Cliven Bundy made his first court appearance and requested a public defender.
I'm not going to snark on that point. It's quite possible that Bundy might not have the ready cash necessary to hire a lawyer. Criminal defense lawyers, at least in my limited experience, want to be paid what they think it will cost to handle the case, up front. That's because the type of folks who need such lawyers generally aren't good credit risks to start with and they're really not inclined to pay up if they go to prison.
But it sort of boggles my mind that he was dumb enough to take a commercial flight. This guy and his kids and the rest of the Y'all Qaeda morons had been going around armed and spouting off all sorts of anti-government, sovereign-citizen rhetoric. They had pointed guns at Federal cops-- that's assaulting a Federal cop with a firearms enhancement, which is good for a consecutive sentence. It should have been reasonably clear that the Feds had had enough of that bullshit and were starting to arrest the usual suspects, of which Suspect #1 was Bundy Senior.
So he gets on a commercial airliner which, like visiting a Federal courthouse or a prison, means walking through weapons detectors. When he bought the ticket and his name went into the DHS computers as a future air passenger, it was like the Feds were being given a gift. The best time to grab up somebody is when they get off the airplane, for (a) they've already been searched and disarmed, and (b) so has everyone around them. (If they had tried to arrest him at the point of departure when he went through screening, some other clown might have been on the other side of the checkpoint.)
The Bundys are in jail. With their track record of disregarding court orders and waving guns around, it's a long shot that they'd be granted bail.
Whatever, their attorneys are probably going to tell them to say nothing, write nothing and sign nothing. Given the amount of mouth-running that they have engaged in to date, I'd hazard that advice won't be followed and that they'll all yak themselves into a long stay at a Federal prison.
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I guess he will be getting free room and board, and free legal advice for a while. Added benefit to society -- once he is convicted of a felony, the government will take away all his guns along with his freedom!
"Given the amount of mouth-running that they have engaged in to date, I'd hazard that advice won't be followed and that they'll all yak themselves into a long stay at a Federal prison."
With any luck.
The Gov't can also go for restitution for the costs of the Bundy Games, and non-payment opens up the door to a judgement and asset seizure...a farm and some cows coming immediately to mind.
I'd assume that they'll start with the million-plus he owes in grazing fees and fines.
It amazes me how few people understand that Bundy is arguing that he shouldn't have to pay to use government resources.
I seriously doubt Bundy can lay his hands on the six figure sum of money needed to hire a private defense lawyer on Federal charges. Maybe last week he could have, but this week my guess is that all his assets are now under lien to pay off his fines on the grazing, i.e., if his wife tries to sell any of them to raise money to hire a lawyer, the money goes to the Feds, not to him.
So he's just going to have to depend on a Federally appointed attorney. I'm sure he will be quite eager to accept that bit of Federal largesse from the same government he's been decrying for the past few years.
As for lessons learned, I think the primary lesson learned is that ignoring these dipwads doesn't work, and assaulting them doesn't work. That leaves either putting them under siege, or picking them off one by one, a combination of which was used to successfully end this particular incident.
BadTux, since two of his sons are also occupying the same jail, he'd have to come up with the cash for two or three lawyers. When this all shakes out, the kids are going to have charges from both incidents.
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