The Washington Post has details about an FBI arrest of an Oklahoma man who tried to unleash a massive terror attack in Oklahoma City:
The FBI has arrested an Oklahoma man on charges that he tried to detonate what he thought was a 1,000-pound bomb outside a bank, acting out of a hatred for the U.S. government and an admiration for Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, according to court papers.
Jerry Drake Varnell was arrested shortly after a Friday night attempt to detonate a fake bomb packed into what he believed was a stolen cargo van outside the bank in Oklahoma City, according to a criminal complaint filed in federal court.
The FBI obviously had been investigating Varnell, infiltrating his world. The van was packed with dummy explosives.
Jerry Drake Varnell is a Timothy McVeigh admirer, who on April 19, 1995, killed 168 people, including 19 children, and injured 800 others at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
Varnell is also reportedly a fan of the Three Percenter militia:
In one conversation he said he believed in the “Three Percenter” ideology — a form of anti-government activism that pledges resistance against the United States government on the belief it has infringed on the Constitution, according to court papers. Those who subscribe to the ideology incorrectly believe that only 3 percent of the colonial population participated in the American Revolution, and they see themselves as their heirs.
JJ MacNab, an expert in domestic extremism, has more info on the suspect and his target—the Federal Reserve Bank building in Oklahoma City.
McNab has details of the government’s case against Varnell. He was “out for blood” and prepping for all-out war by supplying a bunker on his family farm.
Stay tuned for more information as it becomes available.