'Violent' Cliven Bundy, who turned cattle 'mean,' kept in jail

Phil Taylor, E&E reporter

    Cliven Bundy was a lawless sham of a rancher who would be a threat to police and the public if released from custody, federal prosecutors successfully argued yesterday to a district judge who ordered the prisoner to remain behind bars.
    The U.S. attorneys in Oregon and Nevada accused Bundy, 69, of mustering more than 60 firearms to intimidate federal law enforcement officers during the Bureau of Land Management's April 2014 roundup of his cattle, "nearly causing catastrophic loss of life or injury to others."
    "Bundy is lawless and violent," the prosecutors wrote in a memo. "He does not recognize federal courts -- claiming they are illegitimate -- does not recognize federal law, refuses to obey federal court orders [and] has already used force and violence against federal law enforcement officers while they were enforcing federal court orders."
    In addition to detailing a long list of threats and illegal actions, the memo challenges Bundy's "claims he is a cattle rancher."
    "His ranching operation -- to the extent it can be called that -- is unconventional if not bizarre," it says. "Bereft of human interaction, his cattle that manage to survive are wild, mean and ornery." 
    U.S. Magistrate Judge Janice Stewart ordered that the Nevadan be kept behind bars until his trial. No conditions of release would ensure the public's safety or that Bundy would reappear in court, given that he had already ignored four previous court orders, ruled Stewart of the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon.
...The prosecutors' 34-page memo says Bundy has "declared a personal war" against the federal government. It contains a long list of alleged threats Bundy, his family and his followers made to federal agents and members of the public.
    Namely, "Bundy organized and led over 400 followers to assault the BLM officers as they guarded the Impoundment Site, all for the purpose of getting his cattle back."
    Officers guarding the site that day feared for their lives, the memo says. Some were combat veterans who remain "profoundly affected emotionally."
    Bundy's armed posse was organized and trained, the memo alleges.
    He recruited gunmen from more than 10 states to thwart the cattle roundup. Once they arrived, Bundy's "conspirators" grouped them into camps, armed patrols and security checkpoints, the memo says...
   ...The memo calls into question Cliven Bundy's qualifications as a cattle grazer.
    Unlike most ranchers, Bundy lets his cows run wild, does not vaccinate or treat them for disease, does not manage breeding or take them off the lands to feed them in the off-season, and generally has "no knowledge" of where they're roaming at any given time, the memo says.
    He also has to "bait them into traps in order to gather them," it says.

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