He moved to Las Vegas and, at the age of 25, became an officer in the metro police. Kinch came to serve in elite detective units over 23 years in the force, hunting fugitives and helping take down gangs like the Playboy Bloods. Eventually he was assigned to what he called the “Black squad,” according to court records, tasked with investigating violent crimes where the suspect was African American. (A Las Vegas police spokesperson told me they stopped “dividing squads by a suspect’s race” a year before Kinch retired.)

“The Sheriff has become a personal friend who hosted my FBI interview,” Coates responded. “He opens a lot of doors.” Coates had been in D.C. on Jan. 6, he’d told Williams. It’d make sense if that had piqued the FBI’s interest.

To Williams, it hinted at a more menacing scenario — at secret ties between those who threaten the rule of the law and those duty-bound to enforce it. He desperately wanted more details, more context, the sheriff’s name. But he didn’t want to push for too much too fast.

  • pelespiritOPM
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    2 days ago

    Every paragraph has something else insane.

    Early in the meeting, Kinch laid out his vision for the Oath Keepers’ role in American life. “We have a two-edged sword,” he said. The “dull edge” was more traditional grassroots work, exemplified by efforts to combat alleged election fraud. He hoped to build their political apparatus so that in five or 10 years, conservative candidates would be seeking the Oath Keepers’ endorsement.

    Then there was the sharp edge: paramilitary training. “You hone all these skills because when the dull edge fails, you’ve got to be able to turn that around and be sharp.” The room smelled like donuts, one of the men had remarked.

    • otter@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      2 days ago

      This Kinch sounds like a MAGAt brand pajama ninja trying to speechify that running with your arms flung back is faster. 😶🤦🏼‍♂️

      • pelespiritOPM
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        2 days ago

        Yes, that’s true. Except he was a cop in Las Vegas and the police department’s response about the “black squad.”

        (A Las Vegas police spokesperson told me they stopped “dividing squads by a suspect’s race” a year before Kinch retired.)

        And this:

        Then he grew quiet as he recounted the night he decided to retire.

        He’d woken up in an oleander bush with no memory of how he’d gotten there. His hands were covered in blood. He was holding a gun. “I had to literally take my magazine out and count my bullets, make sure I didn’t fucking kill somebody,” he said. “I black out when I get angry. And I don’t remember what the fuck I did.”

    • Jiggle_Physics
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      2 days ago

      yeah, it reads like a lot of the various other people who have infiltrated such groups throughout history.

  • Rivalarrival@lemmy.today
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    2 days ago

    It kinda irks me that the term “militia” has been co-opted to refer to these nutjobs.

    The constitutional term most consistent with their stated purposes is not “militia” but “insurrection”.

    The actual militia is “everyone”.

    • DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social
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      2 days ago

      Yeah the idea of the “citizen soldier” that actually protects the society from tyranny only works when it means every citizen is a soldier and willing to enact violence in defense of that liberty, not just our most crazy and ignorant.