16 April, 2006

Demetrius ‘Van’ Crocker Convicted

Posted by alex in crime, white nationalism at 10:01 am | Permanent Link

[Anybody ever hear of this guy?]

Feds say farmer was area’s ‘McVeigh’

By Lawrence Buser
April 15, 2006

Federal prosecutors on Friday credited state and federal investigators for foiling a plan by a McKenzie, Tenn., farmer to blow up government buildings and kill scores of people with nerve gas.Demetrius ‘Van’ Crocker, a 40-year-old divorced father of two, was convicted late Thursday of illegally trying to obtain dangerous chemicals and explosives. He faces up to life in prison when sentenced July 13 in Jackson.

“He was Timothy McVeigh, live in West Tennessee and every bit as scary,” said U.S. Atty. David Kustoff, referring to the man executed for blowing up the Oklahoma City federal building in 1995 and killing 168 people. “Because of the work of these agents from the FBI and TBI, however, there was a much different result.”According to witnesses in his four-day trial, Crocker was a white supremacist with anti-Semitic and racist views, who intensely disliked law enforcement and who was angry at the government.

“He wanted to go to Washington and detonate a dirty bomb while Congress was in session,” said prosecutor Fred Godwin.

“He more or less said Timothy McVeigh did it right.”

Crocker did not testify, but public defender Randy Alden argued entrapment and said federal authorities took the initial tip and created a scenario that was blown out of proportion.

Alden told the jury Crocker is a simple man with below-average intelligence who was “a go-along, get-along guy.”

Crocker was arrested on Oct. 25, 2004, in a Jackson, Tenn., motel as undercover agents delivered what he thought was deadly Sarin nerve gas and C4 plastic explosives. They said a search of his house that day turned up components for an improvised explosive device.

The undercover investigation, which included secretly recorded audio and video, began in April 2004, when a confidential informant told authorities Crocker had strong anti-government views and was trying to obtain radioactive materials to make a dirty bomb.

The informant agreed to introduce an undercover FBI agent to Crocker, who then told the agent he knew how to make explosive nitroglycerin and chlorine gas, but wanted other chemical weapons and explosives to make a dirty bomb.

The undercover agent portrayed himself as a sympathetic white supremacist who had access to nerve gas and explosives through his employment at the Pine Bluff Arsenal in Arkansas. Crocker paid the agent $500, which supposedly was needed to bribe a guard to get the materials out of the arsenal.

At the time of the arrest, agents gave Crocker an actual Sarin nerve gas cannister, though it was filled with water, and a block of C4 explosives that contained only a small amount of real explosives.

http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/midsouth_news/article/0%2C1426%2CMCA_1497_4623451%2C00.html

White supremacist found guilty on all counts


JACKSON, Tenn. – A federal jury deliberated a little more than an hour Thursday before convicting a white supremacist of acquiring Sarin nerve gas and C-4 explosives that he planned to use to destroy government buildings.Demetrius Van Crocker, a farmhand from the small town of McKenzie, near Jackson, was arrested in 2004 after an FBI undercover agent posing as an employee at the Pine Bluff Arsenal in Arkansas delivered a water-filled Sarin canister and a small quantity of explosives.

U.S. District Judge James D. Todd set a sentencing date of July 13. Crocker, a 40-year-old divorced father of two children, faces up to life in prison. He was convicted on five related counts.

“There is no doubt he had what he needed to cause all sorts of destruction in the United States,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Fred Godwin said in closing arguments.

The jury of eight women and four men, including two black people, listened to several hours of secretly recorded tapes of Crocker using racial slurs and profanity and making terroristic threats against the government.

Crocker did not testify during the four-day trial. Crocker’s attorney, Randy Alden, argued that Crocker was prone to exaggeration, had an IQ of 85, and was a victim of entrapment.

In the tapes, however, Crocker appeared to be obsessed with poisonous chemicals and showed an above-average knowledge of basic chemistry, which he said he acquired while working in an electroplating factory.

“I ain’t gonna quit trying,” he said of his desire to acquire a dirty bomb. “I want one so bad I can’t stand it.”

When he talked about casualties, Crocker said they “can’t be helped.” In a separate conversation with an informant, he said, “Let God sort ’em out.”

On the tapes, undercover agent Steve Burroughs posed as a white racist working as a contract employee at the weapons arsenal, where thousands of tons of military chemical weapons dating to World War I are stockpiled for disposal.

Crocker gave Burroughs $500 to supposedly pay off a guard at the arsenal. When Burroughs pressed Crocker about when he planned to take action, Crocker said, “I’d like to wait two or three years down the road.” But when Burroughs gave him opportunities to back out, Crocker said, “I don’t want fun and games. Got plenty of that.”


  • One Response to “Demetrius ‘Van’ Crocker Convicted”

    1. Arch Says:

      Anyone who might be entertaining this load of grubin’ment crap as something akin to the truth needs to go get a copy of Terrie Gilliam’s 1986 classic movie “Brazil”. Mr. Gilliam was incredibly prescient in this cinematic prognostication of how grubin’ment would use terrorism to justify the oppression, torture and murder citizens who do not conform to official grubin’ment policy.