Guilty Verdict In Plot To Copy Oklahoma City Bombing

The Associated Press reports:

A 24-year-old man is guilty of trying to detonate what he believed was an explosives-laden van outside an Oklahoma City bank, a federal jury ruled Monday. Jurors convicted Jerry Drake Varnell, of Sayre, of attempting to use an explosive device to damage a building and attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction. Prosecutors alleged that Varnell planned to detonate what he thought was a half-ton (450-kilogram) vehicle bomb on Aug. 12, 2017.

During a 2017 meeting with undercover FBI agents, Varnell said he held “III% ideology” and wanted “to start the next revolution,” a reference to the “Three Percenters” patriot movement — begun in 2008, galvanized by President Barack Obama’s election — that has rallied against gun control efforts and pledges resistance to the federal government over the infringement of constitutional rights.

Heavy.com reports:

On Varnell’s Facebook page he shared a Project Veritas YouTube video that was titled, “Rigging the Election – Video I: Clinton Campaign and DNC Incite Violence at Trump Rallies.” He was part of an open group for an Oklahoma militia on Facebook.

His likes page is filled with likes of musicians and movies; he’d also liked an anti-corporate page called The Other 98 Percent. Another of his likes is for a page called “P*ssed Off White Americans.”

The about me section of that page reads, “We are the sons and daughters of European Heritage, and we are tired of being treated as second class citizens. LOUD, PROUD, and very PISSED OFF!” He also liked the sites “Right Wing News” and “Stop Pulling the Race Card” as well as sites on the Illuminati and militias.

Varnell’s family has claimed that he is a schizophrenic and has been institutionalized several times.