Hatewatch Tweets
Hatewatch is managed by the staff of the Intelligence Report, an investigative magazine published by the Alabama-based civil rights group Southern Poverty Law Center.
Search Continues for Ex-Marine Tied to Oath Keepers
Charles Dyer is something of problem for the Oath Keepers, a group that started three years ago to encourage police officers and military personnel to disobey unconstitutional orders. A veteran Marine with time served in Iraq, he might have seemed to be a model of the kind of person the group wants to attract.
But then the self-described Oath Keepers member went on the lam in Oklahoma to avoid trial on charges that he raped a child. He issued threatening, conspiracy-theorizing communiqués that left no room for doubt as to his intentions were police to catch up with him.
“I have been pushed to the limits by law enforcement and the judicial system in an attempt to cause me to take violent actions against them,” Dyer wrote in an E-mail to his family. “Our judicial system is nothing more than a system of liars and crooks working under the color of the law, where the rich go free and the poor are made to suffer injustice. … Something must be done to expose it.”
The search for Dyer began Monday after he failed to appear in court for a trial on charges that he raped and forcibly sodomized his 7-year-old daughter. (At the time of his arrest, he also was charged with possessing a grenade launcher stolen from the military in 2006; he was later acquitted of that charge.) His lawyer, his bail bondsman and his family have no idea where he’s gone. And in what has to be one of the more interesting twists to the search, last week police arrested Dyer’s girlfriend for suspected arson in burning down his house.
“This is a very desperate and dangerous individual who is heavily armed and needs to be found quickly,” Oklahoma’s Stephens County Sheriff Wayne McKinney said. “What concerns me is his ties with some of these very radical groups,” McKinney told Oklahoma City’s KFOR-TV.
The Oath Keepers has worked to put distance between itself and Dyer, with group founder Stewart Rhodes – a Yale Law School graduate and former aide to U.S. Rep. Ron Paul – insisting that Dyer was not a “dues-paying” member. And perhaps it wouldn’t be fair to tar the Oath Keepers with the unrelated crimes of one of its members — as a tendentious story in the conservative Human Events magazine claimed earlier this week — if he was the only case in question. But there are a number of others that cast doubt on Rhodes’ oft-repeated claim that his group is nothing more than a batch of perfectly sober and reasonable defenders of the Constitution.
In April 2010, Matthew Fairfield, who was described by a prosecutor as the president of an Oath Keepers chapter in Ohio, was jailed on 54 counts related to allegations he stored a live napalm bomb at his home, along with other explosives kept at a friend’s home. That same month, a man driving a pickup ornamented with Oath Keepers logos was arrested in Tennessee for plotting to “arrest” two local officials with whom he didn’t agree – a method historically employed by many in the antigovernment “sovereign citizens” movement.
The Stephens County Sheriff’s Department has said the search for Dyer will continue, and law enforcement officers have been told to consider Dyer well armed and extremely dangerous. The tone of that final E-mail Dyer sent to his parents suggests that warning might be more than over-cautious police work. “If you do not hear from me within 90 days,” Dyer wrote in his final caustic lines, “then I am dead and I have failed you.”
on August 17th, 2011 at 3:38 pm
“Our judicial system is nothing more than a system of liars and crooks working under the color of the law, where the rich go free and the poor are made to suffer injustice. … Something must be done to expose it.”
Dyer sounds like Che Guevara. Oh, the irony.
on August 17th, 2011 at 5:41 pm
Charles Dyer was never a member of Oath Keepers. In a video recorded @ the first gathering of Oath Keepers, video taped in Stowe, MA on April 19th 2009, Charles identified himself as an “oath keeper” and at the time, there was no formalized paid membership. That was not available until some months after the April 19th Gathering on the Green. Any and all reference to Charles was removed from the official Oath Keepers website at Charles’ request. He did not want to see Oath Keepers suffer at the hands of either the ill-informed or the ill-intended.
on August 17th, 2011 at 5:42 pm
Here’s something to which your readers might wish to listen carefully : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....r_embedded
on August 18th, 2011 at 2:51 am
The video presents no evidence, only the claims of that idiot.
on August 18th, 2011 at 2:30 pm
Two Other examples is all you can come up with?..Oh come on….three doesnt make a nationwide conspiracy….be fair at least folks
on August 18th, 2011 at 2:44 pm
Allan, you’re straight up lying when you say that Dyer was never an Oath Keeper. Stewart Rhodes, the founder of Oath Keepers, knew Dyer personally, gave his blessing to have Dyer represent the Oath Keepers at Tea Party rallies, and Rhodes had previously insisted—to Lou Dobbs and anyone else who would listen—that you didn’t need to pay dues to be a member.
Oath Keepers has since changed their membership to a paid status, but Dyer was certainly an early Oath Keeper.
on August 18th, 2011 at 3:29 pm
Allan Smith – So Dyer was present at the founding of Oath Keepers, identified himself as a member, but isn’t really a member because he hasn’t paid his “dues.” Oh sure, the fact that he is an accused child raper has nothing to do with your nitpicking denial, right?
As for that silly video, about 99% of criminals claim they are innocent and being framed. Does Dyer have any evidence at all to support his claims? DNA?
Somehow I doubt it.
on August 18th, 2011 at 4:09 pm
Charles Dyer is an innocent man. But they do not give you that option in the court room do they. THE DNA EVIDENCE DOESN’T MATCH.So there is your “conspiracy: FACT stuff that in your pipe and smoke it.
.
on August 18th, 2011 at 4:39 pm
This is one that will not end good. Keep your eyes open with this individual, he is one of the truly bad apples of society from this area, and will hurt someone before we get him ‘Put up.” My prayers are with law enforcement as we try to get him up before he hurts more innocent people.
on August 18th, 2011 at 6:44 pm
Ruslan you are right another idiot……
on August 19th, 2011 at 7:58 am
“Charles Dyer is an innocent man. But they do not give you that option in the court room do they.”
Yes they do, it’s called pleading not guilty.
“THE DNA EVIDENCE DOESN’T MATCH.So there is your “conspiracy: FACT stuff that in your pipe and smoke it.”
Court records, or some verifiable source please.
With all the right-wing nuts cowardly waving their guns in front of web-cams and threatening to overthrow the government, you have to ask why did they choose this one to “railroad” if he’s innocent. Why not just go after as many of these guys as they can at one time? Why run if you’re innocent.
on August 21st, 2011 at 4:41 pm
Hiding in plain sight has become the radical rights’ trademark in the Stevens County, Washington area. Unsuccessful Stevens County Sheriff’s candidate Russell Bolton, was publicly supported last year in Chewelah, with a special appearance by former sheriff Richard Mack. Russell Bolton graduated from Princeton High School in Princeton, North Carolina, served 8 years in the U.S Marine Corps to include Desert Storm, and was invited by Dr. Arthur Houk (509) 684-3983 of the Arden Faith Baptist Church, just south of Colville, to come out West and join his flock. Russell Bolton is now Chairman of the Stevens County Assembly stevenscountyassembly.com, an OathKeepers Website, designed by an OathKeeper from Chewelah. The Website advertises itself as the “spirit and voice of Stevens County” and believes in an organic Constitution.
Charles Dyer is on the run. Russell Bolton ran and lost and is organizing for his next run, for sheriff… next fall.
Our area hasn’t missed the Prophet Pete Peters and his performances at the Arden Community Hall. Just to the west from the hall, across Highway 395, and up the hill behind the sawmill – is the Arden Faith Baptist Church that Russell Bolton and his family attend. Coincidentally, the vehicles present for the now deceased Prophet, are now appearing up the hill at Dr. Houks’ church…I suppose that is what I mean by “hiding in plain sight.”
Jim
Colville
on August 24th, 2011 at 3:52 pm
Is this article about Charles Dyer, or the oath keepers?
Does SPLC hold itself accountable to the U.S. Constitution?
Have the oath keepers been pressed for comment on this issue? Looks like they have, later in the article.
Are they distancing themselves from Mr. Dyer?
Yes.
Mr. Dyer’s rant sounds like something from the political left rather than right.
How many child rapes occured today? How many were from oath keeper non members?
Ties with radical groups,,,, do you really think oath keepers are telling Mr. Dyer to rape and sodomize his daughter?
Desperate and dangerous individual….. absolutely.
Nice….. you’ve connected the dots..Dyer is connected to oath keepers. Oath keepers are connected to a guy from Yale who is connected to Ron Paul.
This is the part where Glenn Beck connects Ron Paul to spooky dude. It all makes sense now.
Now a segway to napalm bombs. Nice.
Next? A connection to sovereign citizens.
Well done.
The circle is complete.
And they would have gotten away with it too if it weren’t for those pesky kids at SPLC.