Peter Santilli, a defendant in the Cliven Bundy standoff trial, asked a federal court Tuesday to order prosecutors to provide the identity of an undercover FBI agent.
Bundy-BLM
Defendant Peter Santilli wants to be tried with others in February, rather than wait for a second trial.
A judge has set a trio of trials for 17 men accused of conspiring together in an armed standoff against federal agents near Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy’s property in April 2014.
The two brothers, who are among 17 defendants in the case, are the sons of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, the central figure in the standoff that unfolded in April 2014 between Bundy’s supporters and federal agents who had rounded up his cows from public lands.
Nevada’s chief federal judge has upheld a protective order that keeps key evidence under wraps in the Bunkerville standoff case involving the Bundy family.
Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy is opposing a proposal from federal prosecutors to split the 17 remaining defendants charged in the Bunkerville standoff case into three separate trials.
In a letter Thursday, U.S. Sen. Dean Heller called on the president to “abandon any plans to unilaterally designate” new national monuments in the Gold Butte area of northeastern Clark County and in the Owyhee Canyonlands of southeastern Oregon, near the Nevada border.
Federal prosecutors have proposed three separate trials next year for the remaining 17 defendants charged in the April 2014 Bunkerville standoff.
Bunkerville rancher Cliven Bundy is suing Democratic congressional candidate Ruben Kihuen over political attack ads that try to tie Bundy’s 2014 dispute with federal agents to the shooting deaths of two police officers later that year.
Federal prosecutors confirmed late Wednesday that undercover FBI agents posed as a documentary film crew to gather evidence during their investigation of the April 2014 standoff near Bunkerville.
Brothers will stand trial along with father Cliven and two siblings over April 2014 showdown with federal agents who seized family’s cattle.
Gerald DeLemus, 61, pleaded guilty in August to conspiracy and extortion charges in the Bunkerville standoff case involving the Bundy family.
Jubilation was in the air Friday at Cliven Bundy’s ranch, with family members of the imprisoned patriarch calling the acquittal of two of his sons for seizing a national wildlife refuge in Oregon a “vindication” of the family’s long-running feud with the federal government.
A federal appeals panel Friday refused to allow conservative lawyer Larry Klayman to join Cliven Bundy’s defense team in the Bunkerville standoff case.
Both also express disappointment with acquittal of armed group that seized a national wildlife refuge in Oregon to protest incarceration of local ranchers.