Ruby Ridge: Setting the Stage

"A federal agent has been shot and killed in a confrontation with a fugitive in North Idaho while trying to arrest Randy Weaver. Weaver, a fugitive on a federal firearms charge has been holed up in a cabin near Naples for more than a year."

- Narrator

"Ruby Ridge: Setting the Stage" is the first episode of Revelations of Waco. It aired on January 24, 2018 alongside "Visions and Omens".

Overview
Take a closer look into Ruby Ridge and how it set the stage months before Waco.

Recap
Gary Noesner: Through the mid-80s and all the way well into the 90s, we faced a variety of challenging issues with survivalists, anti-government extremists, so there were quite a few investigations around the country trying to deal with with this growing anti-government movement.

John Risenhoover: But in Idaho at the time, there were a lot of white supremacist groups that were retreating into the hills back there.

Gary Noesner: Ruby Ridge began with an investigation by the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms agency and they were investigating some right-wing militias out in the northwest part of our country and they identified Randy Weaver as someone that had some association with the Aryan Brotherhood. In an effort to try to turn him as an informant, they set up an operation where he was paid by an undercover informant to modify a weapon making it illegal.

John Risenhoover: And they were successful in an operation. They were actually able to get Randy Weaver to provide them with a sawed-off shotgun and then after they did the deal, they did a takedown with them with no issues.

Gary Noesner: Ultimately, Weaver decided not to cooperate, didn't show up at court hearings, and so United States Marshals now begin to surveil the mountaintop where Weaver lived with his family to try to find a way that they could arrest him.

John Risenhoover: And that's whenever when everything went to hell.

Gene Glenn: taking every step we possibly can, through the use of the phone effect a surrender.

John Risenhoover: They bumped into Weaver's dog and his son and a shootout occurred which ended up with resulting in the death of a US Marshal and the death of Randy Weaver's very young son.

Gary Noesner: The FBI comes in when there's been an assault or murder against a federal agent so now the FBI responded and brought its resources to try to bring about a surrender and a peaceful conclusion. The FBI deployed the hostage rescue team, and the belief was that there was perhaps a running gun battle ongoing, which there was not.

Herbert Kohl: At the very least, Mr. Potts, the rules of engagement seemed to have given the sniper some wiggle room to go beyond normal rules or to justify that second shot...

Larry A. Potts: Never ever ever would I prove knowingly ever approve a rule that said they walk outside you can shoot them.

Gary Noesner: As they changed it, were if they saw anybody with a firearm, any adult with a firearm, they could engage them, and the HRT was allowed to do that, and it was something that's normally not in DOJ policy.

John Risenhoover: It just fed into this large conspiracy... you know the black helicopters back then were a big thing, and so the same thing we're seeing a lot of today with the dark web and deep state, I think is the term they're using, that same militia movement was forming off these things thinking the government is out of control and they're coming to get you, because there's people who use that for their own advantage at that point.

John Risenhoover: Randy Weaver was able to successfully sue the government, which is sort of rare that anybody sues the government, because the federal government is very difficult to sue. You have to have pretty clear cutting evidence of wrongdoing. (Each of her surviving children will receive a million dollars from the government and Randy Weaver is to receive $100,000.)

Gary Noesner: For most Americans Ruby Ridge didn't even register, until the Waco incident six months later, where these two incidents began to be viewed in in tandem as manifestations of perhaps an imbalance in the historic way that the FBI used to more effectively manage incidents. The time of Waco in February of 1993, the the ATF was under attack as it were... there were those in Congress who wanted to in essence eliminate the agency and defund it and there were you know some an ATF that wanted to have a high-profile operation that would showcase the good work that they were doing and showed the value that they brought. So, I think that was part of the motivation to mount this large-scale operation that would receive a great deal of publicity and that became sort of a snowball rolling down the hill.

Quotes

 * Narrator: A criminal investigation is now exploring if high ranking FBI officials covered up and destroyed documents about the deadly force orders for snipers on Ruby Ridge. In an affidavit obtained by NBC News, Potts admits he approved the rules of engagement, that any adult with a weapon whose observed in the vicinity of the Weaver cabin could be the subject of deadly force. According to agents on the scene, this was later changed to could and should.


 * Man: It's totally ridiculous it's a total show of force designed to control people in their minds.


 * Narrator: Randy Weaver has told friends all he wants is to be left alone, but with the sudden appearance of military hardware like this, his one-man stand against the law is suddenly taking on the appearance of a full-blown war.


 * Man: What this is is force to try to scare the average American so he won't open his mouth against a new world order. That's all this is.


 * Man: Police officers like everybody else can't kill simply because they have a badge on.


 * Man: You lose your son and your wife and that's a... it's... I don't know how anything could be more traumatic.