husband would also punch Ethan, and in one

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Speaker 2: notable incident, she says he punched Ethan repeatedly as he

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Speaker 2: lay on the couch trying to cover his face. So

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Speaker 2: Ethan moved out. He moved from flophouse to flophouse and

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Speaker 2: started dealing drugs. He shot another drug dealer. That shooting

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Speaker 2: the when we talked about a bit in the first

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Speaker 2: episode does seem well corroborated. I think it really did happen.

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Speaker 2: But there's also some mention of a possible earlier shooting,

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Speaker 2: an incident where he shot someone during an attempted mugging.

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Speaker 2: It's unclear if that when it is corroborated or not,

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Speaker 2: but according to the psychologist, it was after that second shooting,

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Speaker 2: the one we know was real, when he realized his

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Speaker 2: life was falling apart. So he got off drugs, moved

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Speaker 2: back into his mom's house, got a steady job at

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Speaker 2: a restaurant, and started thinking about getting his ged. His

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Speaker 2: manager at the restaurant recommended the Job Corps, a program

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Speaker 2: administered by the Department of Labor that provides educational opportunities

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Speaker 2: and job training for low income young adults. In September

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Speaker 2: of twenty eighteen, at twenty years old, Ethan Melzer enrolled

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Speaker 2: in the Job Core program. His time in the Job

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Speaker 2: Core Program is marked by intense contradiction. He was praised

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Speaker 2: for his positive attitude and his hard work. He was

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Speaker 2: enthusiastic about joining the military because of his overwhelming patriotism

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Speaker 2: and respect for family members who had served, but He

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Speaker 2: was also ravenously consuming texts produced by the Order Nine Angles,

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Speaker 2: the Satanic Nazi cult he would soon initiate himself into.

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Speaker 2: In an interview after Ethan's arrest, his Job Core career

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Speaker 2: counselor said.

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Speaker 3: Neo Nazis and white supremacists don't last a week here.

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Speaker 3: There is no way a kid who has those ideas

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Speaker 3: can hide their true colors when they are surrounded by

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Speaker 3: black people and I hear everything that goes on in

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Speaker 3: the dorms. Ethan showed no signs at all of being

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Speaker 3: a white supremacist.

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Speaker 2: Another Job Corp employee who worked with Ethan during his

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Speaker 2: time in the program said, the kids who come in

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Speaker 2: with those ideas never last long. They do come, but

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Speaker 2: they get into conflicts and they always leave. Another of

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Speaker 2: Ethan's instructors in the program said, if.

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Speaker 3: You are a white supremacist, you won't make it here.

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Speaker 3: Job Corps has a zero tolerance policy. We've had kids

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Speaker 3: like that before and they only last a few days.

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Speaker 3: We know everything that goes on in the dorms we

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Speaker 3: have had. I had racist and anti American kids here

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Speaker 3: and they never make it. They can't hide it. We

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Speaker 3: always find.

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Speaker 2: Out they can always tell they always root those kids out.

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Speaker 2: Ethan was a model student. He showed no signs of

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Speaker 2: racism or anti Semitism. He was friendly and helpful, and

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Speaker 2: he got top marks on his evaluations in the category

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Speaker 2: of multicultural awareness. He was patriotic and looking forward to

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Speaker 2: serving his country. They can always tell, except he was

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Speaker 2: lying to everyone. It was during his time in the

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Speaker 2: job Corp program that he fell down the rabbit hole.

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Speaker 2: He started researching the Order of Nine Angles. He liked

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Speaker 2: what he saw. He downloaded the literature he would need

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Speaker 2: to self initiate. He was in contact with other members.

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Speaker 2: He was on his way to starting his own nexsion

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Speaker 2: before he finished the In December of twenty nineteen, just

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Speaker 2: three months into his nine months at job Corps, he

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Speaker 2: signed the paperwork to enlist.

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Speaker 1: In the Army.

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Speaker 2: He wouldn't head off to basic training until the following

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Speaker 2: June after completing his ged, but he knew what he

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Speaker 2: wanted to do afterwards, and he signed the documents committing

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Speaker 2: to it. In February of twenty nineteen, he created an

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Speaker 2: account on Discord, a messaging application originally favored mostly by

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Speaker 2: gamers as dagger Light. He joined a Discord server for

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Speaker 2: people interested in conspiracy theories and the occult. The court

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Speaker 2: filings don't say exactly which one, but I have a guess.

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Speaker 2: The nonprofit investigative journalism collective Unicorn Riot has an extensive

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Speaker 2: database of leaked discord chats. Most famously, they published the

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Speaker 2: entire planning chat where the Unite the Right rally. But

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Speaker 2: in the years since, this vault of leaked servers has

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Speaker 2: grown exponentially. Obviously, it's not every extremist discord server, so

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Speaker 2: we're really only looking at a sliver of what's out there.

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Speaker 2: But I did find an account I know to be

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Speaker 2: Ethan Melzer's in a discord server where most of the

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Speaker 2: discussion is about Flatter Earth, anti vax conspiracies, nine to

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Speaker 2: eleven trutherism. Things like that the excerpted messages contained in

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Speaker 2: the court documents aren't there in the unicorn Riot leaks.

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Speaker 2: Those messages may have been shared in private channels or

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Speaker 2: deleted sometime before the discord was archived and published, or

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Speaker 2: maybe I'm barking up the wrong tree entirely, several of

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Speaker 2: the usernames that are visible in the government exhibits do

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Speaker 2: appear within this discord server, though, so even if it

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Speaker 2: wasn't this one in particular, it was one that shared

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Speaker 2: a lot of the same ideas and the same users.

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Speaker 1: Either way.

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Speaker 2: Ethan got on Discord in February of twenty nineteen and

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Speaker 2: he posted, Hello, I have some questions about a group

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Speaker 2: I found. Don't know if you walk help. The group

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Speaker 2: he was asking about was Temple of Blood. Temple of

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Speaker 2: Blood is maybe the most prominent North American nexxion of

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Speaker 2: the Order of Nine Angles, and it is the nexion

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Speaker 2: that is mixed up with Adam Woffin during this time period.

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Speaker 2: I would be remiss if I did not also tell

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Speaker 2: you that the founder of the Temple of Blood, Joshua

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Speaker 2: Caleb Sutter, has been on the FBI payroll for more

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Speaker 2: than twenty years, and that certainly complicates the story a

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Speaker 2: little bit. Sutter came up in the Aryan Nations. He

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Speaker 2: is a longtime member of the movement. His relationship with

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Speaker 2: the FBI began in two thousand and three, when he

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Speaker 2: agreed to cooperate with the authorities after he got caught

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Speaker 2: up on a gun charge. In an article for Wired

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Speaker 2: earlier this year, Ali Winston and Jake Hanrahan spoke to

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Speaker 2: Harvard law professor Alexander Natopov about this kind of arrangement,

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Speaker 2: which she calls a deal with the devil. You can't

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Speaker 2: get from A to B without an informant, she said.

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Speaker 2: Sometimes to get close to criminals, you have to rely

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Speaker 2: on criminals. The FBI has refused to answer questions or

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Speaker 2: even comment on their relationship with Sutter, but the truth

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Speaker 2: finally came out during the trial of Caleb Cole, one

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Speaker 2: of the Adamwoffin members, who was arrested in twenty twenty.

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Speaker 2: Ali Winston's most recent investigation into this story indicates that

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Speaker 2: Sutter may have been involved with the Order of Nine

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Speaker 2: Angles for years before becoming a paid government informant. So

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Speaker 2: it might be disingenuous to say that Temple of Blood

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Speaker 2: only exists because the government was paying the guy who

256
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Speaker 2: ran it. He may well have started his own nexxion

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Speaker 2: with or without the one hundred and forty thousand dollars

258
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Speaker 2: he's been paid by the FBI. But maybe he wouldn't

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Speaker 2: have been allowed to operate with such impunity. Maybe he

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Speaker 2: wouldn't have had the resources to start and run. Martinette Press,

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Speaker 2: the publishing house that produced most of the ona materials

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Speaker 2: available in the United States today, Maybe his influence would

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Speaker 2: have been curtailed years and years ago before he could

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Speaker 2: propagate his violent, pedophilic ideology, sewing it into the minds

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Speaker 2: of young men who would kill for it. I think

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Speaker 2: one thing a lot of people get wrong when they

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Speaker 2: talk about paid informants like Sutter is a belief that

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Speaker 2: people like Sutter aren't sincere in their beliefs or actions,

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Speaker 2: and that they wouldn't be engaging in these things if

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Speaker 2: not for the inducement of the federal government. But the

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Speaker 2: movement is littered with true believers who make a little

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Speaker 2: money on the side snitching on people they don't like.

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Speaker 2: Plenty of them think they're clever enough to benefit from

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Speaker 2: the enragement. They think they can advance their own position

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Speaker 2: in the movement by having the state take out their rivals,

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Speaker 2: or they think they can curry favor with the authorities

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Speaker 2: by dropping a few tidbits of information here and there.

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Speaker 2: Just because he's getting paid to do it doesn't mean

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Speaker 2: he wouldn't be doing it otherwise, or that he doesn't

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Speaker 2: believe it. Sutter's lengthy career as a government informant, the

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Speaker 2: amount of blood in his wake, and the number of

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Speaker 2: zeros on his checks certainly make him an outlier, though

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Speaker 2: while admit so, I had to tell you that that's

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Speaker 2: unavoidable under the pseudonym Swiss discipline. Sutter was the one

285
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Speaker 2: who was really pushing the satanic ideology of the Order

286
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Speaker 2: of Nine Angles to the forefront of Adam Woffin in

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Speaker 2: the year after Brandon Russell's arrest. There's no denying that

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Speaker 2: did he do it because the government asked him to,

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Speaker 2: because he sincerely believed in the things he was saying?

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Speaker 2: Both neither it's impossible to know, and neither Sutter nor

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Speaker 2: the government are talking about it. Honestly, I think it

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00:17:55,520 --> 00:17:57,639
Speaker 2: would be naive to believe either of them, even if

293
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Speaker 2: they did. Been some rumblings within the movement that the

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00:18:01,960 --> 00:18:06,320
Speaker 2: whole idea is a government operation. Sometimes that looks like

295
00:18:06,359 --> 00:18:09,200
Speaker 2: a sort of no true Scotsman's situation.

296
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Speaker 1: For Neo Nazis.

297
00:18:10,160 --> 00:18:12,520
Speaker 2: You know, anyone in the movement who's talking like this

298
00:18:12,760 --> 00:18:15,520
Speaker 2: is clearly a government operative trying to make us all

299
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Speaker 2: look crazy. Another theory I've seen is a little intriguing,

300
00:18:21,880 --> 00:18:26,320
Speaker 2: if convoluted and very unlikely. But there are those within

301
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Speaker 2: the movement who believe that the government's interest in pushing

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Speaker 2: Satanism on them is a strategy aimed at getting them

303
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Speaker 2: to disengage. If someone is falling deeper and deeper into

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Speaker 2: extremist ideology and suddenly they're expected to sacrifice a goat

305
00:18:43,240 --> 00:18:47,119
Speaker 2: and drink its blood under the moonlight, they might say,

306
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Speaker 2: you know what, fuck it. This is too weird, this

307
00:18:50,240 --> 00:18:50,720
Speaker 2: is too weird.

308
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Speaker 1: I can't do it.

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Speaker 2: The idea here is that the goal isn't to deradicalize them,

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Speaker 2: it's to push radicalization to its most extreme limits, making

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Speaker 2: it unpalatable, making the movement just too damn weird to

312
00:19:06,720 --> 00:19:10,640
Speaker 2: keep up with. Like I said, that's a little convoluted.

313
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Speaker 2: I don't know that the government is playing that kind

314
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Speaker 2: of three dimensional chess with Nazis, but it is a

315
00:19:17,600 --> 00:19:21,359
Speaker 2: theory I've seen pushed around a little bit. But Joshua

316
00:19:21,400 --> 00:19:25,360
Speaker 2: Caleb Sutter's story is a long and strange one all

317
00:19:25,400 --> 00:19:28,159
Speaker 2: on its own, and I'm actually saving it until I

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Speaker 2: get to a weird little guy I've been fascinated by

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Speaker 2: for years. You see, we didn't find out that Sutter

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00:19:36,040 --> 00:19:40,639
Speaker 2: was an FBI informant until pretty recently, but a fellow

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Speaker 2: white nationalist who'd known him for decades had been pointing

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Speaker 2: the finger at Sutter for years. Bill White is almost

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Speaker 2: certainly the most prolific jailhouse lawyer in the white supremacist movement.

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Speaker 2: I've spent oh god, probably close to one thousand dollar

325
00:20:00,840 --> 00:20:03,680
Speaker 2: paying ten cents a page over the last five years

326
00:20:03,760 --> 00:20:08,480
Speaker 2: or so buying copies of his ranting and raving court filings.

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Speaker 2: He's got a wide variety of grievances and conspiracy theories.

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Speaker 2: Most of his recent complaints are about unfair treatment inside

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Speaker 2: assorted federal prison facilities. The guards are mean to him,

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Speaker 2: he was framed for a fight he claims another inmate started,

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Speaker 2: he isn't getting adequate treatment for his mental health problems.

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Speaker 1: And so on.

333
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Speaker 2: But he's also been saying for years that he was

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Speaker 2: framed for one of the things that sent him to prison.

335
00:20:38,760 --> 00:20:42,240
Speaker 2: And central to that argument is his fervent belief that

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Speaker 2: Joshua Caleb Sutter was working for the FBI. So when

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00:20:47,040 --> 00:20:49,320
Speaker 2: it turned out he'd been right about Sutter all along,

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Speaker 2: I was stunned. I'm not saying I believe Bill when

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00:20:53,800 --> 00:20:56,040
Speaker 2: he says he didn't send those emails threatening to kill

340
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Speaker 2: a prosecutor's wife, but it's intriguing that he was right

341
00:20:59,520 --> 00:21:02,879
Speaker 2: about any at all. But I think it'll be a

342
00:21:02,920 --> 00:21:05,840
Speaker 2: minute before we get to my favorite vexatious litigant in

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Speaker 2: the federal prison system, so i'll leave it there. He's

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Speaker 2: not getting out until twenty thirty seven, so I've got

345
00:21:12,560 --> 00:21:13,360
Speaker 2: plenty of time.

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Speaker 1: The ratings of an incarcerated Nazi.

347
00:21:30,080 --> 00:21:33,760
Speaker 2: Aside, no one knew Joshua Caleb Sutter was an FBI

348
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Speaker 2: informant until twenty twenty one, so Ethan Melser certainly didn't

349
00:21:38,440 --> 00:21:40,840
Speaker 2: have any inkling about it when he started asking about

350
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Speaker 2: Temple of Blood in February of twenty nineteen. In the discord,

351
00:21:45,640 --> 00:21:47,880
Speaker 2: he says he encountered the group in a Reddit post

352
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Speaker 2: and started looking into it. He says another Reddit user

353
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Speaker 2: told him it was connected to some shit called nine A,

354
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Speaker 2: and in the discord he says it's just morbid curiosity

355
00:22:01,359 --> 00:22:07,000
Speaker 2: that he's always been interested in really obscure shit. After

356
00:22:07,040 --> 00:22:09,040
Speaker 2: a bit of back and forth with the other users,

357
00:22:09,720 --> 00:22:16,119
Speaker 2: he finally says, so they're Nazi vampires. Okay then, and

358
00:22:16,240 --> 00:22:18,440
Speaker 2: he asks if there are groups out there that are

359
00:22:18,600 --> 00:22:23,720
Speaker 2: even more extreme. Another user asks him you want to

360
00:22:23,760 --> 00:22:30,840
Speaker 2: go full throttle, and Ethan Melser replies yes. A few

361
00:22:30,880 --> 00:22:34,320
Speaker 2: days later, in another discord server, he's asking again about

362
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Speaker 2: the Order of Nine Angles. He is again told that

363
00:22:37,720 --> 00:22:40,359
Speaker 2: they are a neo Nazi Satanic group with connections to

364
00:22:40,400 --> 00:22:45,040
Speaker 2: Adam Woffen, and Ethan Melser posts, this is going to

365
00:22:45,119 --> 00:22:48,679
Speaker 2: sound bad, but I want to go further down the

366
00:22:48,760 --> 00:22:52,480
Speaker 2: rabbit hole. Say someone were to go all the way

367
00:22:52,520 --> 00:22:55,800
Speaker 2: trying to look for these people. How bad of an

368
00:22:55,800 --> 00:23:00,880
Speaker 2: idea is that? Like out of ten? A few days

369
00:23:00,920 --> 00:23:04,320
Speaker 2: after expressing his desire to go down the Satanic rabbit hole,

370
00:23:05,200 --> 00:23:08,359
Speaker 2: Ethan Melzer is having a private conversation with a member

371
00:23:08,400 --> 00:23:11,480
Speaker 2: of the Order of Nine Angles, and he's asking for

372
00:23:11,560 --> 00:23:13,800
Speaker 2: the text that he'll need to read to get started.

373
00:23:15,400 --> 00:23:19,040
Speaker 2: Within weeks, he had accumulated a large collection of PDFs

374
00:23:19,040 --> 00:23:22,320
Speaker 2: and books about the Order of Nine Angles. He was

375
00:23:22,320 --> 00:23:26,240
Speaker 2: communicating regularly with at least two members. He got a

376
00:23:26,280 --> 00:23:29,400
Speaker 2: tattoo on his left forearm of an eight pointed star,

377
00:23:29,600 --> 00:23:33,520
Speaker 2: often referred to as the symbol of chaos. He was

378
00:23:33,560 --> 00:23:37,320
Speaker 2: already deep into his new magical practice before he finished

379
00:23:37,320 --> 00:23:40,879
Speaker 2: the job Corp program. Just a few weeks before he

380
00:23:40,920 --> 00:23:43,879
Speaker 2: showed up for basic training, another user in the discord

381
00:23:44,000 --> 00:23:46,200
Speaker 2: server warned him to be careful.

382
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Speaker 3: Not to dissuade you, but you're kind of playing with

383
00:23:50,640 --> 00:23:54,080
Speaker 3: fire dagger. The Uniform Code of Military Justice has a

384
00:23:54,080 --> 00:23:56,400
Speaker 3: few things to say about members of the armed forces

385
00:23:56,400 --> 00:24:00,359
Speaker 3: holding affiliations with extremist groups. For thee, he thought, if

386
00:24:00,359 --> 00:24:03,120
Speaker 3: you're serious about being initiated or whatever.

387
00:24:05,440 --> 00:24:08,879
Speaker 2: He responded by asking if the army could search his phone.

388
00:24:10,320 --> 00:24:14,520
Speaker 2: Upon finding out that that very likely could happen, he

389
00:24:14,600 --> 00:24:18,320
Speaker 2: said he'd just delete everything before he got there. In

390
00:24:18,359 --> 00:24:21,280
Speaker 2: his last few weeks before his official enlistment date, he

391
00:24:21,320 --> 00:24:23,439
Speaker 2: was trying to convince other members of the Discord to

392
00:24:23,480 --> 00:24:26,280
Speaker 2: form an nexsion with him, and was coming up with

393
00:24:26,359 --> 00:24:30,879
Speaker 2: vetting procedures for members of his nexion. He suggested that

394
00:24:30,880 --> 00:24:36,760
Speaker 2: the group's motto should be total aryan victory. In June,

395
00:24:36,800 --> 00:24:40,360
Speaker 2: he joined another Discord server, this one devoted to discussion

396
00:24:40,440 --> 00:24:42,439
Speaker 2: of esoteric Nazism.

397
00:24:43,119 --> 00:24:44,400
Speaker 1: Some Discord servers.

398
00:24:44,119 --> 00:24:47,879
Speaker 2: Allow users to assign little labels to their account, visible

399
00:24:47,920 --> 00:24:51,320
Speaker 2: to other users next to their name. In this server,

400
00:24:51,440 --> 00:24:57,320
Speaker 2: Melzer selected the user labels Satanism and fascism to describe himself.

401
00:24:58,560 --> 00:25:01,159
Speaker 2: Another user asked if he really believed in both, and

402
00:25:01,320 --> 00:25:06,679
Speaker 2: he replied quickly yes, and then backtracked, saying not really

403
00:25:07,000 --> 00:25:11,960
Speaker 2: just fascism, and claimed he was only joking about Satanism.

404
00:25:12,600 --> 00:25:15,200
Speaker 2: In another server, someone asked him if he had already

405
00:25:15,240 --> 00:25:18,919
Speaker 2: initiated into the Order of Nine Angles. He said no,

406
00:25:19,800 --> 00:25:22,520
Speaker 2: but in another chat that same afternoon he had been

407
00:25:22,520 --> 00:25:27,240
Speaker 2: discussing the fact that if asked, ona initiates were supposed

408
00:25:27,280 --> 00:25:31,679
Speaker 2: to deny it. It is interesting to note that the

409
00:25:31,760 --> 00:25:34,800
Speaker 2: second leaked discord server I found Melzer in was one

410
00:25:34,840 --> 00:25:38,800
Speaker 2: mainly used to chat about esoteric Nazism, and it is

411
00:25:38,880 --> 00:25:44,080
Speaker 2: also one in which Shanton Simpson appears. I couldn't find

412
00:25:44,080 --> 00:25:47,119
Speaker 2: any evidence that Melser and Simpson ever interacted there on

413
00:25:47,160 --> 00:25:50,320
Speaker 2: this discord server, but it looks like their paths may

414
00:25:50,359 --> 00:25:53,800
Speaker 2: have crossed here before Melzer made the jump from discord

415
00:25:53,800 --> 00:25:57,800
Speaker 2: servers about the occult into telegram chats for terrorism, and

416
00:25:57,880 --> 00:26:02,760
Speaker 2: they found themselves together once again in rape Waffen. When

417
00:26:02,760 --> 00:26:05,320
Speaker 2: he reported to Fort Benning and Georgia on June fourth,

418
00:26:05,359 --> 00:26:09,600
Speaker 2: twenty nineteen, Ethan Melzer signed a statement of enlistment affirming

419
00:26:09,640 --> 00:26:13,400
Speaker 2: that he was not involved in any extremist groups or activities.

420
00:26:14,400 --> 00:26:17,560
Speaker 2: He was, in fact, almost certainly already self initiated into

421
00:26:17,600 --> 00:26:21,119
Speaker 2: the Order of nine Angles and was demonstrably very interested

422
00:26:21,160 --> 00:26:26,200
Speaker 2: in forming or joining a terrorist organization. After completing basic

423
00:26:26,240 --> 00:26:29,439
Speaker 2: training and airborne school, Ethan Melzer deployed with the one

424
00:26:29,520 --> 00:26:32,360
Speaker 2: hundred and seventy third Airborne Division to a base in Italy.

425
00:26:33,760 --> 00:26:36,040
Speaker 2: In his discord chats, he complained that he needed to

426
00:26:36,040 --> 00:26:38,760
Speaker 2: get some kind of fake book covers so that he

427
00:26:38,800 --> 00:26:41,840
Speaker 2: could read his sinister texts in front of his commanding

428
00:26:41,840 --> 00:26:46,800
Speaker 2: officer without drawing suspicion. He expressed a longing for the

429
00:26:46,880 --> 00:26:50,240
Speaker 2: day of the Rope, a phrase from the Turner Diaries

430
00:26:50,280 --> 00:26:52,960
Speaker 2: that refers to the day the race War really begins,

431
00:26:53,600 --> 00:26:56,720
Speaker 2: when the race traders are murdered, unmasks and left hanging

432
00:26:56,760 --> 00:27:01,760
Speaker 2: from lamp posts and bridges. When another user complained that

433
00:27:01,800 --> 00:27:05,600
Speaker 2: it felt like the race war would never come, he replied.

434
00:27:07,600 --> 00:27:10,359
Speaker 3: I'm working on it. Okay, give me three years and

435
00:27:10,400 --> 00:27:13,920
Speaker 3: I got you, motherfucker. I'm in the Army specifically for this.

436
00:27:14,480 --> 00:27:17,480
Speaker 3: I mean I literally did join for this exact reason.

437
00:27:18,000 --> 00:27:20,520
Speaker 3: Can't really do anything when I'm in fucking Italy. My

438
00:27:20,720 --> 00:27:21,959
Speaker 3: unit is stationed in Italy.

439
00:27:25,560 --> 00:27:31,840
Speaker 2: I'm in the Army specifically for this, That's what he said.

440
00:27:33,359 --> 00:27:38,639
Speaker 2: Ethan Melzer joined the Army as an insight role. The

441
00:27:38,720 --> 00:27:41,440
Speaker 2: insight role is a core tenet of the Order of

442
00:27:41,520 --> 00:27:44,400
Speaker 2: Nine Angles. You can think of it as a sort

443
00:27:44,440 --> 00:27:50,159
Speaker 2: of evil magical undercover assignment. A members should take on

444
00:27:50,240 --> 00:27:53,399
Speaker 2: this role for six to eighteen months, depending on the

445
00:27:53,440 --> 00:27:56,639
Speaker 2: texture looking at and the nature and purpose of the

446
00:27:56,720 --> 00:27:59,679
Speaker 2: insight role has shifted a little bit over time and

447
00:28:00,280 --> 00:28:04,800
Speaker 2: on the source text. At it's most innocuous, it's just

448
00:28:04,840 --> 00:28:10,200
Speaker 2: that same left hand path magical notion of doing something transgressive. Right,

449
00:28:10,240 --> 00:28:13,880
Speaker 2: you should do something antithetical to yourself to deepen your

450
00:28:13,880 --> 00:28:17,800
Speaker 2: practice of magic, to truly test your sinister resolve, you

451
00:28:17,800 --> 00:28:21,040
Speaker 2: should pick a lifestyle a role that is as close

452
00:28:21,080 --> 00:28:23,960
Speaker 2: to the polar opposite of your own life, your own

453
00:28:24,160 --> 00:28:29,040
Speaker 2: true nature as possible. You should be the opposite of

454
00:28:29,080 --> 00:28:34,080
Speaker 2: yourself for a year. But the insight role is widely

455
00:28:34,160 --> 00:28:39,040
Speaker 2: understood to be something a bit darker than a little

456
00:28:39,040 --> 00:28:43,920
Speaker 2: Antinomian role playing game. Your insight role should allow you

457
00:28:44,000 --> 00:28:50,440
Speaker 2: to infiltrate and ultimately subvert some kind of institution. Religious orders,

458
00:28:50,520 --> 00:28:54,720
Speaker 2: police departments, and the military are commonly suggested for this purpose,

459
00:28:56,320 --> 00:28:59,440
Speaker 2: particularly when it comes to insight roles in policing or

460
00:28:59,480 --> 00:29:03,720
Speaker 2: the military. This also provides an opportunity to gain training

461
00:29:03,960 --> 00:29:08,680
Speaker 2: and access to weapons. It can also provide a suitable

462
00:29:08,760 --> 00:29:15,600
Speaker 2: environment for the practice of culling. That's human sacrifice. These

463
00:29:15,640 --> 00:29:19,200
Speaker 2: are jobs where you may well have the opportunity to kill,

464
00:29:20,880 --> 00:29:24,360
Speaker 2: and that's what he's referring to. In the months before

465
00:29:24,400 --> 00:29:28,280
Speaker 2: he reported for active duty, Ethan Melzer rapidly became obsessed

466
00:29:28,320 --> 00:29:32,920
Speaker 2: with and then initiated himself into the Order of Nine Angles.

467
00:29:34,480 --> 00:29:37,320
Speaker 2: He may not have formed the plan before he told

468
00:29:37,320 --> 00:29:40,760
Speaker 2: his career counselor that he wanted to enlist, but by

469
00:29:40,800 --> 00:29:43,120
Speaker 2: the time he put on the uniform for the first time,

470
00:29:44,400 --> 00:29:47,960
Speaker 2: he was only pretending to be a soldier. This was

471
00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:53,160
Speaker 2: an insight role. By April of twenty twenty, when Ethan

472
00:29:53,160 --> 00:29:56,480
Speaker 2: Melzer was joining rape Waffen, he'd been studying the Order

473
00:29:56,520 --> 00:29:59,840
Speaker 2: of Nine Angles for more than a year. In one

474
00:29:59,840 --> 00:30:03,280
Speaker 2: way early discussion with another Rapewaffen member, he said he

475
00:30:03,320 --> 00:30:05,920
Speaker 2: needed to be careful because he didn't want to end

476
00:30:06,000 --> 00:30:09,240
Speaker 2: up like another guy in their circle who got caught

477
00:30:09,520 --> 00:30:10,640
Speaker 2: while he was in the military.

478
00:30:12,280 --> 00:30:13,480
Speaker 1: There are so many.

479
00:30:13,240 --> 00:30:16,520
Speaker 2: Guys that that could refer to that I can't actually

480
00:30:16,520 --> 00:30:20,280
Speaker 2: pin down who he might have meant just looking at

481
00:30:20,280 --> 00:30:23,320
Speaker 2: guys who have some sort of crossover. You know, Adam

482
00:30:23,360 --> 00:30:27,320
Speaker 2: Waffen Order of Nine Angles, were in the military, got

483
00:30:27,360 --> 00:30:32,120
Speaker 2: in trouble in twenty nineteen or so. That's actually a

484
00:30:32,160 --> 00:30:36,440
Speaker 2: surprisingly long list of guys. He may have been referring

485
00:30:36,480 --> 00:30:40,360
Speaker 2: to Army private Corwin Storm Carver, who was investigated in

486
00:30:40,400 --> 00:30:43,600
Speaker 2: twenty nineteen over allegations that he was the current leader

487
00:30:43,600 --> 00:30:46,080
Speaker 2: of Adam Woffin and was involved in the Order of

488
00:30:46,160 --> 00:30:50,880
Speaker 2: Nine Angles. Or maybe he meant Jarrett Smith, the Adam

489
00:30:50,960 --> 00:30:54,880
Speaker 2: Woffin member, Satanist and infantry soldier arrested in twenty nineteen

490
00:30:55,000 --> 00:30:59,240
Speaker 2: for distributing information about bomb making. Maybe he was talking

491
00:30:59,240 --> 00:31:02,080
Speaker 2: about Kyle Bent, the U. S. Army specialist who was

492
00:31:02,080 --> 00:31:05,000
Speaker 2: discharged in twenty nineteen after he was arrested for domestic

493
00:31:05,040 --> 00:31:09,480
Speaker 2: violence and the subsequent army investigation revealed that he too

494
00:31:09,720 --> 00:31:13,520
Speaker 2: was involved with the Order of Nine Angles. Or maybe

495
00:31:13,560 --> 00:31:16,719
Speaker 2: he was talking about Vasilio's Pastolis, the Marine lance corporal

496
00:31:16,720 --> 00:31:19,200
Speaker 2: who was court martialed in twenty eighteen over his ties

497
00:31:19,240 --> 00:31:24,520
Speaker 2: to Adam Woffin. There are plenty of possibilities here, and

498
00:31:24,560 --> 00:31:28,440
Speaker 2: they all point to the same grim reality. As Corwin

499
00:31:28,520 --> 00:31:35,800
Speaker 2: Carver said, soldiers make the best Nazis. It's just a fact,

500
00:31:36,000 --> 00:31:38,320
Speaker 2: and that's a fact. Ethan Melzer was well aware of.

501
00:31:39,560 --> 00:31:42,560
Speaker 2: The same week he's having this conversation about not wanting

502
00:31:42,600 --> 00:31:45,720
Speaker 2: to be another guy in the military caught doing what

503
00:31:45,760 --> 00:31:49,000
Speaker 2: he's doing, he advised another member of rape Waffen who

504
00:31:49,040 --> 00:31:53,440
Speaker 2: was considering joining the military to do it for the training, saying,

505
00:31:54,040 --> 00:31:58,560
Speaker 2: the ridiculous forced patriotism bullshit can go fuck itself. Just

506
00:31:58,600 --> 00:32:00,960
Speaker 2: play the game for four years and get the fuck out,

507
00:32:01,520 --> 00:32:05,080
Speaker 2: but stronger, smarter, and more dangerous.

508
00:32:05,080 --> 00:32:07,760
Speaker 1: Of course, he gave the.

509
00:32:07,720 --> 00:32:09,920
Speaker 2: Same advice a few days later to a rape Woffen

510
00:32:09,960 --> 00:32:14,400
Speaker 2: member who called himself Frycorps and was considering joining the Marines.

511
00:32:16,080 --> 00:32:19,360
Speaker 2: Those early months of twenty twenty were a lifetime ago,

512
00:32:19,720 --> 00:32:23,760
Speaker 2: so maybe you don't remember the specifics, but the COVID

513
00:32:23,840 --> 00:32:27,240
Speaker 2: nineteen pandemic hit Italy pretty hard. I mean, it was

514
00:32:27,280 --> 00:32:27,880
Speaker 2: a pandemic.

515
00:32:27,960 --> 00:32:29,440
Speaker 1: It hit us all pretty hard.

516
00:32:30,280 --> 00:32:35,400
Speaker 2: But Italy had actual lockdowns, and so did the US military.

517
00:32:35,560 --> 00:32:38,400
Speaker 2: And so in those early months of the pandemic, stationed

518
00:32:38,440 --> 00:32:41,600
Speaker 2: in Italy, Ethan Melzer was more or less confined to

519
00:32:41,640 --> 00:32:45,320
Speaker 2: his barracks, and he used that time to really commit

520
00:32:45,440 --> 00:32:48,600
Speaker 2: to reading his sinister texts and to work his way

521
00:32:48,640 --> 00:32:53,960
Speaker 2: deeper into the online subculture surrounding it. Photos recovered from

522
00:32:53,960 --> 00:32:56,720
Speaker 2: his cell phone include one of Melzer wearing a ski

523
00:32:56,760 --> 00:33:00,280
Speaker 2: mask and holding up a copy of a book has

524
00:33:00,360 --> 00:33:03,400
Speaker 2: cut himself and smeared his own blood over a sigil

525
00:33:03,440 --> 00:33:04,200
Speaker 2: on the page.

526
00:33:03,960 --> 00:33:04,840
Speaker 1: The book is opened to.

527
00:33:06,760 --> 00:33:09,720
Speaker 2: If I had to guess based on the picture, I

528
00:33:09,800 --> 00:33:13,360
Speaker 2: think that's a copy of Keleethi, the second of three

529
00:33:13,440 --> 00:33:16,160
Speaker 2: parts of an Ona text called the Black Book of Satan.

530
00:33:17,760 --> 00:33:20,120
Speaker 2: It looks like the copy he has as the fully

531
00:33:20,160 --> 00:33:25,120
Speaker 2: illustrated version with drawings by Christos Beast, an English musician

532
00:33:25,200 --> 00:33:28,600
Speaker 2: named Richard Molt who was allegedly a member of Ona's

533
00:33:28,600 --> 00:33:33,280
Speaker 2: Old Guard. With David Mayat and alone in his barracks,

534
00:33:33,680 --> 00:33:37,360
Speaker 2: Melzer consumed the violent gore videos that were shared so

535
00:33:37,520 --> 00:33:42,360
Speaker 2: gleefully in those telegram channels. Found in his digital possession

536
00:33:42,440 --> 00:33:45,560
Speaker 2: were things like a video that appears to show a

537
00:33:45,600 --> 00:33:48,440
Speaker 2: black woman being lynched by a white man in front

538
00:33:48,440 --> 00:33:51,640
Speaker 2: of a Confederate flag, and a photo of a woman

539
00:33:51,680 --> 00:33:55,040
Speaker 2: who is bound and hooded being held at gunpoint by

540
00:33:55,040 --> 00:33:56,760
Speaker 2: a man standing in front of a flag with the

541
00:33:56,760 --> 00:34:01,240
Speaker 2: insignia for the Order of nine Angles. The court record

542
00:34:01,280 --> 00:34:06,000
Speaker 2: specifically notes several videos he'd watched depicting jihadist attacks on

543
00:34:06,160 --> 00:34:10,040
Speaker 2: US military forces, which may be where he got his

544
00:34:10,200 --> 00:34:15,000
Speaker 2: next big idea. Immediately after walking out of the briefing

545
00:34:15,080 --> 00:34:18,160
Speaker 2: room for his upcoming mission to Turkey, Melzer shared the

546
00:34:18,160 --> 00:34:23,080
Speaker 2: information with Rapewaffen Chat. Soon after, the channel administrator, our

547
00:34:23,200 --> 00:34:27,719
Speaker 2: Canadian teenager posting as Gulag Cult, asked him for more

548
00:34:27,719 --> 00:34:32,080
Speaker 2: information about the deployment because another Rapewaffen member, a user

549
00:34:32,160 --> 00:34:38,240
Speaker 2: called Kurt Kobani, needed to know. Gulag Cult told Melzer

550
00:34:38,280 --> 00:34:41,000
Speaker 2: that this other user, we'll just call him Kurt I Guess,

551
00:34:42,000 --> 00:34:45,640
Speaker 2: was a member of the Gray Wolves, a Turkish ultnationalist

552
00:34:45,719 --> 00:34:49,960
Speaker 2: fascist paramilitary group that the European Parliament considers an international

553
00:34:50,040 --> 00:34:54,840
Speaker 2: terrorist organization. A week before he was scheduled to deploy,

554
00:34:55,320 --> 00:34:58,560
Speaker 2: Melzer posted in at least two telegram chats for adherents

555
00:34:58,560 --> 00:35:00,920
Speaker 2: of the Order of Nine Angles that he was a

556
00:35:01,000 --> 00:35:04,600
Speaker 2: US Army soldier stationed in Italy and he was about

557
00:35:04,640 --> 00:35:10,080
Speaker 2: to deploy to Turkey. Gulag Cult forwarded several of Melzer's messages,

558
00:35:10,120 --> 00:35:13,920
Speaker 2: which contained sensitive details about the mission, to a chat

559
00:35:13,960 --> 00:35:18,920
Speaker 2: called the Order of Nine Rapes. That chat had just

560
00:35:19,000 --> 00:35:25,200
Speaker 2: eighteen members. One of those members was Ethan Melzer, one

561
00:35:25,320 --> 00:35:29,919
Speaker 2: was Gulug cult Our, fifteen year old Canadian, and one

562
00:35:30,040 --> 00:35:34,480
Speaker 2: was a user who called herself Red hour Glass, and

563
00:35:34,600 --> 00:35:36,560
Speaker 2: Red hour Glass would be the one to pull the

564
00:35:36,600 --> 00:35:39,080
Speaker 2: plug on the whole operation by reporting the plot to

565
00:35:39,120 --> 00:35:43,279
Speaker 2: the FBI. The FBI didn't arrest their own informant, and

566
00:35:43,800 --> 00:35:47,440
Speaker 2: they can't arrest a Canadian child. But you do have

567
00:35:47,520 --> 00:35:49,920
Speaker 2: to wonder what came of the other fifteen members of

568
00:35:49,960 --> 00:35:55,799
Speaker 2: that chat room. Not much as known about Red hour Glass.

569
00:35:55,880 --> 00:35:57,680
Speaker 1: She may not even be a woman at all.

570
00:35:57,840 --> 00:36:04,480
Speaker 2: Who knows line she was Gulag Colt's girlfriend, Whether she

571
00:36:04,640 --> 00:36:08,319
Speaker 2: knew her internet boyfriend was really a child, we don't know.

572
00:36:10,040 --> 00:36:13,600
Speaker 2: She's referred to in the government's documents as a confidential source,

573
00:36:14,560 --> 00:36:18,440
Speaker 2: not an undercover employee, so she may be getting paid

574
00:36:18,560 --> 00:36:22,000
Speaker 2: by the FBI for the information she provides, but she

575
00:36:22,120 --> 00:36:26,440
Speaker 2: is not an FBI agent. One footnote indicates that she's

576
00:36:26,480 --> 00:36:28,880
Speaker 2: only been a source for the government since May of

577
00:36:28,920 --> 00:36:32,200
Speaker 2: twenty twenty, which is when all of this went down.

578
00:36:33,480 --> 00:36:35,520
Speaker 2: They don't give a more specific date than that, just

579
00:36:36,120 --> 00:36:40,160
Speaker 2: May of twenty twenty, So was she already a government

580
00:36:40,200 --> 00:36:43,320
Speaker 2: informant when she entered the Order of Nine rapes Chat

581
00:36:43,560 --> 00:36:47,160
Speaker 2: where this plan was hatched. Or did she only become

582
00:36:47,320 --> 00:36:52,000
Speaker 2: a government informant after the plan took shape and maybe

583
00:36:52,040 --> 00:36:57,719
Speaker 2: she felt compelled to report it. We can't know, but

584
00:36:57,840 --> 00:36:59,720
Speaker 2: her username is interesting.

585
00:36:59,400 --> 00:37:02,719
Speaker 1: To me, red hour glass.

586
00:37:04,040 --> 00:37:06,880
Speaker 2: Maybe that means something else to you, but to me,

587
00:37:07,400 --> 00:37:09,839
Speaker 2: a red hour glass is a clear reference to the

588
00:37:09,880 --> 00:37:13,759
Speaker 2: markings on the abdomen of a black widow spider. I

589
00:37:13,760 --> 00:37:16,359
Speaker 2: don't want to draw the ire of any spider scientists

590
00:37:16,360 --> 00:37:19,600
Speaker 2: out there. I understand that the commonly held belief that

591
00:37:19,640 --> 00:37:24,840
Speaker 2: black widow spiders engage in sexual cannibalism isn't really supported

592
00:37:24,880 --> 00:37:29,240
Speaker 2: by the science. Those instances of female black widows devouring

593
00:37:29,280 --> 00:37:33,680
Speaker 2: their mates occur primarily in laboratory environments when the male

594
00:37:33,760 --> 00:37:39,920
Speaker 2: spider can't get away, but it is nevertheless something people believe.

595
00:37:41,480 --> 00:37:46,320
Speaker 2: So this red hour glass, this mysterious woman, is tricking

596
00:37:46,360 --> 00:37:51,880
Speaker 2: Gulag cult into thinking they are romantically involved. She's drawing

597
00:37:52,280 --> 00:37:56,520
Speaker 2: these young men into her web. Was she a black

598
00:37:56,520 --> 00:37:59,200
Speaker 2: widow bent on consuming these men's futures?

599
00:38:00,520 --> 00:38:00,960
Speaker 1: I don't know.

600
00:38:04,480 --> 00:38:08,160
Speaker 2: Within the Order of Nine rapes Chat, a plan began

601
00:38:08,239 --> 00:38:11,719
Speaker 2: to form. If they could get the information about this

602
00:38:11,840 --> 00:38:15,120
Speaker 2: mission into the hands of al Qaeda, they could cause

603
00:38:15,160 --> 00:38:20,560
Speaker 2: a mass casualty incident. One user asked Melzer if he

604
00:38:20,640 --> 00:38:24,399
Speaker 2: understood that he too would likely die in the kind

605
00:38:24,400 --> 00:38:29,399
Speaker 2: of attack they're talking about. Melzer replied, if we were

606
00:38:29,400 --> 00:38:31,680
Speaker 2: to trigger this the right way, the amount of shit

607
00:38:31,760 --> 00:38:35,440
Speaker 2: it would cause would cover it. He felt like his

608
00:38:35,560 --> 00:38:38,920
Speaker 2: life quote would be absolutely meaningless in the amount of

609
00:38:38,920 --> 00:38:43,120
Speaker 2: shit it would cause if the plan worked, if these

610
00:38:43,200 --> 00:38:45,880
Speaker 2: forty soldiers were killed at a Turkish air base.

611
00:38:47,640 --> 00:38:49,320
Speaker 1: A day later, Gurlug Cult.

612
00:38:49,040 --> 00:38:53,759
Speaker 2: Asked him, are we really planning a Jihati attack, and

613
00:38:53,840 --> 00:38:59,320
Speaker 2: Melzer agreed they were. Gulug Cult joked that if Melzer

614
00:38:59,320 --> 00:39:02,919
Speaker 2: got himself shit in this attack would be his own fault,

615
00:39:03,840 --> 00:39:07,560
Speaker 2: and Melzer again expressed a total willingness to die if

616
00:39:07,600 --> 00:39:11,440
Speaker 2: it meant the plan was successful, saying, who gives a fuck?

617
00:39:11,800 --> 00:39:14,520
Speaker 2: The after effects of a convoy getting attacked would cover it.

618
00:39:14,920 --> 00:39:18,200
Speaker 2: It would be another war. I would have died successfully

619
00:39:18,800 --> 00:39:20,959
Speaker 2: because another ten year war in the Middle East would

620
00:39:20,960 --> 00:39:25,440
Speaker 2: definitely leave a mark. As the deployment date grew closer,

621
00:39:26,320 --> 00:39:29,800
Speaker 2: Melzer shared every detail about the mission with Gulag Cult,

622
00:39:30,719 --> 00:39:33,960
Speaker 2: the coordinates of the base, the number of US soldiers

623
00:39:34,040 --> 00:39:37,120
Speaker 2: and what kind of weapons they were issued, the purpose

624
00:39:37,160 --> 00:39:39,920
Speaker 2: and defensive capabilities of the U. S Army presence at

625
00:39:39,960 --> 00:39:43,960
Speaker 2: this base, the layout of the installation and the surrounding terrain,

626
00:39:44,880 --> 00:39:47,440
Speaker 2: and even the route his convoy would be taking to

627
00:39:47,480 --> 00:39:52,560
Speaker 2: get there. He shared information he'd received in briefings and trainings,

628
00:39:53,400 --> 00:39:55,480
Speaker 2: things like the fact that the base was home to

629
00:39:55,640 --> 00:39:59,360
Speaker 2: many non military employees who are not armed, and that

630
00:39:59,400 --> 00:40:01,880
Speaker 2: the Army was limited in the defenses available for this

631
00:40:02,000 --> 00:40:04,239
Speaker 2: convoy because they were operating by the rules of the

632
00:40:04,280 --> 00:40:09,680
Speaker 2: host government. Using the training he'd received about avoiding ambush

633
00:40:09,719 --> 00:40:13,920
Speaker 2: style attacks, he explained in detail how an effective attack

634
00:40:14,400 --> 00:40:19,359
Speaker 2: could work. Just days before the scheduled deployment, a new,

635
00:40:19,680 --> 00:40:23,759
Speaker 2: even smaller chat room was formed to finalize the details.

636
00:40:25,200 --> 00:40:31,160
Speaker 2: This one, called Operation hard Rock, was just four members, Melzer,

637
00:40:31,960 --> 00:40:37,680
Speaker 2: our Canadian teenager, Gulag Cult, our government informant Read Hourglass,

638
00:40:38,320 --> 00:40:41,680
Speaker 2: and a fourth user the government calls co Conspirator III,

639
00:40:42,360 --> 00:40:47,000
Speaker 2: someone posting under the name Jaw with two ws. In

640
00:40:47,040 --> 00:40:50,840
Speaker 2: this chat, Melzer promised to provide the group with the

641
00:40:50,920 --> 00:40:55,040
Speaker 2: frequency and channels for the US Army radio communications so

642
00:40:55,080 --> 00:40:57,200
Speaker 2: that they would be able to hear their victims deaths

643
00:40:57,239 --> 00:41:12,279
Speaker 2: in real time. When the attack was carried out on

644
00:41:14,680 --> 00:41:17,840
Speaker 2: May twenty fifth, the day before his twenty second birthday,

645
00:41:18,760 --> 00:41:20,760
Speaker 2: Ethan Melzer may have gotten cold feet.

646
00:41:21,960 --> 00:41:22,799
Speaker 1: He suggested to the.

647
00:41:22,840 --> 00:41:26,040
Speaker 2: Chat that maybe they shouldn't attack his convoy at all.

648
00:41:27,000 --> 00:41:29,920
Speaker 2: He still loved the idea of murdering a whole convoy

649
00:41:29,920 --> 00:41:33,120
Speaker 2: of US soldiers. He just thought maybe it would be

650
00:41:33,120 --> 00:41:36,640
Speaker 2: better for him to go on this deployment, spend a

651
00:41:36,680 --> 00:41:40,319
Speaker 2: few months there researching the vulnerabilities of the place, you know,

652
00:41:40,440 --> 00:41:43,640
Speaker 2: sending back more intel, and then they could carry out

653
00:41:43,680 --> 00:41:47,400
Speaker 2: this attack on the unit sent to replace his a

654
00:41:47,440 --> 00:41:50,920
Speaker 2: few months from now. He promised that he was packing

655
00:41:50,920 --> 00:41:52,920
Speaker 2: a burner phone so he'd be able to provide them

656
00:41:52,920 --> 00:41:55,399
Speaker 2: with photographs of the whole base once he got there,

657
00:41:56,680 --> 00:42:00,359
Speaker 2: and then he didn't post for a few days. Red

658
00:42:00,400 --> 00:42:03,040
Speaker 2: hour Glass informed the FBI of the plot the next day,

659
00:42:03,680 --> 00:42:08,040
Speaker 2: May twenty six, twenty twenty, That was Ethan Melser's twenty

660
00:42:08,040 --> 00:42:11,520
Speaker 2: second birthday and two days before the scheduled deployment date.

661
00:42:13,200 --> 00:42:14,840
Speaker 1: The authorities were quickly able.

662
00:42:14,640 --> 00:42:17,799
Speaker 2: To identify the platoon in question, and the deployment date

663
00:42:17,840 --> 00:42:23,440
Speaker 2: was pushed back to May thirtieth. The soldiers weren't told why.

664
00:42:23,760 --> 00:42:26,680
Speaker 2: Ethan Melzer had no idea his plans weren't a secret anymore.

665
00:42:26,719 --> 00:42:28,840
Speaker 2: When he posted in the Operation hard Rock chat on

666
00:42:28,880 --> 00:42:32,080
Speaker 2: May twenty ninth, the eve of the new scheduled departure date,

667
00:42:33,400 --> 00:42:36,680
Speaker 2: he said he was still committed to the plan. He

668
00:42:36,719 --> 00:42:39,719
Speaker 2: asked if it was possible to pull exact coordinates from

669
00:42:39,760 --> 00:42:42,640
Speaker 2: the metadata on photos that were taken with a cell phone.

670
00:42:43,719 --> 00:42:45,440
Speaker 2: He was hoping that if he was able to sneak

671
00:42:45,440 --> 00:42:48,960
Speaker 2: his burner phone out on patrol and snap pictures, his

672
00:42:49,040 --> 00:42:51,560
Speaker 2: co conspirators would be able to use the metadata to

673
00:42:51,640 --> 00:42:55,400
Speaker 2: pinpoint the exact locations of the areas of vulnerability in

674
00:42:55,440 --> 00:43:00,520
Speaker 2: the photos. Now, whether Red hour Glass was working for

675
00:43:00,600 --> 00:43:04,880
Speaker 2: the government all along or not, we don't know. But

676
00:43:04,960 --> 00:43:08,120
Speaker 2: on the evening of May twenty ninth, she may or

677
00:43:08,160 --> 00:43:11,480
Speaker 2: may not have even been the one using her phone

678
00:43:11,600 --> 00:43:14,839
Speaker 2: once she spilled the beans to the FBI. It may

679
00:43:14,880 --> 00:43:18,120
Speaker 2: have been an actual FBI agent chatting with Ethan Melzer

680
00:43:18,120 --> 00:43:22,239
Speaker 2: as Red Hourglass as he reaffirmed his commitment to the

681
00:43:22,280 --> 00:43:26,719
Speaker 2: plan that night, Red Hourglass asked him, what makes you

682
00:43:26,800 --> 00:43:28,759
Speaker 2: think you can actually get away with fucking with the

683
00:43:28,880 --> 00:43:33,759
Speaker 2: US military and Melser replied, because I fly under the

684
00:43:33,840 --> 00:43:37,200
Speaker 2: raidar already act completely normal around other people outside and

685
00:43:37,280 --> 00:43:41,440
Speaker 2: don't talk about my personal life or beliefs with anyone.

686
00:43:41,640 --> 00:43:43,720
Speaker 2: But he was starting to get nervous about the mission.

687
00:43:44,760 --> 00:43:48,400
Speaker 2: He deleted most of his old posts. If the plan

688
00:43:48,520 --> 00:43:51,759
Speaker 2: now was to attack the replacement convoy two months down

689
00:43:51,760 --> 00:43:54,840
Speaker 2: the road, he was going to be alive when the

690
00:43:54,880 --> 00:44:00,239
Speaker 2: investigation started, and he didn't want to get caught. Red

691
00:44:00,280 --> 00:44:05,480
Speaker 2: Hourglass needled him, saying, you deleted them because that's treason duh,

692
00:44:05,880 --> 00:44:11,040
Speaker 2: and he replied, KEK, that's k e K. It's a

693
00:44:11,120 --> 00:44:17,160
Speaker 2: substitute for LOL. The lore here is complicated and irrelevant,

694
00:44:17,800 --> 00:44:21,400
Speaker 2: but the short version is that keck originated with Korean

695
00:44:21,480 --> 00:44:25,160
Speaker 2: online gamers as a typed indication that the user is laughing,

696
00:44:25,880 --> 00:44:29,640
Speaker 2: and it eventually migrated into the American altright lexicon of

697
00:44:29,680 --> 00:44:33,920
Speaker 2: the twenty sixteen era. It's not important. The point is

698
00:44:34,920 --> 00:44:37,120
Speaker 2: he was laughing off what he knew to be true.

699
00:44:38,520 --> 00:44:44,120
Speaker 2: This was treasonous behavior. And Nat gets us back up

700
00:44:44,120 --> 00:44:48,839
Speaker 2: to where we started today. Ethan Melzer standing outside at

701
00:44:48,880 --> 00:44:53,400
Speaker 2: Camp Betterly with his platoon on May thirtieth, twenty twenty.

702
00:44:53,560 --> 00:44:57,520
Speaker 2: His bags were packed forty soldiers were waiting for the

703
00:44:57,560 --> 00:45:01,719
Speaker 2: bus that would take them to the airstrip. Inside Ethan

704
00:45:01,760 --> 00:45:06,000
Speaker 2: Melser's bag, they found two cell phones he really had

705
00:45:06,080 --> 00:45:07,960
Speaker 2: packed the burner phone that he'd promised to use to

706
00:45:07,960 --> 00:45:12,400
Speaker 2: take photographs of the military base. They also found two books,

707
00:45:13,360 --> 00:45:17,040
Speaker 2: The Sinister Tradition, a seminal text for adherents of the

708
00:45:17,120 --> 00:45:21,120
Speaker 2: Order of Nine Angles written by ONA Grandmaster Anton Long himself,

709
00:45:22,120 --> 00:45:26,720
Speaker 2: and a copy of Kodux Aristarchus, one of the ONA

710
00:45:26,840 --> 00:45:30,280
Speaker 2: texts authored by the English Nazi pedophile Ryan Fleming.

711
00:45:32,160 --> 00:45:33,839
Speaker 1: I did give it a little skim this.

712
00:45:33,800 --> 00:45:36,760
Speaker 2: Week, like I promised you last week, and it turns

713
00:45:36,800 --> 00:45:41,680
Speaker 2: out he's just talking about psychic vampirism. Sorry, so I

714
00:45:41,680 --> 00:45:47,320
Speaker 2: don't think vampires are real. Immediately after being taken into custody,

715
00:45:47,600 --> 00:45:50,759
Speaker 2: Ethan Melzer admitted that he had disclosed information about his

716
00:45:50,840 --> 00:45:54,560
Speaker 2: deployment to members of the rape Waffenchat. He admitted that

717
00:45:54,640 --> 00:45:57,120
Speaker 2: he had done so in order to facilitate an attack

718
00:45:57,160 --> 00:46:01,200
Speaker 2: on his fellow soldiers. He admitted that the messages had

719
00:46:01,200 --> 00:46:05,440
Speaker 2: been typed and sent by him. He agreed that his

720
00:46:05,560 --> 00:46:10,640
Speaker 2: actions were tantamount to treason, but as required by the

721
00:46:10,719 --> 00:46:14,360
Speaker 2: rules of the Order of Nine Angles. He repeatedly denied

722
00:46:14,920 --> 00:46:18,840
Speaker 2: that he was a member of the Order of Nine Angles.

723
00:46:20,239 --> 00:46:23,880
Speaker 2: As the case progressed, his lawyers argued that he was

724
00:46:23,920 --> 00:46:29,279
Speaker 2: just messing around online. He was addicted to posting. They

725
00:46:29,320 --> 00:46:32,680
Speaker 2: wanted to have a psychologist testify about internet addiction and

726
00:46:32,760 --> 00:46:37,320
Speaker 2: the phenomenon of people lying online for attention, inhabiting elaborate

727
00:46:37,360 --> 00:46:41,320
Speaker 2: fake identities online because they're high on likes and comments.

728
00:46:42,680 --> 00:46:45,799
Speaker 2: They argued that there was no actual chance of any

729
00:46:45,920 --> 00:46:49,759
Speaker 2: real attack ever taking place, leaning heavily on the fact

730
00:46:49,760 --> 00:46:53,239
Speaker 2: that the primary co conspirator was a child who had

731
00:46:53,280 --> 00:46:56,319
Speaker 2: recently been released from a psychiatric facility and who was

732
00:46:56,360 --> 00:47:00,680
Speaker 2: only pretending to be an adult with military training. The

733
00:47:00,719 --> 00:47:05,120
Speaker 2: Defense sentencing memo doesn't mention that the government believes that

734
00:47:05,320 --> 00:47:09,200
Speaker 2: co conspirators two and three.

735
00:47:08,200 --> 00:47:08,880
Speaker 1: Were not lying.

736
00:47:09,800 --> 00:47:13,040
Speaker 2: One of them really was based in Kurdistan, and the

737
00:47:13,120 --> 00:47:16,200
Speaker 2: other does appear to have actual connections to some kind

738
00:47:16,239 --> 00:47:21,719
Speaker 2: of jihadist organization. In his post arrest interviews, Melzer told

739
00:47:21,760 --> 00:47:25,120
Speaker 2: investigators that he hadn't been serious about any of it,

740
00:47:25,760 --> 00:47:29,440
Speaker 2: but that he'd felt pressured to provide information about the deployment,

741
00:47:30,400 --> 00:47:34,160
Speaker 2: so he made something up and that kind of falls apart,

742
00:47:34,520 --> 00:47:39,880
Speaker 2: considering the information he provided was real. He did provide actual,

743
00:47:40,160 --> 00:47:44,120
Speaker 2: correct information about this military base in Turkey and his

744
00:47:44,200 --> 00:47:48,240
Speaker 2: deployment to it, and he really did pack a burner

745
00:47:48,280 --> 00:47:52,319
Speaker 2: phone for his deployment. But he said it had never

746
00:47:52,360 --> 00:47:54,720
Speaker 2: even crossed his mind that the people he was talking

747
00:47:54,719 --> 00:47:59,640
Speaker 2: to were serious, and he certainly wasn't serious. He said

748
00:47:59,640 --> 00:48:01,560
Speaker 2: that he was only curious about the order of nine

749
00:48:01,600 --> 00:48:05,000
Speaker 2: angles because it was so weird, and he claimed that

750
00:48:05,040 --> 00:48:08,400
Speaker 2: the beliefs of the group were quote pretty much the

751
00:48:08,520 --> 00:48:14,640
Speaker 2: polar opposite of his own, which is interesting because that's

752
00:48:14,719 --> 00:48:17,720
Speaker 2: sort of the same language in a lot of ona

753
00:48:17,800 --> 00:48:20,080
Speaker 2: texts about the kind of insight role you should choose.

754
00:48:20,160 --> 00:48:21,440
Speaker 1: You should choose something that is.

755
00:48:21,360 --> 00:48:27,640
Speaker 2: The polar opposite of your own beliefs. He later claimed

756
00:48:27,640 --> 00:48:30,040
Speaker 2: that he'd only provided some information to the group in

757
00:48:30,120 --> 00:48:32,799
Speaker 2: order to gain their trust so he could learn more

758
00:48:32,800 --> 00:48:36,400
Speaker 2: about them, which is kind of what Shandon Simpson, that

759
00:48:36,560 --> 00:48:40,000
Speaker 2: Ohio National guardsmen we were talking about last week, has

760
00:48:40,040 --> 00:48:43,160
Speaker 2: been claiming all along about why he was in the

761
00:48:43,239 --> 00:48:46,759
Speaker 2: rape wop and chat rooms. So there's a lot of

762
00:48:46,800 --> 00:48:50,760
Speaker 2: guys in the terrorism planning chat that are claiming after

763
00:48:50,800 --> 00:48:54,040
Speaker 2: the fact that they were only pretending to support terrorism

764
00:48:54,600 --> 00:48:57,160
Speaker 2: in order to uncover how bad everybody else.

765
00:48:56,960 --> 00:48:58,480
Speaker 1: In there really is.

766
00:49:00,480 --> 00:49:04,160
Speaker 2: And Knowlser's attorneys maintained all the way through sentencing that

767
00:49:04,239 --> 00:49:07,879
Speaker 2: there was never any real possibility that anyone was going

768
00:49:07,920 --> 00:49:10,840
Speaker 2: to get hurt. Right, they're saying that this plan is

769
00:49:11,560 --> 00:49:15,000
Speaker 2: half baked at best, and it never would have actually worked.

770
00:49:15,719 --> 00:49:18,600
Speaker 2: It was just posts online and the guy he was

771
00:49:18,640 --> 00:49:22,520
Speaker 2: talking to turned out to be a kid anyway. But

772
00:49:22,600 --> 00:49:27,080
Speaker 2: maybe terrorism is kind of like magic. Right. We were

773
00:49:27,080 --> 00:49:30,160
Speaker 2: talking a little bit last week about how much does

774
00:49:30,200 --> 00:49:37,560
Speaker 2: it matter what's real, what you really believe. Does it

775
00:49:37,680 --> 00:49:40,960
Speaker 2: matter if you're actually communing with demonic entities and the

776
00:49:41,000 --> 00:49:44,000
Speaker 2: acausal realm, if the end result is still a specific,

777
00:49:44,080 --> 00:49:48,239
Speaker 2: concrete action in the real world. Does it matter if

778
00:49:48,239 --> 00:49:51,160
Speaker 2: you didn't know the person you were sharing classified military

779
00:49:51,200 --> 00:49:55,680
Speaker 2: intelligence with was a child, if that information still found

780
00:49:55,719 --> 00:49:59,160
Speaker 2: its way onto the broader Internet, resulting in a very

781
00:49:59,239 --> 00:50:03,280
Speaker 2: real to overhaul security protocols at a military base.

782
00:50:04,880 --> 00:50:06,080
Speaker 1: And sometimes the law.

783
00:50:05,960 --> 00:50:10,360
Speaker 2: Really is kind of like ritual magic in that way.

784
00:50:10,440 --> 00:50:13,200
Speaker 2: You can catch the same charge for something like armed

785
00:50:13,280 --> 00:50:16,279
Speaker 2: robbery whether the gun you were holding was real or not,

786
00:50:17,400 --> 00:50:19,520
Speaker 2: because it doesn't matter if it's a real gun that

787
00:50:19,600 --> 00:50:23,520
Speaker 2: shoots real bullets if the people you're pointing it at

788
00:50:24,080 --> 00:50:29,280
Speaker 2: think it is Ethan Melzer entered into a plea agreement

789
00:50:29,360 --> 00:50:32,080
Speaker 2: in June of twenty twenty two, just two weeks before

790
00:50:32,120 --> 00:50:36,239
Speaker 2: he was scheduled to stand trial. The agreement dropped most

791
00:50:36,280 --> 00:50:38,560
Speaker 2: of the charges on the indictment, which is a pretty

792
00:50:38,560 --> 00:50:41,640
Speaker 2: standard practice in a federal criminal case, so he was

793
00:50:41,719 --> 00:50:44,480
Speaker 2: convicted only on the charges of attempted murder of US

794
00:50:44,560 --> 00:50:49,200
Speaker 2: service members, provision and attempted provision of material support to terrorists,

795
00:50:50,080 --> 00:50:53,320
Speaker 2: and illegal transmission of national defense information.

796
00:50:54,560 --> 00:50:54,960
Speaker 1: Pursue it.

797
00:50:55,000 --> 00:50:57,320
Speaker 2: To that plea agreement, he was sentenced to five hundred

798
00:50:57,320 --> 00:51:03,080
Speaker 2: and forty months. That's forty five years in prison, assuming

799
00:51:03,120 --> 00:51:05,920
Speaker 2: he maintains good behavior and doesn't commit any new offenses

800
00:51:05,960 --> 00:51:09,319
Speaker 2: while incarcerated. The eighty five percent of that sentence that

801
00:51:09,360 --> 00:51:11,880
Speaker 2: he'll end up serving is a little over thirty eight years.

802
00:51:13,239 --> 00:51:16,560
Speaker 2: His scheduled release date is in November of twenty fifty eight.

803
00:51:18,040 --> 00:51:19,359
Speaker 1: He'll be sixty years old.

804
00:51:21,760 --> 00:51:24,840
Speaker 2: When entering his plea, he was asked and said that

805
00:51:24,880 --> 00:51:28,279
Speaker 2: he understood that the terms of this agreement included a

806
00:51:28,320 --> 00:51:31,560
Speaker 2: waiver of his right to appeal any sentence of five

807
00:51:31,640 --> 00:51:35,040
Speaker 2: hundred and forty months or less, and he got five

808
00:51:35,120 --> 00:51:38,799
Speaker 2: hundred and forty months. But in March of last year,

809
00:51:38,920 --> 00:51:41,879
Speaker 2: just a few days after his sentencing, his attorneys filed

810
00:51:41,880 --> 00:51:44,440
Speaker 2: an appeal asking for the case to be re sentenced,

811
00:51:44,960 --> 00:51:47,600
Speaker 2: citing a particular comment the judge made in his remarks

812
00:51:47,640 --> 00:51:51,800
Speaker 2: after pronouncing the sentence. The transcript of that hearing shows

813
00:51:51,800 --> 00:51:56,440
Speaker 2: the judge's remarks were fairly lengthy, covering nearly twenty pages

814
00:51:56,480 --> 00:52:01,480
Speaker 2: in the transcript. Judges usually offer some explanation of how

815
00:52:01,480 --> 00:52:05,319
Speaker 2: they arrived at their decision at a sentencing hearing. Some

816
00:52:05,360 --> 00:52:09,360
Speaker 2: are more succinct. Others enjoy waxing poetic about the nature

817
00:52:09,400 --> 00:52:14,239
Speaker 2: of justice or their feelings about a defendant's actions. There's

818
00:52:14,280 --> 00:52:17,200
Speaker 2: no jury in the room anymore, so judges can get

819
00:52:17,239 --> 00:52:19,879
Speaker 2: a little wild with it at this stage. It can

820
00:52:19,920 --> 00:52:22,760
Speaker 2: be kind of jarring to hear them drop the act

821
00:52:22,920 --> 00:52:27,560
Speaker 2: and actually have a deeply personal opinion. And Judge Gregory

822
00:52:27,560 --> 00:52:31,879
Speaker 2: Woods spoke at length. He explained, as judges often do,

823
00:52:32,160 --> 00:52:35,640
Speaker 2: the legal framework for calculating a sentence and the factors

824
00:52:35,640 --> 00:52:38,880
Speaker 2: that must be weighed. He summarized the facts of the

825
00:52:38,920 --> 00:52:43,280
Speaker 2: case and its procedural history. He highlighted pieces of evidence

826
00:52:43,320 --> 00:52:47,440
Speaker 2: that contributed to his decision. He referenced the mitigating factors

827
00:52:47,480 --> 00:52:50,440
Speaker 2: presented by the defense and explained why he didn't agree

828
00:52:50,480 --> 00:52:53,520
Speaker 2: with the defense's position that they warranted a downward departure.

829
00:52:54,960 --> 00:52:59,239
Speaker 2: And none of this is unusual or even remarkable. But

830
00:52:59,320 --> 00:53:01,440
Speaker 2: the appeal h just on the judge's use of the

831
00:53:01,480 --> 00:53:05,440
Speaker 2: phrase Judeo Christian values.

832
00:53:08,400 --> 00:53:12,240
Speaker 3: Mister Melzer's crimes were pugnant. He betrayed the United States

833
00:53:12,239 --> 00:53:16,040
Speaker 3: of America. He betrayed the United States military. He targeted

834
00:53:16,080 --> 00:53:21,120
Speaker 3: for murder his fellow soldiers. He worked to aid Jahadis terrorists. Also,

835
00:53:21,160 --> 00:53:24,560
Speaker 3: he could achieve his nihilist goal of unreminding Judeo Christian

836
00:53:24,680 --> 00:53:27,839
Speaker 3: values and rupturing civilized society.

837
00:53:30,400 --> 00:53:33,719
Speaker 2: Of the Order of Nine Angles. Judge Woods said, the

838
00:53:33,880 --> 00:53:38,240
Speaker 2: organization and mister Melzer opposed those Judeo Christian values because

839
00:53:38,280 --> 00:53:42,279
Speaker 2: they are good for civilization. His crimes were committed in

840
00:53:42,440 --> 00:53:48,160
Speaker 2: order to destroy civilization and look, to be honest, it

841
00:53:48,160 --> 00:53:50,200
Speaker 2: probably would have been better if he had not said that,

842
00:53:51,520 --> 00:53:54,840
Speaker 2: but it was a brief mention in a very lengthy

843
00:53:54,920 --> 00:53:58,720
Speaker 2: monologue that also emphasized that the defendant was not charged

844
00:53:58,840 --> 00:54:02,440
Speaker 2: or sentenced because of his beliefs, but for the actions

845
00:54:02,560 --> 00:54:08,000
Speaker 2: motivated by those beliefs. That single statement wasn't the basis

846
00:54:08,040 --> 00:54:12,960
Speaker 2: for the sentence. It was just a comment. But the

847
00:54:13,000 --> 00:54:17,400
Speaker 2: appeal argues that those comments constitute a sufficient appearance of

848
00:54:17,440 --> 00:54:21,680
Speaker 2: the sentence having been based on a constitutionally impermissible factor,

849
00:54:22,480 --> 00:54:27,320
Speaker 2: such as the defendants race or religious beliefs. The government

850
00:54:27,440 --> 00:54:30,279
Speaker 2: contends that not only had Melser waived his right to

851
00:54:30,320 --> 00:54:33,440
Speaker 2: appeal the sentence and his attorneys failed to object to

852
00:54:33,480 --> 00:54:36,239
Speaker 2: these comments when they were made, but the comments in

853
00:54:36,360 --> 00:54:41,239
Speaker 2: question don't raise an issue of constitutionality. If anything, the

854
00:54:41,320 --> 00:54:44,760
Speaker 2: judge was referring to the bias motivation for the crime,

855
00:54:45,520 --> 00:54:50,280
Speaker 2: not a characteristic of the defendant. There's a difference between

856
00:54:50,600 --> 00:54:54,680
Speaker 2: talking about a defendants race or a defendant's religion and

857
00:54:54,840 --> 00:54:59,680
Speaker 2: talking about the defendant's racial or religious motivation for a

858
00:55:02,440 --> 00:55:05,560
Speaker 2: I'm no judge, I'm not even a lawyer. I'm just

859
00:55:05,600 --> 00:55:09,600
Speaker 2: an enthusiastic consumer of the law. But I don't think

860
00:55:09,640 --> 00:55:12,799
Speaker 2: this appeal holds a lot of water. They're hoping to

861
00:55:12,800 --> 00:55:14,920
Speaker 2: get the case resentenced so they can have a second

862
00:55:14,920 --> 00:55:18,759
Speaker 2: shot at getting a sentence of fifteen years rather than

863
00:55:18,800 --> 00:55:23,120
Speaker 2: the forty five years currently on the books. If you're

864
00:55:23,160 --> 00:55:26,040
Speaker 2: listening to this, the day it came out oral argument

865
00:55:26,080 --> 00:55:30,439
Speaker 2: in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals was yesterday, November six,

866
00:55:30,640 --> 00:55:34,880
Speaker 2: twenty twenty four. The Second Circuit tends to be a

867
00:55:34,920 --> 00:55:38,839
Speaker 2: little speedier than some, but I've given up trying to

868
00:55:38,960 --> 00:55:43,480
Speaker 2: divine a court's timeline. It never works out. A final

869
00:55:43,520 --> 00:55:46,319
Speaker 2: opinion in Melzer's appeal could come as quickly as a

870
00:55:46,320 --> 00:55:48,759
Speaker 2: few weeks, but it's more likely we won't see an

871
00:55:48,800 --> 00:55:53,440
Speaker 2: opinion filed for a couple of months. Leaving aside the

872
00:55:53,440 --> 00:55:56,359
Speaker 2: comments at issue in the appeal, though, Judge Woods made

873
00:55:56,400 --> 00:55:59,520
Speaker 2: it clear how he felt about Ethan Melzer's crimes and

874
00:55:59,640 --> 00:56:03,480
Speaker 2: his aims that he regretted his actions, saying, in part,

875
00:56:04,960 --> 00:56:08,520
Speaker 2: mister Melser now expresses remorse as he is facing justice

876
00:56:08,520 --> 00:56:12,600
Speaker 2: for his crimes, but I frankly do not believe him.

877
00:56:13,400 --> 00:56:17,040
Speaker 2: Part of the methodology of his organization, as I understand it,

878
00:56:17,080 --> 00:56:19,560
Speaker 2: is that one should hide one's true intentions and commitment

879
00:56:19,680 --> 00:56:23,280
Speaker 2: to better achieve its goals, and over an extended period

880
00:56:23,320 --> 00:56:27,480
Speaker 2: of time, mister Melser effectively did just that. So I

881
00:56:27,520 --> 00:56:30,000
Speaker 2: do not trust his expression of remorse or that he

882
00:56:30,040 --> 00:56:35,520
Speaker 2: has truly renounced his commitment to violence. I hope it's true, but.

883
00:56:35,520 --> 00:56:36,200
Speaker 1: I don't trust it.

884
00:56:37,440 --> 00:56:39,560
Speaker 2: I think it is more likely that mister Melser is

885
00:56:39,600 --> 00:56:44,040
Speaker 2: playing another role to obtain leniency from the court, as

886
00:56:44,040 --> 00:56:47,400
Speaker 2: he played soldier while working in secret to murder servicemen.

887
00:56:49,880 --> 00:56:53,440
Speaker 2: So maybe the role of contrite federal prisoner is just

888
00:56:53,480 --> 00:56:57,200
Speaker 2: another mask. Either way, he is going to be behind

889
00:56:57,200 --> 00:57:00,319
Speaker 2: bars for a long time and he probably won't come

890
00:57:00,320 --> 00:57:05,160
Speaker 2: out a better man whenever that day comes. Sentencing is

891
00:57:05,200 --> 00:57:10,719
Speaker 2: meant to balance the need for punishment, rehabilitation, protection of

892
00:57:10,760 --> 00:57:15,720
Speaker 2: the public, and deterrence. But based on the comments made

893
00:57:15,760 --> 00:57:19,960
Speaker 2: at sentencing and the length of the sentence, this seems

894
00:57:20,000 --> 00:57:24,960
Speaker 2: to be almost entirely in the service of deterrence. This

895
00:57:25,040 --> 00:57:29,400
Speaker 2: isn't about preventing Ethan Melzer from doing this again. He

896
00:57:29,640 --> 00:57:34,480
Speaker 2: couldn't do this again. It's about sending a message to

897
00:57:34,600 --> 00:57:39,320
Speaker 2: everyone else who is considering joining the US military as

898
00:57:39,360 --> 00:57:42,200
Speaker 2: part of their plan to reinvent the world through bloodshed

899
00:57:43,080 --> 00:57:47,480
Speaker 2: with violent revolution and mass murder. But you have to

900
00:57:47,520 --> 00:57:51,120
Speaker 2: ask yourself if there's a more effective way to address

901
00:57:51,200 --> 00:57:55,160
Speaker 2: this underlying issue of young men enlisting in the military

902
00:57:55,200 --> 00:57:59,320
Speaker 2: because they dream of a race war this can't be

903
00:57:59,360 --> 00:58:04,280
Speaker 2: the only option. Ethan Melzer is currently being held at

904
00:58:04,480 --> 00:58:09,280
Speaker 2: FCI Marion, a medium security federal prison in Illinois that

905
00:58:10,080 --> 00:58:12,880
Speaker 2: I most strongly associate with being the place where a

906
00:58:13,000 --> 00:58:17,480
Speaker 2: man aptly nicknamed a crying Nazi befriended a man that

907
00:58:17,560 --> 00:58:22,080
Speaker 2: they call the Merchant of Death. But maybe now's not

908
00:58:22,120 --> 00:58:24,000
Speaker 2: the time to tell you about how a guy who

909
00:58:24,120 --> 00:58:27,880
Speaker 2: used to really publicly fantasize about raping me used to

910
00:58:27,920 --> 00:58:30,600
Speaker 2: watch Tucker Carlson every night in the prison wreck room

911
00:58:31,200 --> 00:58:34,440
Speaker 2: with the Russian arms dealer that Vladimir Putin traded Brittany

912
00:58:34,440 --> 00:58:37,160
Speaker 2: Griner for another time.

913
00:58:37,280 --> 00:58:37,680
Speaker 1: Perhaps.

914
00:58:51,440 --> 00:58:53,840
Speaker 2: Weird Little Guys is a production of Cool Zone Media

915
00:58:53,880 --> 00:58:58,320
Speaker 2: and iHeartRadio. It's researched, written and reported by me, Molly Coner.

916
00:58:59,160 --> 00:59:02,880
Speaker 2: Our executive produces are Sophie Lichterman and Robert Evans. The

917
00:59:02,920 --> 00:59:06,280
Speaker 2: show is edited by the wildly talented Rory Gagan. The

918
00:59:06,400 --> 00:59:10,000
Speaker 2: theme music was composed by Brad Dickert. You can email

919
00:59:10,080 --> 00:59:12,920
Speaker 2: me at Weird Little Guys podcast at gmail dot com,

920
00:59:12,920 --> 00:59:16,080
Speaker 2: but I probably will not answer it. You can exchange

921
00:59:16,120 --> 00:59:18,440
Speaker 2: conspiracy theories about the show with other listeners on the

922
00:59:18,440 --> 00:59:21,919
Speaker 2: Weird Little Guys subreddit. Please don't post anything that will

923
00:59:21,920 --> 00:59:24,880
Speaker 2: make you one of my weird little guys.