this article was originally post at Sturmgewhr about a Pasadena, Calif. man being arrest for weapons charges after police discovered his cache of weapons.
http://www.sturmgewehr.com/webBBS/general.cgi?read=10046
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http://www.laweekly.com/ink/99/08/news-hunter.shtml

LA Weekly: News Feature: LAPD Zealots Cost City a Cool Million

.NEWS * FEATURE January 15 - 21, 1999.

LAPD Zealots Cost City a Cool Million
by Jane Hunter

The case surfaced with a bang last May - a sensational press
conference announcing that a series of predawn arrests had brought a
dangerous militia cell "to its knees," averting a "holocaust" and
saving "countless lives." More than a hundred weapons and thousands
of rounds of ammunition were confiscated, and in the ensuing months,
three defendants in the case pleaded guilty to weapons charges. One,
Irwindale reserve police officer Glenn Yee, was sentenced to 16
months in prison on weapons charges.
Which made it all the more confounding when the Los Angeles City
Council last week agreed to pay out $1.1 million to settle four
civil lawsuits brought by the defendants in the case. Council
members said those arrested had been defamed as militia terrorists
by overzealous police officials, and voted to institute mandatory
training for LAPD spokespeople.
But defamation was just one of the complaints against the
department, prosecutors and the city attorney, who reportedly sold
the deal to the council by warning that a trial verdict might top $5
million. The plaintiffs alleged the cops had framed and entrapped
them, spied on them illegally, and then lied under oath to cover up
their excesses. Moreover, the suits alleged that police officials at
the LAPD's Anti-Terrorist Division (ATD) had conspired with city and
district attorneys to withhold exonerating evidence.
Said Michael Stoller, the attorney representing all four defendants
and the wives of two of them, "I believe that the complaints
involving police conduct were of merit and were taken into
consideration for making this settlement." Stoller said he couldn't
discuss any terms.
The million-dollar settlement means the allegations of wrongdoing
will never be tried. But it also marks another miserable outing for
one of the last remnants of the LAPD's once-vaunted - and widely
feared - spy apparatus. The ATD is a secretive division directly
descended from the Public Disorder Intelligence Division, which was
disbanded after activists disclosed widespread spying on liberal
political figures, including some public officials.
The lawsuits assert that the ATD had pressed its investigation
because it urgently needed a major bust to make up for years of
lackluster performance and head off plans to dissolve the division.
(The ATD has accrued more lawsuits than major arrests in its
controversial history.) So the unit dispatched an officer to
infiltrate the plaintiffs' group of gun enthusiasts and
survivalists, and depicted its quarry as militia militants bent on
fomenting urban terror.
Filed in federal court last summer, the lawsuits recount
unsuccessful efforts by the ATD's undercover officers to induce the
group, which generally met in the northeastern part of the county,
to instigate an armed encounter in South-Central L.A. and provide
protection to an anti-immigrant group. Uncomfortable with the
behavior of one ATD infiltrator, the lawsuits allege, the group

disbanded, but members consented to that undercover cop's plea for
one last shooting practice - which turned out to be a setup for the
arrest.
ATD investigative records obtained by the Weekly chronicle the
unit's infiltration by that officer, the LAPD's Doug Stice, into the
Southern California Marksman's Association (SCMA), a group formed by
Yee and others. The records show how the cops portrayed the SCMA as
a racist militia, bent on killing illegal Mexican immigrants and
"hostages," despite the fact that the SCMA was multiracial - Yee and
another plaintiff are Asian; a third member's wife is Mexican.
Stice's report, about what the plaintiffs say was the first meeting
he attended, in January 1996, calls the group the "Orange County
Militia." In subsequent reports, Stice alternates that name with the
"Orange County Corps," an actual organization - but not the one he
was attending. Glenn and Christine Yee and their SCMA associates had
split from the corps in mid-1995, before Stice entered their lives
as "Andrew Nelson." They left because the corps was too "political,"
according to the lawsuit and Weekly interviews. (One of those
arrested, Timothy Swanson, a childhood friend of Glenn Yee, says he
never belonged to the SCMA.)
According to the Orange County Corps' founder, National Rifle
Association activist T.J. Johnston, the organization was intended
for community protection in the event of riots or natural disasters.
Johnston told the Weekly that he and Dave Ralph, an LAPD officer who
later joined the SCMA, met with Congressman Ed Royce to discuss the
organization. One of Stice's reports terms the Orange County Corps'
founding meeting at Cal State Fullerton a "militia callout."
Stice's reports reflect nothing of the SCMA's survivalist focus.
Instead, Stice reports attending "militia training" and drills. In
interviews over the past year, Swanson, the Yees and other
plaintiffs insisted that Stice fabricated, twisted and outright lied
about what went on inside the group. Prosecutors who filed 13 felony
charges against SCMA member and plaintiff Alvin Ung in San
Bernardino County, a case that is only now going to trial, alleged a
plan to kill immigrants, but have introduced no evidence besides
Stice's report.
Use of the word militia, which acquired considerable punch after the
April 1995 bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, probably
helped the ATD persuade the Police Commission and then-Police Chief
Willie Williams to give the required permission to launch and
continue the investigation. In an interview for an earlier story,
then-Police Commission president Raymond Fisher told the Weekly that
he was familiar with the operation and that it was justified.
The dire characterization of the militia threat, in turn, helped
persuade the same police commissioners and the City Council to
decide in 1996 to substantially loosen the guidelines governing the
activities of the ATD. Even so, those guidelines require a
reasonable suspicion that a group be planning criminal activity
before officers may investigate. The lawsuits contend that, when it
came to the SCMA, the ATD had no basis for such an investigation.
After it arrested the men, the ATD said its investigation was the
first under the loosened guidelines and couldn't have been conducted
under the old rules.
The new guidelines continue a requirement that the Police Commission
monitor the ATD. A recently released commission audit of the u

commission staffer Clifford Weiss, who conducted the audit, told the
Weekly that because of the litigation, he was told to put
"information about the militia case in a confidential version of the
audit."
In fact, Weiss said, neither the Police Commission nor the City
Council has yet seen his report on the SCMA investigation. He said
the commission will soon - in closed session, because the report
deals with undercover operations. The commission considered
settlement of the lawsuits during a closed session before Christmas,
then sent its recommendations on to the council.
Weiss said the commission would "not necessarily" pass along his
confidential audit to the City Council. In the past, Weiss said,
"There were courtesy copies [of ATD audits] given to the Public
Safety Committee," but there's no requirement to do so.
The plaintiffs and their attorneys say that Stice lied repeatedly
about the weapons used or owned by members of the group. They also
say the ATD officers swore to these lies in order to obtain search
warrants. Alvin Ung recently petitioned the judge presiding over his
San Bernardino case for access to personnel records to help him
prove that Stice, Sergeant Glynn Martin and officer Michael O'Brien
made "misstatements" in police reports. Ung's motion is set for
hearing on January 29.
In addition, the affidavits for the search warrants served in the
case mischaracterize Stice himself. The officer is identified as a
"reliable confidential informant" who had infiltrated right-wing
groups and helped bring off previous arrests - not as a member of
the LAPD. It's a crucial distinction, say civil rights attorneys.
At court hearings, officials identified Stice as an LAPD officer,
but they repeatedly thwarted defense attorneys' efforts to learn his
identity and get him into a courtroom. At one hearing, when an
attorney cross-examining ATD Sergeant Martin asked about Steich,"
the name officials had given him, Martin said, "I don't know anybody
by that name." After the judge intervened and the defense lawyer
mentioned "prosecutorial misconduct" and "misrepresentations,"
Martin volunteered that it was "a spelling and pronunciation issue,"
then gave the correct spelling.
Doubts about Stice's affiliation resurfaced when attorneys trying to
serve papers on him learned he wasn't listed on the LAPD's personnel
roster. His ties to the department were confirmed only after a
Weekly reporter visited Stice at his suburban home earlier this
month. The next day, an LAPD spokesperson phoned a Weekly editor to
express concern that the paper might reveal the address of "a member
of our department." Stice would not comment on his activities as
Andrew Nelson.
Weiss, of the Police Commission staff, said he couldn't comment on
Stice's ghost status or on the cops' description of him as an
informant. Two sources with direct knowledge of the LAPD's
operations told the Weekly that the department routinely keeps some
of its officers off the books.
In their lawsuits and in interviews, the SCMA plaintiffs also
complained of more prosaic misconduct. In an earlier report, the
Weekly detailed how the prosecution withheld evidence of the
investigation as "not relevant," but trotted it out selectively to
justify stiff charges and sentences. The plaintiffs, their defense
attorneys and other sources with inside knowledge say these
statements - plus judges' unwillingness to second-guess allegations
of terrorism - re

sentences.
When Yee entered his plea, the prosecutor told the judge that the
district attorney had agreed with the police and city attorney to
withhold certain investigative records. Yee and Swanson included
with their pleas statements that they'd withdraw them if they
obtained the evidence they'd been denied. The Weekly has learned
that deputy D.A.s in at least two cases threatened to introduce
additional charges unless the defendants plea-bargained by a certain
date.
When contacted, a spokesperson for the D.A.'s Office claimed not to
know about the lawsuits or their settlement, even though District
Attorney Gil Garcetti and several of his lieutenants were named
defendants.
Yee's defense attorney, Chuck Michel, said the State Court of
Appeals has agreed to hear Yee's appeal of his sentence. After he
pleaded to a negotiated misdemeanor, plaintiff Tim Swanson
complained to the LAPD's Internal Affairs Bureau about the conduct
of the ATD investigation. He said that after he heard nothing from
the bureau, he took his complaint to police Inspector General
Katherine Mader, but was informed that she was not allowed to
investigate the case.

Copyright (c) 2001, L.A. Weekly Media, Inc. All rights reserved.
P.O. Box 4315, Los Angeles, CA 90078-9810

Man, that's scary!!![:eek:] Those police are some Evil Bastards!

Only the Guilty and Cowards plea bargain.

The short version of this article is they were guilty of weapons violations but were not terrorist. The City Council concluded that even if a person is an admitted crook, you cant defame his character by calling him a terrorist.

BTT

PS..
Am I the only one who thinks about this case when I see the pics posted from AR15.com get togathers at burrow canyon & lytle creek?

I wish that they would force those JBT's involved with this case to pay the 1.1 million out of their own pockets. Every time they screw up, the rest of us have to pay for their mistakes.

I brought this case up EARLY last year and again was subjected to ad hominem attacks by several members, including a lapd cop that accused me of conspiracy theories, cop bashing and making up the Anti-Terrorist Division.

Hang your heads in shame.

Lawdawg posted:


I disagree.  

First, I should state that I've only been to court on traffic tickets.  That said, I think most people can be intimidated into taking a Plea Bargain, given the awesome and immense power the State wields against and individual.

Innocence has NOTHING to do with it.  Look at OJ Simpson.  Justice has NOTHING to do with it.  It's all about the money.  I could see taking a Plea Bargain to avoid being destroyed by the State, even if I were 100% innocent.

It's kind of like playing chicken with the truck trying to merge into your lane - it doesn't matter if you are right, playing with a 80,000 pound truck will just make you DEAD RIGHT.

Yeah, and people who don't have large fortunes to spend defending themselves!
And guilty of what, Lawgawg? Possessing a piece of metal that some idiot has declared illegal in KA? Hoo-Boy! That mere possession injured alot of people!
Statist Pigs really sicken me. No wonder there is so little respect for the law.

Go watch a guilty plea at a criminal trial sometime. Those who have never seen it expect somthing like the defendant pleading guilty to a crime he claims he didnt do. But Judges will not allow that!
Judges will not allow you to say "your honor, I didnt do this crime but I would rather plead guilty and get a short stint in jail rather than take my chances at trial." If the judge even thinks that is what you are doing he will reject the plea bargain and set a trial date.

In fact when a defendant pleads guilty the judge questions the defendant about the details of the crime. This is done to ensure the right guy is going to jail and its not some innocent person pleading guilty to avoid a trial. If you dont know the answers the plea gets rejected and a trial date is set.

Thats why I say only the guilty plea bargain.

I hate to pull a Klinton, but I guess it depends on your definition of "guilty".

Scenario 1 - Some guy buys a gun that is illegal, but he doesn't know.  Cops raid the house for whatever reason, he's facing weapons charges.  Is he guilty?  Technically yes.  But with 25,000 gun laws, how was the guy to know?  Can you be 100% CERTAIN nothing you own violates the law?  No.

Yes. Its not only my job, its my hobby. Its also my moral obligation as a law abiding gun owner.

I don't consider "weapons violations" to be a crime morally or ethically.  I wouldn't do it because of practical considerations, but I do not consider those who do to be bad people.

LawDawg - I appreciate what you are trying to say, I try my best to obey the law as well.  But I have called the State Police regarding gun laws and then read the exact opposite on the State Police website.  Who do you believe?

Face it - BATF changes the rules on the fly, so how can you be in compliance all the time?

Secondly, they get to take your weapons and work them over at a machine shop in Quantico for 8 hours.  If they can get them to double once, you just bought the farm for a machine gun.

I can probably make a single shot gun a full auto spending 8 hours in a machine shop.

Some laws are in contradiction of each other.

The AG of Kalifornia tells you that you can legally register your gun.  The next AG tells you that you are now a Felon for said gun.

Have you read all 26,000 (or so) laws that apply to guns?  Or just the ones your department chooses to enforce?

All around good guy and was briefly on NRA board of directors.
I hear he is not very well liked by Orange & Riverside county firefighters though, after one of the students is his class he nearly burned down trabuco canyon with a tracer.  I'm sure the land owner whose property he was shooting on wasnt thrilled either.  

[b]"The ATD is a secretive division directly
descended from the Public Disorder Intelligence Division"[/b]
WTF is this "Secret Police" crap doing here anyway....MAN!, we are so close to becomming a total police state.  Arrests are just going to stop completely, you can find the "guilty" dead in the streets the next morning...


BISHOP

Now how about this sort of 'SS' Police being patterned in every major metropolitan police force in the US.  

Look at the exponential growth of SWAT type tactical teams from inception till now.

Who knows the accurate history of that one tactical team?

I would hazard a guess that SWAT was birthed in LA, glorified in some 70's Cop show along with the Good Cop-Bad Cop routine and then adopted all over.

Like it or not, LA is the paternalistic COP Behaviour breeding ground that soon enough will visit your neck of the woods.

My opinion of course but then again my interaction with city cops has been violent solely from the COP application of pain to the "Guilty until proven innocent" victim/perp.

County Sheriff is who I admire and respect, they live where they work in my locale.

Railgun....[rail]

In the interest of keeping blood pressures down nationwide I have to mention that the LA Weekly
is a free local rag whose readership consists primarily of Amazonian parrots who read it as they put the paper to good use. To call it biased to the left is the understatement of the month. The Weekly is a joke. Anything they say can be taken as 3/4 distortion and 1/4 outright lie. They care nothing for the truth of the matter but only for how it sounds to the other ulta left folks here in LA. Ignore them. We do.

There was actually an earlier article on this subject by the same author:

http://www.laweekly.com/ink/98/31/news-hunter.shtml

Check it out.  Apparently these guys were supposed to have meets at Burro Canyon!!!  It also mentions that PO Doug Stice had email wars with a racist.  

Doesn't this hit close to home!?!??!!?