SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, July 6, 2016 (Gephardt Daily) — William Keebler, the Utah militia leader charged with the attempted bombing of a remote Bureau of Land Management facility in northern Arizona, pleaded not guilty Wednesday in federal court.
Keebler, 57, entered the plea as he stood handcuffed and shackled before Magistrate Judge Paul Warner in Salt Lake City’s U.S. District Court.
Warner scheduled Keebler’s trial for Sept. 12, 2016 at 8:30 a.m. before U.S. District Judge David Sam, but said he doubted the trial would actually start on that date based on the massive volume of discovery facing attorneys on both sides.
The self-appointed militia leader has been charged with two felonies, including one count of attempting to damage federal property by use an explosive device and one count of carrying a weapon in the commission of a violent act.
The weapons charge alone could land Keebler a life sentence, although Judge Warner told the defendant maximum sentences are seldom imposed.
Each charge carries a minimum five-year sentence, and prosecutors said they would run consecutively.
According to the original probable cause statement, Keebler, a resident of Stockton, Utah, was arrested just hours after he attempted to trigger what he thought was an explosive device placed at the door of a BLM cabin in Mount Trumball, Arizona.
Charging documents reveal the bomb was a dummy, built and planted by undercover FBI agents who had infiltrated Keebler’s militia group.
Prosecutors said Keebler is the commander of the Patriots Defense Force (PDF) headquartered in Stockton in Tooele County. They claim he and members of his small militia group had been actively plotting to bomb BLM facilities, including an office at the Gateway Mall in downtown Salt Lake City.
Keebler is also alleged to have scouted a mosque in the Salt Lake City area.
An allegation in the original probable cause claimed Arizona rancher Robert “LaVoy” Finicum had joined Keebler on an October 2015 reconnaissance mission of the Mount Trumbull facility. The FBI amended that statement during last week’s detention hearing, saying Finicum was attending a rodeo that day.
Keebler appeared rested and alert as he sat crouched next to his defense attorney, Lynn Donaldson. The two spoke in hushed tones while a handful of supporters offered silent waves and quiet whispers of support.
Keebler failed in a bid to be released pending trial late last week when Magistrate Judge Dustin B. Pread ruled in a detention hearing the militia man was a flight risk and a “danger to the community at large.”
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