BURNS, Ore. — Authorities have arrested Ammon Bundy, the leader of a group of protesters holed up at a federal wildlife refuge in Oregon for more than three weeks, according to authorities.
The FBI and Oregon State Police moved in to arrest members of the armed group about 4:25 p.m. PT Tuesday along Highway 395. Shots were fired and one individual "who was a subject of a federal probable cause arrest is deceased," said a joint FBI-OSP release. No other information about the deceased was immediately released.
Bundy Ranch, on its Facebook page, said in a post Tuesday evening that Arizona resident Robert "Levoy" Finicum, author of the novel Only by Blood and Suffering, was shot and killed during the encounter.
Another person received non-life threatening injuries and was taken to a local hospital. He was subsequently arrested and taken into custody.
Those arrested in the initial event were:
• Ammon Edward Bundy, 40, of Emmett, Idaho
• Ryan C. Bundy, 43, of Bunkerville, Nev.
• Brian Cavalier, 44, of Bunkerville, Nev.
• Shawna Cox, 59, Kanab, Utah
• Ryan Waylen Payne, 32, of Anaconda, Mont.
• Ammon Edward Bundy, 40, of Emmett, Idaho
• Ryan C. Bundy, 43, of Bunkerville, Nev.
• Brian Cavalier, 44, of Bunkerville, Nev.
• Shawna Cox, 59, Kanab, Utah
• Ryan Waylen Payne, 32, of Anaconda, Mont.
Also arrested, in Burns, at about 5:50 p.m., was:
• Joseph Donald O'Shaughnessy, age 45, Cottonwood, Ariz.
• Joseph Donald O'Shaughnessy, age 45, Cottonwood, Ariz.
Officials said all six of those arrested face a federal felony charge of conspiracy to impede officers of the United States from discharging their official duties through the use of force, intimidation, or threats, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 372.
Bundy, head of an anti-government group, had been holed up at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge since Jan. 2, when he and followers seized its headquarters south of Burns as part of a long-running dispute over public land use in the West.
Bundy is the son of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, who was involved in a high-profile 2014 standoff with the government over grazing rights.
Later Tuesday the FBI announced two other arrests resulting in the confrontation, bringing the total number of those arrested to eight.
The FBI said 50-year-old Peter Santilli of Cincinnati was arrested at 6:30 p.m. in Burns.
And at 8:30 p.m. the FBI's Phoenix Division made a probable cause arrest of Jon Eric Ritzheimer, 32, who turned himself into the Peoria, Ariz., police department.
Santilli, who hosts The Pete Santilli Show, a neoconservative online radio show, says he embedded himself with the group in late December and had served as a spokesman for the armed ranchers.
Earlier this month, Santilli told the Cincinnati Enquirer that he did not participate in the takeover of the cluster of small buildings in the high desert of eastern Oregon, "because that is an illegal action."
"I'm here as an independent media journalist, coordinating major international media coverage of this event," he said.
The Oregon situation began when Dwight Hammond, 73, and Steven Hammond, 46, lit fires on federal land in 2001 and 2006 to reduce the growth of plants and protect their property from wildfires. The father-son pair were convicted three years ago and served time — Dwight Hammond three months, Steven Hammond one year.
In October, a federal judge in Oregon ruled the Hammonds' prison terms were too short under U.S. law and ordered them back to jail for roughly four years each.
Santilli said he was chosen as a spokesman because he took part in Cliven Bundy's defiance of federal court orders related to his cattle grazing illegally on federal lands since the 1990s.
"I do not speak directly for the Bundy family, but I do speak on behalf of their constitutional issues," Santilli said, who did interviews with MSNBC, Al Jazeera, Reuters and Fox News as a spokesman.
"My role is the same here that it was at the Bundy ranch, to talk about the constitutional implications of what is going on here," Santilli said. "The Constitution cannot be negotiated."
Two militia members playing key roles in the siege of an Oregon wildlife refuge say Arizona officials took children out of their homes as part of a campaign to pressure them into surrender.
Finicum and Blaine Cooper, two of the more outspoken members of the anti-government occupation, said federal authorities pressured Arizona child-welfare officials to retaliate against them days after the siege began.
Interviews and research by The Arizona Republic indicate a court case was filed against Finicum. Court and Arizona Department of Child Safety officials, however, would not provide details of any such case, saying the law prevents disclosure of information.
"Any decision regarding a child in care is made solely on the basis of what is in the child's best interest and is always done in consultation with the Attorney General's Office and the courts," DCS spokesman Doug Nick said. "Confidentiality would prevent me from saying more."
Non-profit tax records show that before joining the standoff, Finicum collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in state subsidies caring for foster children at his former ranch in Paulden and his new one near Colorado City.
On social media accounts and in multiple interviews, Finicum and Cooper accused the state of kidnapping children at the behest of the federal government.
Contributing: (Salem, Ore.) Statesman Journal , The Cincinnati Enquirer, The Arizona Republic and The Associated Press.
