Armed Militia Takes Over Malheur National Wildlife Refuge HQ

I knew it. "God" told him to do it

Brief History on the Area:

The Harney Basin (were the Hammond ranch is established) was first settled in the 1870’s. In 1908 President Theodor Roosevelt creates an “Indian reservation” around the Malheur, Mud & Harney Lakes despite the absence of Indians. The reservation later turns became the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.

1964 – The Hammond family purchases roughly 6000 acres of property grazing and water rights to the public land area. By 1970 the US Department of Fish and Wildlife Service begins to pressure local ranchers in Harney Basin to sell their property, the Hammonds refused.

1970’s nearly all the ranches adjacent to the Blitzen Valley were purchased by the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and added to the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. Government expand the refuge to cover over 187,000 acres, stretching over 45 miles long and 37 miles wide. Hammond Ranch is now surrounded by the refuge.

FWS and BLM continue to pressure ranchers to sell their property by stating “grazing was detrimental to wildlife.” They start revoking ranch permits, water rights and grazing rights. Fees for grazing and irrigation skyrocket.

Dmt, it's severe but the law states 5 years and to impose less amounts to a judge making up the law. I think the reversal was entirely appropriate. As stated up thread, the merits of mandatory minimums are certainly debatable, but a judge needs to interpret the law correctly, and he/she blew it.

"Did the government tell you to come here and drive us off this reservation? Did the Big Father say, go and kill us all off, so you can have our land? Did he tell you to pull our children's ears off, and put handcuffs on them, and carry a pistol to shoot us with? We want to know how the government came by this land. Is the government mightier than our Spirit-Father, or is he our Spirit-Father? Oh, what have we done that he is to take all from us that he has given us? His white children have come and taken all our mountains, and all our valleys, and all our rivers; and now, because he has given us this little place without our asking him for it, he sends you here to tell us to go away. Do you see that high mountain away off there? There is nothing but rocks there. Is that where the Big Father wants me to go? If you scattered your seed and it should fall there, it would not grow, for it is all rocks there."

4-years in the pen for starting a controlled burn, with the sentence lengthened by some federal judge, after they'd already served their original sentence?

That does seem like bullshit to me. This does seem a case of justice-amok.

Seizing federal property isn't right. But at least as I understand it, the ranchers themselves have been railroaded.

Do you know why they were sentenced under that act?

The AEDPA had a tremendous impact on the law of habeas corpus in the United States. One provision of the AEDPA limits the power of federal judges to grant relief[3] unless the state court's adjudication of the claim resulted in a decision that was

contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States; or
based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the state court proceeding.

I don't know if its for similar reasons as the Defense Authorization Act but I know in those instances if you're suspected of terrorism all rights are suspended. Suspected not convicted. No attorney, no trial, no bond not even a phone call.

So the fact that a cowboy is convicted of terrorism for burning a pasture ought to terrify everyone. It does me at least.

Cool. I don't pretend to know the facts. I'm not going to assume I do. So I won't take your or Norton's or anyone else's words as fact, either. :D

But I still sympathize with those ranchers and think that sentence is excessive.

Oh come on. They had attorneys, they had phone calls, they even had appellate review. Your suggestions otherwise amount to pure speculative tin foil hat nonsense.

I'm not lining up. I'm not rooting for my team. I just don't like the vilification of the ranchers though. That whole 'they took Federal dole' angle is what prompted me to post... so f*#king what they took dole???