Sentenced to 35 years behind bars after trying to gun down six federal agents in 2019, an ex-member of a white separatist prison gang is appealing his case.
Patrick Elliott Pearson, 49, had been living a grubby existence inside a Mae Valley, Washington, trailer when Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents arrived to arrest him for his suspected role in a heroin and meth distribution ring.
Pearson contends he tried to scare off the agents by randomly blasting his shotgun before turning the weapon on himself, but neither the jury nor the federal judge believed him.
A jury convicted him on June 23, 2021, on four charges: conspiracy to distribute narcotics between 2015 and 2019; being a felon in possession of a firearm; assault with a deadly weapon on federal law enforcement; and discharge of a firearm during the commission of a crime.
On Dec. 13 in Spokane, US District Judge W. Fremming Nielsen sentenced Pearson to 420 months in prison.
In the court records and trial testimony, a picture of Pearson’s grubby existence as a bit player in a wider narcotics syndicate emerged. Initially hired as a mechanic in a used car business owned by Luis Farias-Cardenas, he eventually found himself doing odd jobs for his boss — mowing his grass, fetching his children from school, and occasionally helping move heroin and methamphetamines to dealers canvassing the Yakima area.
When agents opened Pearson’s wallet after his arrest, they found $60.
Although he drew the longest sentence of everyone in the trafficking network, Pearson never was the target of the US Drug Enforcement Administration and ATF in Grant County. Wiretaps and cooperating witnesses put Farias-Cardenas in the feds’ crosshairs.
Eventually, superseding indictments corralled 18 suspected members of the drug ring. Pearson drew the longest sentence in the gang. His boss, Farias-Cardenas, got eight years; Joshua Isaac “Heat” Stine, 20; Jesus Valencia-Morfin, 11; and Luis Manuel “Sin” Ramirez and Randall Curtis Gross, 10.
Three co-conspirators — Zacarias “Listo” Martinez-Garza, Noe Angel Gonzalez-Martinez, and Leonel Caballero — were sentenced to time served. Prosecutors dismissed two cases.
When the ATF’s elite Special Response Team arrived at the car repair shop on July 16, 2019, to nab Pearson, they were greeted with a shower of buckshot rounds blasting through the fiberglass walls of his trailer. He reloaded his Sun City Machinery Stevens 320 12-gauge pump-action shotgun and fired again.
Although he told Judge Nielsen he was “shooting blind,” Pearson could pinpoint where the lead needed to go, even while blasting through a trailer’s wall. Grant County Sheriff’s Office detectives found surveillance cameras rigged around the compound streaming footage into a high-definition television monitor inside the trailer.
Although Pearson never shot anyone, Grant County authorities determined that two agents were injured trying to arrest him. Because they didn’t know if anyone else was in the trailer, ATF agents returned fire with tear gas and less lethal — but very painful — SOC bean bag rounds before unleashing a police canine to force him out.
That’s when they discovered Pearson botched his own suicide. They airlifted him to a Spokane hospital in a helicopter.
“No one can be allowed to shoot at law enforcement,” said US Attorney Vanessa Waldref in a prepared statement released in the wake of the sentencing. “Numerous brave ATF agents went to Mr. Pearson’s trailer that morning to do their jobs by executing a lawful court order and serving a valid arrest warrant. Thanks to Mr. Pearson’s poor aim, this community has not had to endure the potential tragedy of fallen ATF officers.”
Pearson’s attorney, David R. Partovi, declined comment when contacted by Coffee or Die Magazine. Although he filed Pearson’s appeal on Dec. 13, Partovi requested to withdraw as his counsel nine days later and urged the Ninth Circuit’s justices to appoint a new attorney.
Pearson’s appellate brief is due on April 15, 2022. Federal prosecutors are slated to submit a response 21 days after that.
He remains incarcerated by Spokane County Detention Services on a federal hold by the US Marshals.
—
Original Article: Prison Time for Man Who Tried To Gun Down 6 Federal Agents (coffeeordie.com)
Discover more from Next Gen News
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
I don’t buy this guy’s claim that he never intended to hurt any of the ATF or anyone else who came to arrest him. A rigged camera system that fed into his trailer was enough to suggest that he KNEW that they would come for him…Keep him locked up! He’s lucky that he didn’t kill any of those ATF or he’d be facing the Death Penalty…
Word!
I would have to know a lot more than what any fake news is telling me ,the way these Federal fascist communist Nazis of this corrupt government act I’m sure they had it coming in some way ,a lot more this is going to happen as they suppress our freedoms and screw with decent people, they’re trying to put conservative people in jail so nothing but the communist scum like them can rule the Earth ,I would love to be a fly on the wall when these scumbags tried to violate this man civil rights and constitutional rights I believe zero to nothing what comes out of the mouth of this communist corrupt government ,especially with this fraudulently elected a hole in the White House who should be in a mental house instead.
I just thank God none of the agents were killed. I’m glad when people are taken off the street selling drugs to hurt innocent children. With the closed circuit camera he had I believe he was meaning to do harm to ATF besides he was a felon and should never had possession of any firearm! May God protect our law abiding citizens.