Original subtitles

- Suddenly, you went from this cattle issue

to you have somebody in overpass with a scoped,

high-powered rifle pointing it at a federal agent.

They think the federal government doesn't have

the right to own land.

- They just beat the U.S. government.

- We're not going to fall into the same trap

that happened in Bunkerville.

- The Hammonds were convicted of lighting

a fire that spread to federal land

in protest over cattle grazing rights.

- The Hammonds were supposed to report to prison.

The Bundys, they were going to go protect them.

- We need you to bring your arms

and we need you to come to the Malheur

National Wildlife Refuge.

- We didn't exactly know who all is there,

how many are there, who do they represent?

- FBI, you can bring your freaking guns

and put a freaking bullet right here.

Put a bullet right here.

I'll take that first bullet, you disgusting, filthy--

- The folks at the refuge said if we can kidnap an FBI agent,

we can end this on our terms.

- They put armed men in a 100-foot

fire tower with sniper rifles.

They took fire practice, practiced with their firearms.

- Who's going to show up?

And do tensions boil over into one bad moment?

- All you military that's been fighting

for your country overseas,

you can fight for your country right here in America.

Get here! Get some!

- Block that front. Guard the front.

- In the FBI, we make a lot of headlines.

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Drug busts,

mob stings,

terrorist takedowns.

- Get down! Get down!

- We understand why people want to tell stories about us.

- Mark it.

- Freeze! - FBI.

- FBI! - Action!

- But they don't know the half of it.

What really goes down,

we save that for each other

when we're talking agent-to-agent.

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This is "FBI True."

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- Saturday morning, good college football weekend.

I was done with my coffee and everything.

I was ready to start watching football because out there,

it starts at 9:00 a.m.

The ASAC calls me and gives me a brief rundown.

Says the people that were in Burns, some of them

went to take over a federal refuge.

So go ahead and pack your bag and start heading that way.

Three hours later, I'm pulling into Bend.

- But while this is going on, while we're

mustering our resources, the Bundys are doing the same.

We have determined who the leadership is.

That is Ammon Bundy, Ryan Bundy,

Ryan Payne, and LaVoy Finicum.

- We need you to bring your arms

and we need you to come to the Malheur

National Wildlife Refuge.

- If you wait for legal means, you will wait forever.

- They're not allowed to own on the land that it's on.

They're not allowed to have those buildings there.

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That administrative agency shouldn't even exist.

They're unconstitutional.

- I think that you're sitting on seeing

the cusp of a major, a major dynamic shift in this country.

That's why you're seeing the uptick in the saber-rattling

from the feds, because they do not want to let go of this.

They do not intend on losing here.

And we do not intend giving it back to them.

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- They set up at the refuge with the intent

of holding it and expecting that at some time,

someone may try to dislodge them from there.

- And they are looking at a moment,

for a lot of these groups, where they can say,

this is the federal government we're fighting.

I mean, they're looking, they're spoiling for that.

- We didn't exactly know who all is there,

how many are there, who do they represent?

How many are ardent Bundy supporters?

How many are there for their own personal cause?

We're doing the best we can to generate this intelligence.

Our three goals were, one, resolve the standoff

peacefully, return it to the control

of the federal government, and to hold those accountable

who had taken these actions.

All of those were informed by what happened before,

but we had to hold those people accountable

because we couldn't have them walking around saying,

nobody touched me.

- Again-- - We did this and yeah.

- Yeah.

- When that social media call goes out

to the various militias,

you have five major militias show up.

And they formed a group called the Pacific

Patriot Network, PPN.

- And these aren't just, you know,

five and six guys that go out and shoot guns on the weekends.

- Mm-hmm. - Right?

These are organized. They have regular trainings.

They're paramilitary.

- I don't know any other way to describe what happened

to the Hammond family other than I

don't understand what country we live in

when it comes to that.

- They were playing soldier.

That's why when you see them walking around town, again,

with their bulletproof vests, their long arms,

their sidearms, their extra magazines,

that is intended to intimidate--

- Absolutely. - --and to coerce

and to influence.

- This is what U.S. military generally

are going to be trained in some type of format

with this type of weapon.

- I remember one of my first mornings,

at the Best Western in Burns, going down to breakfast.

Half the hotel was militia and half the hotel

was FBI or Oregon State Police,

all descending upon the breakfast room.

And it was surreal because you would walk down the hallways

and you'd see somebody and they may be all Carhartted up,

long beard, and, you know, both giving each other

the north-south, kind of figuring

out which side you were on.

- They would follow us.

You would leave the command post, head back to the hotel,

and a car would follow you.

There were so many guns in town that the bosses put out

the edict that nobody that is not carrying a weapon

can be out by themselves.

So they have to be escorted by agents.

- Burns became sort of a civil war, a hearts-and-minds

campaign for that populace.

- And it divided a number of families.

- As it still does.

- Yeah. - Yeah, and it still does.

- One evening we're at the gym, the high school gym,

in walks Ammon Bundy.

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His bodyguard.

Several other members.

And they went to the four corners of the gym.

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And they, of course, left a group outside

of armed escorts as well.

And it's a whole community meeting,

and it's, again, the community there are telling the Bundys

and militia members, go home.

You know, we don't want you here anymore.

- People are happy you've raised issues,

but they say it's time for you to leave,

what do you say to that?

- Well, I just barely met with three

ranchers that asked me not to.

And-- and that seems to be, at least

flowing through these doors, has been the message.

- We often would get comments, why don't you arrest them here?

People would be pointing, arrest them now.

Well, this tension would rise almost daily when we'd

see Ammon Bundy in one part of town,

or we'd his brother, Ryan, somewhere else.

And we knew we could arrest them.

But if we did that and left a-- you know, a core of leadership

back on the refuge, that would just

be an escalation point again.

We went through that calculus regularly.

- Daily.

If this, then this. - Right.

- If we do this, does it raise or lower

the temperature on the refuge?

- You take him now, he's got his

rallying cry for those left back at the refuge.

- Exactly. - So we didn't.

- So what are some of the fears we're

dealing with at this point?

- When they first got there, we knew

they put armed men in a 100-foot

fire tower with sniper rifles.

You can take a shot from anywhere in a 360-degree

circle and be effective.

They put heavy equipment on one road coming in and out.

On the back side, they put highway barriers

in a sawtooth formation to give them the opportunity to shoot

in multiple directions.

They had armed patrols that were

going around the perimeter.

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They took fire practice and practiced with their firearms.

They were set up in a defensive perimeter,

in a defensive situation in order to, in their words,

repel any attack that might come.

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- We don't know who's up on those towers,

but we knew their capabilities.

We knew that weapons they had.

We knew that standoff ranges.

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One thing, too, that we heard often out there,

you would hear the phrase, "No free Wacos,"

meaning that they saw that events at Waco had transpired

and the horrific loss of life, but this time around,

they were going to exact as good as they got.

And so it was very much of a warning

of what they intended to do to the federal government

and the FBI.

As the days went on, we wanted to wait them out

with no loss of life, but you realize the more and more

folks, especially from the other side, that could come in,

wild cards. - Right.

- And something-- the longer we went on in trying

to wait them out, it also introduced who's going

to show up and do tensions boil over into one bad moment?

And then you've got something entirely different.

- And it was a very deliberate decision on our part

to use Sheriff Ward

as the intermediary with the militia,

understanding them as we do,

where they recognize the sheriff

is the only recognized law enforcement officer.

Every time he went out to meet with the Bundys,

he would deliver the message.

And it's coming from someone that they

proclaim all the time as the recognized

law enforcement officer.

- And it would send that powerful message

that this isn't Bundy versus the federal government.

This is Bundy against the people of Burns,

against elected law enforcement, the sheriffs,

state and local law enforcement throughout the state.

- And they knew we were doing this, and it was bugging them.

And they were regularly making requests through negotiators

and others to speak with me, to speak with Eric,

to speak with someone in charge.

Well, we refused those requests.

We knew they were looking for a federal presence

to push up against.

- FBI, you can bring your freaking guns

and put a freaking bullet right here.

Put a bullet right here.

I'll take that first bullet, you disgusting,

filthy, freaking-- oh!

- And that was something we weren't going to give.

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- So they took the refuge over.

They had guards set up.

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They had a sniper in the tower.

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They had roadblocks set up.

But they were also encouraging people

from Burns to come visit them.

Come see.

And bring me food, you know?

Yeah.

- There was some kind of like-- - Oh, they--

- They were eating like kings.

- Barbecued pork, man.

And chicken enchiladas.

- Yes!

- They were sending out requests for food and underwear

and you name it.

- So the building out there is not-- it's not a shed.

- No. - They have living quarters.

They have washers and dryers, showers, full kitchens.

- These buildings are very symbolic.

They're a bunch of rock buildings

35 miles away from nowhere, but they're symbolic.

We're holding this.

It's been the federal government's fortress,

their-- their castle.

And we're holding it.

We shall not give it up to them, ever.

- And, you know, the governor is telling me,

we've got to do something.

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The town's nerves are fraying.

- They're not from here.

We don't want them here. We want them to go home.

all: Go home! Go home!

- Militia, go home!

- There's no end in sight to this occupation.

- How long will you stay?

- As long as it's necessary.

- This contest is just beginning.

But we will not stop.

We will not back down.

- We've got to do something.

Time was running out.

- All you military that's been fighting for your country

overseas, you can fight for your country

right here in America.

Get here, get some!

- The folks at the refuge said if we can kidnap an FBI agent,

we can end this on our terms.

- # What are you going to do when the militia #

# Comes after you, FBI? #

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- You can feel the pressure building on both sides.

We're still getting intelligence

from inside the refuge.

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- Pressure was building.

There's an action imperative.

We even start feeling like, we've got to do something.

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- Here we have this video of an interview with Finicum.

- Better dead than in a cell.

- Absolutely.

Dude, would you like to be in the cell?

Nobody wants to live their--

live their life in a cell.

Absolutely I'm not going to live my life in a cell.

- Yeah.

I remember when the--

the team in the command post that was watching social media,

the news, et cetera, brought that to our attention.

And it's a bit chilling, right?

- Absolutely.

- It makes you understand the kind of people

we are dealing with and their ideology

and their motivation.

- Through our negotiations, picked up information

that the leadership was going to head to a nearby town,

a different county, and a county run

by a constitutional sheriff that was

sympathetic to their cause.

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So our fear was that they-- he would allow them to take

over another federal property in his county,

thus dividing us.

We set out on a mission of negotiations

to determine when and who's going to be in the car.

And there's only one way to get there.

You've got to go through a mountain pass.

- Ammon Bundy, Ryan Bundy, Ryan Payne, and LaVoy Finicum

all were going to travel to this meeting in John Day.

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And we knew when they were going to leave,

we knew that cars they were going to drive,

and we knew the time that the rally was scheduled.

And with that information, we came up with an operations plan

that would allow us to effect an arrest

of the entire leadership of the occupation in one fell swoop.

We had a team of OSP, the Oregon State Police,

and HRT operators that had specifically

selected the location where this would happen.

And it was in an area in the mountain pass

where there was no cell coverage.

Because you got to remember, these guys

are heading to John Day to meet with sympathetic people.

There's a whole group of sympathetic people

back in Burns.

So we don't want them calling for help

and having both sides of the road

filled with militia members coming to their support.

- And now it's on.

- And now it's on.

I can remember standing in the command post

as we're watching these cars live

drive down the road.

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And when the car that Ammon Bundy was in

passed the spot where OSP and FBI HRT had staged--

--you can see them pulling out,

and we were able to arrest Ammon Bundy

and the occupants of his car without incident.

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As the second team approached a car that was driven by LaVoy

Finicum, a standoff occurred.

- Who are you? - Who are you?

Who are you?

- And then he engages in a drawn-out conversation with

the officers and agents, basically saying, "You're going

"to have to shoot me.

I'm going to John Day."

- You shoot me.

I'm going to meet the sheriff.

The sheriff is waiting for us.

So you do as you damn well please,

but I'm not going anywhere.

Here I am right there, right there, put a bullet through it.

You understand?

I'm going to go meet the sheriff.

You back down or you kill me now.

- There was a video in the vehicle

that LaVoy Finicum was driving,

so we know exactly what he was saying

at the exact time that our officers

were engaging with him.

They're giving him lawful orders to get out of the car,

to show his hands, and he says, "Nope, I'm not going.

You can go to John Day with me, but I'm not getting out."

- It's going to get real.

You want my blood on your hands?

Get it done because we got people to see and places to go.

- And they did it because there's no service here.

- No, they got it--

- --there's no service here at all.

- We should never have stopped.

We should never have stopped.

- I'm going to keep going.

- Then we're going to have to duck.

- OK. - If we take off--

- And we can get right in back.

- --shoot your tires out?

- Most likely.

- OK, are you ready?

- Well, where's those-- where's the guns?

- They got us stopped.

We can't get around him.

I'm going to go.

You guys ready? - OK. Get down.

- Then you duck down.

Give me that camera.

OK, give me this camera.

Go.

- And I can remember the pit in my stomach

when after about four minutes,

I see the white truck that Finicum's driving dash off.

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- Keep going.

- What about Ammon and those guys?

- We can't get around him.

I'm going to go get help.

- And now you know the chase is on.

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We had set up a roadblock ahead.

The intent was to put spikes on the road

to disable the vehicle, but it happened so fast.

You could just see the white truck

winding through the mountain roads on this video.

And as all of a sudden, the roadblock

comes into view of the camera,

and he's still speeding, high speed toward him.

- Coming up fast.

- Yeah, they are.

- At the last second, you can see him swerve off to the left,

and there is an HRT operator swerving around him,

you know, to try to get out of the way of the speeding car.

And LaVoy Finicum's truck hits a snow bank

at a high rate of speed.

And it looks like, from what we could see,

that he's just plowed right over it.

- Hang on!

- OK, they're shooting.

- Hang on!

- OK, we're here.

- Well, I thought for sure that we had

an agent underneath that car.

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That car came to a hard stop.

In fact, so much so that the camera goes way back and has

to come back again because the car came

to such a dramatic stop.

I see the driver of the car get out.

- Go ahead and shoot me.

Go ahead and shoot me.

- And start waving his hands.

You can see him reach for a weapon.

- Stay down, stay down, stay down.

- The third time you see a reach,

then you just see him fall over.

- Damn it. Are they shooting him?

Did they shoot him?

You assholes.

Keep your head down.

Stay down.

- Did they kill him?

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- Nobody wants to see a loss of life, but in that instance,

he controlled his destiny.

- Yep, he had a choice to make, and he made his choice.

- Did they kill him?

- I think they did, and they're shooting

over here on this door.

- What's even more disturbing is once LaVoy Finicum made

his decision to not give up,

there's still more people in that car.

- OK.

- And over a period of time, we have

to get them out and ensure we get them safely

and appropriately arrested.

We later found out the officer

we thought had been hit by the white truck was unharmed.

As soon as we affected the arrests, that the negotiators

contacted every telephone number

we had, and I don't know how many

hundred calls you guys made.

- Yeah.

Well over 100 calls in the next couple of hours.

- To anybody that we knew was on the refuge to leave now.

I want to make it very clear, that we'll continue to enforce

federal law here in Harney County,

and anybody who travels to Oregon with the intent

of breaking the law will be held accountable

and will be arrested.

Illegal acts such as occupying federal property

in a violent manner, armed, to deprive employees' or citizens'

access to those facilities will not be tolerated

in the United States.

I've often been asked afterwards,

when we went through this entire 40-plus-day ordeal,

were you successful?

Do you think the way that the refuge occupation was handled

was a success for the FBI?

And I'd have to say yes.

I would say that, did we resolve it peacefully?

We did the best that we could.

We took every effort to resolve this

in a peaceful, bloodless way.

Unfortunately, the bad guys get a choice, too.

- Exactly.

- I wish Mr. Finicum hadn't made the decisions he did.

Go ahead and shoot me.

- But he's solely responsible for what happened.

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- And the fact that that was the only death in a situation

that was very tense, no shortage of guns,

no shortage of very strong feelings, was a success.

- It was the first major drawn-out negotiation

barricade with social media.

We learned a lot from that.

And we've been teaching those techniques to state and local

police officers since then.

- But I still believe that Ammon

and Ryan and those at trial with him were held accountable.

They will forever be associated with the occupation at Malheur.

They will always be known as those who actions led

to the death of their friend.

That could have been avoided had they not done these things.

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