FBI Induces Paranoid Schizophrenic to Participate in Bombing Plot with Help of Paid Informant

Illustration by Edwin D. Babbitt.

“And how do I know this? I have lived it. I have an immediate family member with the same diagnosis.” Gretchen Mullen, Skeptic Review

 

Before I discuss the details of the case, here’s a statement from the parents of Jerry Drake Varnell, 23, of Sayre, Oklahoma. Varnell was arrested in August of 2017 for trying to detonate what he thought was a vehicle bomb at a downtown Oklahoma City bank.

Family statement, published August 16, 2017 by NewsOk.

“We as a family are extremely distraught about this situation with our son Jerry Drake Varnell, but what the public must understand is that he is a paranoid schizophrenic and is extremely susceptible to different types of ideology that normal people would deem immoral. Underneath his condition, he is a sweet-hearted person and we are extremely shocked that this event has happened. However, what truly has us flabbergasted is the fact that the FBI knew he was schizophrenic. The State of Oklahoma found him mentally incompetent and we, his parents have legal guardianship over him by the Court. These documents are sealed from the public, which is why no news media outlet has been able to obtain them. The FBI clearly knew that he was schizophrenic because they have gathered every ounce of information on him. Reading the criminal complaint against him has brought us great pause due to the numerous lies from the informant. We do not have an underground bunker! We built our home a few years ago and bought a storage container, as we use it for a storm shelter. We only recently pushed dirt up around it to make it safe. The building is used for storage and is NOT a bunker full of food and supplies, in fact the doors close from the outside. It has neither electricity nor anything that would make it habitable.

What the public should be looking at is the fact that the FBI gave our son the means to make this happen. He has no job, no money, no vehicle, and no driver’s license, due to the fact that he is schizophrenic and we; his parents do everything we can possible to keep him safe and functional. The mental health system has consistently failed us due to the lack of establishments and health care coverage for a person like him. He has attended college and just enrolled in welding school. His medications allow him to be somewhat functional but he will never be completely functional in life. His brain does not work like a normal person and never will due to the nature of his mental illness. He has suffered through countless serious full-blown schizophrenic delusional episodes and he has been put in numerous mental hospitals since he was 16 years old. The FBI came and picked him up from our home, they gave him a vehicle, gave him a fake bomb, and every means to make this happen none of which he had access to on his own. We know who their informant is and what the public should know is that he is that a drug-dealing criminal. On June 15, 2017, Jerry’s Father told the criminal informant “that he was not allowed back on our property and if he returned we would have him arrested for trespassing and drugs”.  Apparently, he continued to sneak onto our residence. The FBI paid him to continue this operation and I believe they have cleared his criminal record.

The FBI should have filed conspiracy on our son and had him committed to a mental institution. They should not have aided and abetted a paranoid schizophrenic to commit this act. There are many more facts that I will not make public that will support my son and the disturbing acts made by the FBI.

I realize that many will say my son could have found another person to commit this act. Yet, any person that has access to the materials and the state of mind necessary to bomb a building would not have any need for a schizophrenic who has no resources to contribute. Schizophrenics always have conspiracy theories and feels everyone is out to get them. They trust no one and there is no doubt in my mind that this informant began this hate against the government and my son followed along because others easily influence him. There is no person in his life that has even heard anything about hatred for the government and we have all been shocked by the event.

We ask all news media outlets to please respect our privacy. Do not fly helicopters over our home and stalk us at our gates for a story, we are trying our very best to comfort each other because this is a devastating loss for our family. We do not need to be bombarded by reporters who only want to omit important facts of this event. We understand the public wants to know how this could possibly happen. We simply ask them to look at the facts of the case and ask why the FBI made this happen. He is our son and he is a brother and loved one no matter what he has done. We have unconditional love for him, we are heart broken by this event and wish we had been made aware by the FBI, and we would have committed him into a mental institution for help.”

Sincerely,

Clifford and Melonie Varnell

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And here is what was released by the Department of Justice, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Western District of Oklahoma, on Monday, August 14, 2017. Note that there is not a single reference to Varnell’s extreme mental illness nor his suggestibility or delusions about government persecution so common among paranoid schizophrenics.

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma — Jerry Drake Varnell, 23, of Sayre, Oklahoma, was arrested in connection with a plot to detonate a vehicle bomb at BancFirst, 101 N. Broadway, in downtown Oklahoma City, announced Mark A. Yancey, United States Attorney for the Western District of Oklahoma.

According to a criminal complaint filed in the Western District of Oklahoma, the FBI arrested Varnell at approximately 1:00 am on August 12, 2017, after he attempted to detonate what he believed to be an explosives-laden van he had parked in an alley next to BancFirst. The complaint alleges that Varnell initially wanted to blow up the Federal Reserve Building in Washington, D.C., with a device similar to the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing because he was upset with the government.

The complaint explains that after Varnell’s intentions came to the attention of law enforcement, an undercover FBI agent posed as a person who could assist him. According to the complaint, Varnell took a series of actions to advance his plot. He identified BancFirst as the target, prepared a statement to be posted on social media after the explosion, helped assemble the device, helped load it into what he believed was a stolen van, drove the van by himself from El Reno to BancFirst in downtown Oklahoma City, and dialed a number on a cellular telephone that he believed would trigger the explosion.

Varnell is charged with attempting to use explosives to destroy a building in interstate commerce. If convicted, he would face a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a mandatory minimum sentence of five years’ imprisonment. He is expected to make his initial appearance in federal court in Oklahoma City today at 3:00 pm.

This arrest is the culmination of a long-term domestic terrorism investigation involving an undercover operation, during which Varnell had been monitored closely for months as the alleged bomb plot developed. The device was actually inert, and the public was not in danger. “There was never a concern that our community’s safety or security was at risk during this investigation,” said Kathryn Peterson, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI in Oklahoma. “I can assure the public, without hesitation, that we had Varnell’s actions monitored every step of the way.”

U.S. Attorney Yancey said: “I commend the devoted work of the FBI and our state law enforcement partners in ensuring that violent plots of this kind never succeed.”

The investigation was conducted by the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force, including members from the Oklahoma City FBI; Homeland Security Investigations, part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security; the Oklahoma City Police Department; the Edmond Police Department; the Oklahoma Highway Patrol; the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs; and the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. The FBI worked in conjunction with BancFirst during the investigation. Oklahoma District Attorney Angela Marsee, of District 2, also provided assistance. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Matt Dillon, with assistance from the Justice Department’s Counterterrorism Section.

Reference is made to court records for further information. The public is reminded that this complaint is only an allegation and that Varnell is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

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A look at the criminal complaint tells a much different story. The FBI employed a paid confidential informant who was incarcerated and wanted to make a deal to get out of prison. The complaint conveniently skips over who actually initiated the plot, relying only on a tip from a CI wanting to get out of prison. It leaves open the question of whether the CI may have planted the idea in Varnell’s head to begin with.

In addition, the complaint shows time and time again that Varnell had to be provided with the means necessary to carry out this “plot.” He had no vehicle, he had no money to purchase explosives, no particular plan. He was spurred on by the constant contact he received from the CI and later an undercover FBI agent posing as the person who could obtain the explosives.

Paranoid schizophrenics often fear authority, particularly the government, feeling that these entities may be responsible for inserting thoughts into their heads. They are also lonely, craving friendship, which this CI certainly provided. Some suffer from a disordered pattern of thinking which makes pulling together such a complex plot almost impossible. In this case, Varnell was often contacted and had made no progress on the plot, so the CI and FBI agent would do it for him and then invite him along to “help.”

And how do I know this? I have lived it. I have an immediate family member with the same diagnosis. The toll on the family is unbelievable. To think that these parents have lived with the burden of serving as guardians, seeing to his care, involuntarily committing him if necessary… these are hard tasks. And to think that the FBI comes along and creates a scenario that was unlikely to occur without the set-up and support seems to be a criminal act in itself.

Full complaint:

https://jnslp.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/varnell-complaint.pdf

 

645. Entrapment—Elements/Department of Justice

Entrapment is a complete defense to a criminal charge, on the theory that “Government agents may not originate a criminal design, implant in an innocent person’s mind the disposition to commit a criminal act, and then induce commission of the crime so that the Government may prosecute.” Jacobson v. United States, 503 U.S. 540, 548 (1992). A valid entrapment defense has two related elements: (1) government inducement of the crime, and (2) the defendant’s lack of predisposition to engage in the criminal conduct. Mathews v. United States, 485 U.S. 58, 63 (1988). Of the two elements, predisposition is by far the more important.

Inducement is the threshold issue in the entrapment defense. Mere solicitation to commit a crime is not inducement. Sorrells v. United States, 287 U.S. 435, 451 (1932). Nor does the government’s use of artifice, stratagem, pretense, or deceit establish inducement. Id. at 441. Rather, inducement requires a showing of at least persuasion or mild coercion, United States v. Nations, 764 F.2d 1073, 1080 (5th Cir. 1985); pleas based on need, sympathy, or friendship, ibid.; or extraordinary promises of the sort “that would blind the ordinary person to his legal duties,” United States v. Evans, 924 F.2d 714, 717 (7th Cir. 1991). See also United States v. Kelly, 748 F.2d 691, 698 (D.C. Cir. 1984) (inducement shown only if government’s behavior was such that “a law-abiding citizen’s will to obey the law could have been overborne”); United States v. Johnson, 872 F.2d 612, 620 (5th Cir. 1989) (inducement shown if government created “a substantial risk that an offense would be committed by a person other than one ready to commit it”).

Even if inducement has been shown, a finding of predisposition is fatal to an entrapment defense. The predisposition inquiry focuses upon whether the defendant “was an unwary innocent or, instead, an unwary criminal who readily availed himself of the opportunity to perpetrate the crime.” Mathews, 485 U.S. at 63. Thus, predisposition should not be confused with intent or mens rea: a person may have the requisite intent to commit the crime, yet be entrapped. Also, predisposition may exist even in the absence of prior criminal involvement: “the ready commission of the criminal act,” such as where a defendant promptly accepts an undercover agent’s offer of an opportunity to buy or sell drugs, may itself establish predisposition. Jacobson, 503 U.S. at 550.

[cited in USAM 9-18.000]