LAURA ELLERTSO
Although Utah has a reputation for being sheltered, it seems the problem of terrorism may run as rampant in “the Beehive State” as it does in many other states.
Mark Vincent, special assistant United States attorney, said terrorism is on the rise in Utah. He didn’t remember prosecuting anything involving local militia groups in Utah, but he contends that several other groups are out there.
Carl Yaeger, a professor of political science at UVSC and a recognized terrorism expert, thinks that in Utah people are out of the mainstream of terrorism. However, Yaeger has strong feelings about what about what might attract terrorism to Utah.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a worldwide church, which makes its headquarters a plausible target. Yaeger said he knows the church is concerned about terrorist acts against church authorities.
“There are many LDS dissident groups that think the church has gone into apostasy,” Yaeger said. Groups based on the Islamic faith believe that anyone who claims to be a spokesman of God after Mohammed should have a holy war waged against them.
There is an environmentalist group in Utah called Earth First that is prominent. So is People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. The Aryan Nations group is reported to have active cells in Utah.
The Posse Comitatus is a prominent anti-tax group in Utah that feels that income and state taxes are unconstitutional. The Posse Comitatus does not support government above the county level.
Members are often recognizable because they don’t put license plates on their cars, they don’t register their vehicles, and many don’t have valid driver licenses.
“They seem to have a death wish,” Yaeger said. Many of them would like to be martyrs for their cause.
Another type of terrorism that is on the rise in Utah is Narco-terrorism. Yaeger said Utah is a conduit for a lot of drugs, and those people involved are willing to defend their “stash” with violence.
“With a lot of these groups, their rhetoric is very violent, but their actions don’t match it,” Yaeger said.
Yaeger said he believed that if a terrorist decided to strike in Utah, there are a lot of natural targets for terrorism to choose from. There are a lot of natural gas pipelines, power lines and transformers.
“Utah is vulnerable because of its centralized technology,” Yaeger said.
Yaegar and Vincent believe that gangs are causing problems for Utah and may fall under the classification of terrorism.
“The biggest cases of terrorism the community faces are gangs. They are real, they exist, and people can see them,” Vincent said. “Gangs are infiltrating and are in some aspects taking over our community.”
Yaegar said the acts of gangs in areas like Los Angeles are escalating from the use of automatic weapons to bombs.
In 1988, Vickie Singer and Addam Swapp were involved in a 13-day standoff with police at their home in Marion, Utah after they had bombed an LDS stake center in Kamas. A note that was found at the bomb scene declared war against the government for persecution of their family.
According to Vincent, Singer and Swapp had religious motives, animal rights groups have their motives, and gangs just have a myriad of motives.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms reports that there are acts of terrorism that have been committed as recently as two to three weeks ago in Utah.
The cases of various terrorist acts in Utah are numerous. Some, like the Unabomber, the Singer-Swapp standoff and the Alta View Hospital incident, have received much more media coverage than others, but Vincent said other local cases definitely exist.
Salt Lake City has seen a lot of vandalism activities, and not too long ago, some minks were released.
Last Easter an egg plant was burned.
A few years ago an animal rights group was responsible for the arson of an animal research laboratory at Utah State University. They also set many animals free.
In March 1994, a gunman entered the Salt Lake City Library and took hostages.
On Sept. 20, 1991, Richard L. Worthington entered Alta View Hospital in Sandy fully armed with two guns and a homemade bomb. He took eight hostages and killed a nurse in expression of his anger concerning a tubal ligation that was performed on his wife more than two years previously.
“We’ve been doing a lot in the past 18 months, mostly with counter-terrorism,” said Douglas Bodrero, commissioner of the Utah Department of Public Safety. Bodrero said they have been training those working in emergency management areas like firefighters and police officers.
It has been determined that the Unabomber has ties to Utah. Once Theodore John Kaczynski had been picked up for committing the acts attributed to the Unabomber, two Utahns told reporters that they recognized Kaczynski from the photographs on television.
One claimed to have seen Kaczynski in the last three or four years drinking coffee at a Hardee’s restaurant in downtown Salt Lake City.
